254 THE HISTORY OF VETERINARY MEDICINE. 



about tliem, and thus become dangerous to the animals yet in 

 health. 



'• We can not, then, hope for any good from remedies. For more 

 than two thousand years an infinite number of the most learned 

 men have given their constant attention to observing the effects of 

 medicines on mankind. We know well enough the value of sim- 

 ples, the properties which they have of stimulating or evacuating, 

 and their dose. But we have not nearly the same knowledge to 

 guide us when we deal with animals : few talented persons have 

 observed their diseases ; the art of curing them has been left to men 

 of low condition, who have no knowledge of the anatomy of the 

 lower creatures, and who have not informed themselves by the study 

 of nature or of good authors. The cattle-doctors invariably fol- 

 low the same routine traced out by the ancient veterinarians, and 

 their science (art) consists of divers receipts which they have found 

 among the papers of their predecessors. 



" The structure of the stomachs of cattle is very different from 

 that of man; in general, the envelopes of their nerves are much 

 thicker, the sensations less active, the pulse less frequent, the arteries 

 more hard, the heart less irritable. All these peculiarities change 

 the effect of remedies in animals, in a way quite different to man ; 

 and it is only within a few years that convincing proof has been 

 afforded of the differences between the effect which a given remedy 

 has on man and the animals. The saffron of metals is a violent 

 emetic for man ; in the horse it only increases the transpiration ; a 

 dose of glass of antimony, which produces violent vomiting in man- 

 kind, simply purges the horse ; no poison will make a horse or cow 

 vomit. Because the effects of medicines, therefore, on the lower 

 animals are so little known ; because scarcely any one has observed 

 closely enough the diseases of cattle, or given definite rules for the 

 exhibition of the proper remedies ; because the use of remedies can 

 only tend to spread the contagion — for all these reasons it is pru- 

 dent to abstain from a dangerous tentative which promises but lit- 

 tle, and which may have the worst effects ; it is infinitely preferable 

 to oppose the disease by means which are more certain and com- 

 mendable. 



'' 6. We hegin ly disabusing the pxiblic of the idea that the pneii- 

 monia {la pidmonie) is not a contagious disease. This outrageous 

 idea even comes from some savants. There are those, too, who rob 

 the plague of its contagious power. I do not pretend to say that the 

 skin of an infected beast preserves its contagious properties for a 

 long time after death ; experiments upon this matter, which deserve 



