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others considered it a result of arsenic or other poisonous material 

 administered with malicious intent ; but why it should attack certain 

 animals in a herd and not others kept under exactly the same condi- 

 tion, or why it should appear among the cattle in one pasture while 

 those in an adjoining one escaped — these with other peculiarities 

 were mysteries for which there seemed to be no satisfactory 

 explanation. 



With a view of ascertaiuing the cause and nature of this peculiar 

 disease, the writer on June eighth, in company with Mr. Cheever and 

 Dr. Etienne of Ware, made a visit to the farms in the section of the 

 town where the disease was and had been most prevalent. 



We went at once to the farm of Miss Mary Howe, just over the 

 boundary line between Ware and Enfield, in hopes of finding an 

 animal recently dead upon which to hold a post mortem examination. 



In this we were successful, for there we found a cow that had died 

 the day previous and one that had died that morning. The latter 

 was selected and a post mortem examination made which revealed 

 nothing abnormal about any parts of the body except a few old 

 adhesions in the abdominal cavity, indicating that inflammation had 

 previously existed there. The brain was included in the examina- 

 tion, and was carefully removed with a part of the spinal cord and 

 wrapped in a clean cloth to Ue preserved for future inspection and 

 investigation. 



After completing the autopsy, and examining a cow in the stable 

 that had that morning begun to show foi" the flrst time symptoms of 

 the disease, we drove to the farm of Mr. St. Jamin and learned that 

 a short time before he had had two yearling heifers die in the pas- 

 ture with the same disease. From JNIr. St. Jamin's we proceeded to 

 the Town farm. Through the kindness of Mr. W. H. Perkins we 

 were informed of the history of the outbreak of the disease among 

 the cattle upon that farm. 



From the Town farm we drove some four miles to Mr. Cheever's 

 place, where we found in the stable two cows, a brindle and a red 

 one, that had been sick for two days. These were carefully exam- 

 ined in the stable, then were driven outside and watched for some 

 time. 



On June eighteenth another visit was made to Mr. Cheever's farm 

 in order to continue the investigations by the examination of a ten 

 months old heifer that was first noticed ailing two days before. 



The character of the symptoms in all of the animals was nearly the 



