ma 



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ROT. 109 



man, that is to say, every animal possessed of iUngs, is 

 bie to rot. Tiie inelegance of the term might be 

 verlooke;!, provided a precise meaning were attached 

 to it. Every one, however, seems to place some peca- 

 T signification, and to hang some favourite theory, 

 on it, so that little wonder need be expressed either 

 at the varying tenor of the treatment, or at the unsa- 

 tisfactory conclusions which have been drawn regarding 

 it. The word " rot" when employed in speaking of 

 man, implies what, in popular language, is called "con- 

 sumption," and is applied to that disease only when it 

 affects the lungs. Thus the fork-grinders of Sheffield, 

 who, from the nature of their employment, are much 

 exposed to the exciting causes of consumption, and 

 who, at an early age, fall victims to it, are said, by the 

 people of that town, to die of rot. The term, however, 

 far as it has yet been used in relation to the sheen 

 as figured as the representative of a host of diseases, 

 and, in becoming standard from frequent usage, has 

 only rendered confusion worse confounded. '* Hot,*' 

 says the late Professor Coventry, in his Introductory 

 iscourses, *' is a word which has been employed to 

 press a variety of disorders affecting this animal, with 

 no small confusion and detriment. Indeed, in few in- 

 stances has senseless indiscrimination done more mis- 

 chief; for means inapt and injurious have been had 

 recourse to, where skilful and timely interference would 

 have had the happiest effects. Sheep are sometimes 

 said to have the rot, when they labour under phthisis 

 pulmonalis (consumption of the lungs), which they do 

 but rarely ; or under disorders of the liver, as hepatitis 

 chronica, and that state of the same organ produced, 



