144 DISEASE AMONG SWINE AND OTHER DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 



and but for the comparative scarcity of hoga in this rogion, would have proved much 

 more disastrous. Reports from diflereut counties in Illinois show the present season 

 as almost equally pestiferous, and doubtless in the absence of preventive measures 

 similar ravages will recur at frequent intervals, whereas the merest fraction of the 

 loss would sustain an efficient system of prevention, and leave ample margin for main- 

 taining a veterinary college and experimental station which would be a credit and 

 safeguard to the country. I need not say more on this afiection, having recently fur- 

 nished your department with an extended essay on the subject. (See Dejjartmeut Re- 

 port, 187.^) 



Texas fever. — Next to hog-cholera perhaps the disease which at present most engages 

 the public mind is the fever produced by cattle from the Southern States mingling 

 with our northern herds. During the great excitement of 1868 measures were adopted 

 to prevent the introduction of such southern cattle into our Northern States, excepting 

 during the frosts of winter. But immunity soon bred carelessness, and now the sum- 

 mer traffic has again acquired wide dimensions, and every year we snlier extensive 

 losses in our Northern aud Eastern States. Within the last moTith I have traced no less 

 than four outbreaks in New York — at North Bangor, Franklin County ; Watertown, 

 Schenectady, and Brighton, Monroe Countj-. These are mere straws indicating the 

 direction of the current, aud doubtless many other smaller outbreaks have occurred 

 at other points, as they are rarely acknowledged so long as the parties interested can 

 preserve the secret. It is only when, as at Cleveland, Ohio, the losses become so gen- 

 eral that it is impossible to conceal them that the general public are api)rised of the 

 occurrence. The losses at North Bangor up to date have been seventeen, at Cleveland 

 one hundred and thirty-nine. The losses in such cases, however, are not to be esti- 

 mated by the deaths occurring on the infected pastures, but also by the loss of fodder 

 incident to the disease of such pastures by the stocking of them with horses or sheep, 

 or to the fatal results occurring at a distance to which the hay from such fields has 

 been sent. In all the above-mentioned cases the trouble has supervened on the im- 

 portation of southern cattle, and the parasites (ticks) of these are found on their 

 northern victims. 



Nothing can be simpler or more certain than the prevention of this disease, but it 

 will never be permanently established by other authority than the general govern- 

 ment. Safety consists in restricting the northern exodus of cattle to the winter season, 

 and sometime before the last frosts. But it is not to be expected that the Middle States 

 will prevent the through traffic which brings no danger to themselves, and the means 

 can easily be found to ship and reship, so that the stock appears to come from a 

 salubrious locality. (For description of Texas fever see department report on diseases 

 of cattle, 1871; also report of New York board of health, 1868.) 



LurKj-Jever. — This is a much more redoubtable affection than Texas fever, which is 

 limited in its prevalence to our northern latitudes by the appearance of frost. Lung- 

 fever knows no limitation by winter or summer, cold or heat, rain or drought, higher 

 low altitude. In Western Europe and America it is a purely contagious disease, depend- 

 ent alone on the pre-existing virus, and never arising spontaneously. This is amply 

 proved not only by the records of the invasion of Ireland, England, Scotland, America, 

 Australia, the Cape of Good Hope, Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, but also by the 

 preservation of countries (Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Schleswig Holstein, Oldenburg, 

 Mecklenburg, Switzerland, the Channel Islands, Massachusetts, and Connecticut), 

 which have treated it as an exotic, and even of such localities in plague-stricken coun- 

 tries as breed their own stock and never import strange animals. Of the latter maybe 

 particularly mentioned the Highlands of Scotland, certain portions of the Chev- 

 iots, and parts of Normandy. This is the most insidious of all plagues, for the 

 poison may be retained in the syslem for a period of one or two months, or evep 

 more, in a latent form, and the infected animal may meanwhile be carried half 

 way round the world in apparent health, yet bearing the seeds of this dread pes- 

 tilence. And this malady we harbor on our eastern seaboard, where it is gradually 

 but almost imperceptibly invading new territory, and preparing, when opportunity 

 offers, to descend with devastating effect on our great stock range of the West. There 

 is abundant evidence of the existence of this affection in Eastern New York, in New 

 Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, and the District of Columbia. 

 (See government report on diseases of cattle, 1871, and many instances in current 

 agricultural journals.) Within tlie past year I have advised in the case of three 

 outbreaks, one in Eiistern New York, one on Staten Island, and one in New Jersey. 

 At present it creates little apprehension, but we are asleep over a smouldering volcano, 

 which only wants a little more time to gather strength, when the general infection of 

 the country will bo imminent. Spreading from the port of New York, it has already 

 gained a substantial hold upon seven different States, including the District of Co- 

 lumbia, and has invaded and been repeatedly expelled from two more, and it is only 

 requisite that it should reach the sources of our stock supplies in the West to infect 

 our railroad cars and Eastern States generally. It will create no such panic as did 

 the Texas fever in 1868, but by its leisurely invasion of a herd, taking one victim now 



