DISEASE AMONG SWINE AND OTHER DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 109 



who are able to buy good Texas or western beef will not buy it if they can get the 

 better. Some few steers eight years old or nioro make very fine beef late in the fall. 



A moment's glance at this manner of cattle-raising will convince yon of the severe 

 trials infants and children from one to three or four years old must undergo. Four 

 months of the year they have an abundance of milk, a food easily digested and an- 

 swering most oi' the demands of the animal economy. They use little else. Their 

 stomachs are fitted to its easy digestion. In an hour it is all taken from them, and the 

 most indigestible of all food for children is substituted. Now, new sweet-potatoes, 

 corn-bread, and pork or bacon is the food for their tender stomachs to digest. The 

 change is too great for their delicate organs of digestion. They feel a restless crav- 

 ing for something, and they eat whatever comes in their way— rags, jiaper, pine- 

 bark, rotten wood, and finally the clay with which their chimneys are daubed. 



Sheep in this section, like cattle, sufler from few diseases except such as are brought 

 on from neglect. The scab is a common disease among them, and so far as I know but 

 few attempts are made to cure it. It is also a very common disease among goats. 

 Sheep likewise suiier from rot. I have recently tested tobacco as a remedy for this 

 disease. Sheep eat it very readily when it is mixed with their food, and soon become 

 fond of it. If properly used, I think it will effect a cure. The range for sheep is much 

 better than it is for cattle, and they generally keep in good order most of the year. 



I have had a great deal of observation, but little experience, with the diseases of 

 hogs. During the war a good many hogs died of cholera, for which there was no 

 remedy. Copperas was used as a preventive with some success. Preventives I believe 

 to be the only safe policy. 



In conclusion, let me assure you that there is great room for improvement in agri- 

 culture in this section, and much can be done by your department if it is afforded the 

 necessary means. It is pleasant to witness your efforts to build up the substantial 

 interests of the nation, and your confidence in the prospective economy is not a vision. 



Dr. J. G. Hart, Murray, Calloway County, Kentucky, says : 



A disease uniformly fatal to horses has prevailed in this section for two years. It 

 appears to be propagated by actual contact with matter or virus, inasmuch as animals 

 kept separate though near the disease are not liable to take it. Some regard the dis- 

 ease as cold distemper, while others believe it to be glanders. The symptoms are about 

 as follows : At first fever, which is soon followed by a dry cough and a nasal dis- 

 charge resembling that from ordinary distemper. There is more or less enlargement 

 of all the glandular organs so far Ss can be observed. Constitutional disease soon sets 

 in, which is denoted by the change in the nasal discharge from a watery to a gleety 

 and offensive flow. The animal loses flesh rapidly; the skin soon becomes thick and 

 eruptive; the lymphatic glands throughout the body become much enlarged, but never 

 soften or suppurate ; the submaxillary and sublingual glands are most especially in- 

 volved, at least in most cases to the extent of suppuration and softening. The dura- 

 tion of the disease is from two to twelve months. It is invariably fatal. Quite a 

 number of remedies have been used, but without success. Veterinary surgeons have 

 been employed with like ill success. 



Hog-cholera, with its usual symptoms, has prevailed to a considerable extent in this 

 locality. The only remedies that have been used with any degree of success are 

 hygienic. If the animals are confined in a dry lot when the disease makes its appear- 

 ance, the mortality will be very small. Driukmg cold water appears to Be the imme- 

 diate cause of death in a majority of cases. 



A disease called by some hog-measles prevailed here as an epidemic from June until 

 October of this year. The disease is characterized by a high grade of fever for two or 

 three days, which is followed by an eruption about the head, neck, and shoulders, and 

 in some cases of the entire body. This lasts three or four days, when the auimal either 

 begins to recover or dies. Salphur and poke-root have been used with apparent good 

 success. Hogs should be confiued to prevent them from drinking too much. The 

 fatality corresponds with the character of the epidemic as to mildness or malignancy. 



A disease called chicken-cholera has also prevailed quite extensively. By commenc- 

 ing early I used carbolic acid with good success for two years, but it has signally 

 failed J;his year. Confinement in coops elevated above the ground, with little or no 

 water to drink, would seem to be the surest remedy. 



Mr. H. P. Jordan, Victoria, Victoria County, Texas, says : 



Native cattle are free from disease and comparatively healthy, but I think fully one- 

 third and perhaps one-half of all the Durham cattle imported into this section of the 

 State have died during the past two years from what people are pleased to term accli- 

 mating fever. The disease appears to be similar to that which afflicts the cattle in 

 Missouri and Kansas, and which is supposed to be imparted to them by the native cat- 

 tle of this State. I think all cattle brought here have this disease sooner or later. The 



