REAL CAUSES OF ROT. 



215 



iC 



^he previous suamier, may seem to controvert what I 

 ive above slated, as to time and frequent change of 

 isture often intervening between the origin of the dis- 

 ease, and its termination ; but when it is recollected 

 that he pursued the destructive system of breeding in 

 and in, of itself sufficient to induce a tuberculous pre- 

 disposition, the reader will perceive that his sheep 

 '^ere, in all likelihood, more or less tainted, and there- 

 re, sure to fall victims to the disease the moment 

 ley were subjected to the deleterious influence of an 

 unwholesome pasture.* 



Over-driving and hurrying of every kind, is, hi my 

 opinion, a fruhful source of rot, not only from the 

 fatigue it causes, or the risk it leads to of taking cold, 



I^^ut also from the injury, which in many cases results, 

 ^■> the delicate texture of the lungs. As shown in the 

 ^Hote to paragraph (157), no animal is more easily put out 

 ^Bf breath by running, than the sheep. Whenever the 

 breathing is hurried, the circulation through the lungs is 

 quickened also. If the tissue of the lungs be in any 

 way delicate, the force with which the blood is propell- 

 ed is sure to make it yield, and in this manner the 

 animal is often suffocated by the large quantity of 

 blood, which issues into the air tubes at once from many 

 points. Fig. 1, Plate VI. exhibits a good illustration 

 of this taken from a sheep. Numerous red points are 

 seen sprinkled over the surface of the section, indi- 

 cating that blood has been effused from many minute 



* When parcels of Mr Bakewell's best sheep became, from any defect, 

 unserviceable to him, he used to fatten them for the butcher. But as 

 there was a probability of their becoming valuable in other hando, ba 

 always gave them the rot before he sold them ! An example, which, I 

 hope, f<ir the sake both of man and shoep, never to see followed. 



