DISEASE AMONG SWINE AND OTHER DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 15 



prevailed among our horses a few years ago, but comparatively few cases proved fatal. 

 At that time warm stabling, light food, and exercise proved to be the most efficient 

 remedy. For a few years past I think heaves and other Inng complaints have prevailed 

 to a greater extent than fifteen years ago. A little lobelia, say a teaspoonful, once in 

 two or three days, together with straw and provender (oats and corn ground), seems 

 to be the most approved remedy. 



I lost a valuable mare last spring which appeared to have every symptom of pul- 

 monary consumption. She began with a sliglit hacking cough, which increased steadily 

 until April, when she died very much emaciated. No remedy seemed to even check 

 the disease or afford temporary relief. Such cases, however, are rare. 



It is very rarely that meat cattle are either afiected or die of disease here. On Thursday 

 I met with our Farmer's Club, and laid the subject of your circular before it. The tes- 

 timony of those present generally corresponded with what I have above stated. A few- 

 instances were reported of cattle'having what some called "dry murrain," or food drying 

 up in the first stomach. The following remedies have been used for this trouble with 

 success by difierent farmers: Linseed-oil; one pint of flax-seed boiled with three or 

 four quarts of water; saleratus and buttermilk; spirits of turpentine. 



A few flocks of sheep are aflected with " foot-rot" or " hoof-ail." Remedies are used 

 with success, which makes the damage to flocks comparatively small. 



The only cases of hog-cholera I have ever heard of were three or four years ago, and 

 occurred in a drove from the West, which were peddled out to the farmers and factories 

 in this locality. They evidently brought the disease with them. I heard of one man 

 who lost eleven headj and another one who lost two or three. No remedy was of any 

 benefit. The soil and climate of this county seem adapted to the healthfuluess of 

 hogs ; but too little com is raised to make hog-raising for market profitable. 



Dr. J. M. Johnson, Locksburg-, Sevier County, Arkansas, says: 



As a physician I have been engaged in the practice of medicine in all its branches 

 for the last twenty years. I have also had a farm, and have given a good deal of atten- 

 tion to stock-raising upon a small scale. As to the names given to the diseases aff"ect- 

 ing our farm-animals, they are generally so far established that, whether suitableor not, 

 it would be hard to change and eradicate them from the minds of the people. Horses, 

 cattle, and sheep here, according to my observation, are comparatively healthy, al- 

 though, like all mortal creatures, they are subject to disease and premature death. For 

 an animal occasionally to become diseased, sicken, and die is something we naturally ex- 

 pect ; but what alarms us most are the destructive epidemics which, for the past twenty 

 years, are existing somewhere at all times, killing our useful and indispensable animals, 

 as well as our much-relished and profitable fowls. Hogs and poultry here seem to 

 suffer most from the ravages of disease. 



Hog-cholera, meningitis or staggers, quinsy, and mange are by far the most common 

 diseases among swine. The symptoms of cholera are : The hog is obviously sick, mopes 

 about and lies down most of the time, occasionally vomits or tries to do so, eats but little 

 or none at all. In a day or two it will perhaps have superadded a profuse diarrhea. If 

 the disease runs a regular course the animal will continue to vomit and purge imtil 

 the alimentary canal is emptied of all its feculent or substantial contents, followed by 

 watery or serous and sometimes bloody operations, with cramping of the muscles and 

 particularly of the bowels. When all the above-described symptoms are seen the com- 

 plaint has reached its second stage, and is in its height or at its acme of apparent force. 

 Here, if it does not yield to the efforts of nature with the aid of remedies, the hog will 

 pass into the last or declining stage. If the disease yields, the animal will continue 

 warm and all the symptoms will begin to moderate. If not, it will go into collapse, 

 become cold, or nearly so, continue to strain and cramp and utter low grunts, and some- 

 times will even shriek with pain. The duration of the disease is a good deal owing 

 to its severity. Generally it lasts from one to four days. All cases that result in death 

 do not run the same course. Sometimes all of the above symptoms are not present. 

 Some epidemic symptoms are milder than others, but all seem to be malignant, for 

 nearly all the hogs die that take it if left alone. The same epidemic is not equally 

 severe in different cases. Sometimes the attack is so violent that the animal is in the 

 last stage from the outset, or it may die from nervous prostration with no reaction, 

 vomiting or purging. 



The diagnosis can easily be determined by the symptoms when they are all present, 

 especially if the hogs are in living order, and the weather is warm ; for, according to 

 my observation, the disease prevails almost entirely during the summer months. Of 

 the causes of the disease I can say but little, because they are not perfectly known ; 

 but we know that hog-cholera is epidemic, and that it is a poison, very irritating in 

 its action upon the stomach and bowels ; that it has a preference for localities, and 

 prevails moi-e generally upon the borders and in low bottoms than upon lands that 

 have been previously overflowed. That it is also contagions we have some good rea- 

 sons to believe. One thing I do positively know— that there are some powerful predis- 



