ROT. 



ROT. 



M administer this medicine to the living sheep, ' 

 and what probability there is of its disturbing ! 

 an animal inhabiting the liver. With regard \ 

 to the first exception, there can arise no diffi- 

 culty. The spirit of turpentine is borne rea- 

 dily by children, and has been given to adults 

 in doses of a quarter of a pint; it is likewise 

 applied externally to blistered surfaces, and as 

 a styptic to the bleeding mouths of ruptured 

 blood-vessels. There can be as little doubt 

 with regard to the second exception, when we 

 consider the penetrating nature of this drug ; 

 when we know that the mere immersion of the 

 hand in it is sufficient to impregnate the uri- 

 nary secretion ; nor can we doubt that its influ- 

 ence will be acknowledged by an organ ap- 

 proximating and communicating with the 

 stomach, and by the worm inhabiting that 

 organ." 



The outward symptoms of this disease were 

 many years since well described by Dr. Har- 

 rison of Boston, Lincolnshire, when he said, 

 "If in warm, sultry, and rainy weather, sheep 

 that are grazing on low and moist lands feed 

 rapidly, and some of them die suddenly, there 

 is reason to fear that they have contracted the 

 rot : this suspicion will be further increased, 

 if in a few weeks afterwards the sheep begin 

 to shrink, and become flaccid in their loins. 

 By pressure about the hips at this time, a 

 crackling is sometimes perceptible. Now or 

 soon afterwards the countenance looks pale, 

 and upon parting the fleece, the skin is found 

 to have parted its vermilion tint for a pale-red, 

 and the wool is easily separated from the pelt; 

 as the disorder advances, the skin becomes 

 dappled with yellow or black spots. About 

 this time the eye loses its lustre, and becomes 

 white and pearly, from the red vessels of the 

 tunica adnata and eyelids being contracted or 

 entirely obliterated. To this succeeds debility 

 and emaciation, which increase continually till 

 the sheep die, or else ascites or perhaps gene- 

 ral dropsy supervene before the fatal termina- 

 .ion." 



Such are the symptoms and the most power- 

 ful known remedies for this disease ; an equally 

 important research is its origin, its predispos- 

 ing circumstances, or immediate cause. In 

 this, however, in common with most other dis- 

 eases of animal and vegetable life, difficulties 

 occur at every turn, of a nature almost entirely 

 inexplicable. We must be content to do little 

 more than merely trace its symptoms and the 

 course in which it commonly runs. No flock- 

 masters are perhaps more anxiously alive to 

 the disease, or more often its victims, than the 

 owners of the noble water-meadows of the 

 south of England, such as those of the valleys 

 of the Kennett, the Itchen, and the Wiltshire 

 Avon. 



Thes<; excellent farmers have noticed, that 

 the first crop of spring water-meadow grass 

 never imparts the rot to sheep ; but that the 

 second crop, which they therefore make into 

 Hay, is almost certain to do so. They notice, 

 a.so, that the worst rotting-time is from Mid- 

 summer to Michaelmas ; that almost all mea- 

 dow land, if chance flooded in summer, that is, 

 if covered by the overflowing of rivers, so as 

 o be covered with their muddy waters, is 

 956 



almost certain to rot the sheep ; that gravelly 

 bottomed water-meadows, like those between 

 Marlborough and Hungerford, never rot the sheep 

 fed on them, in any season or period of the year. 

 This would appear to confirm the very common 

 suspicion that it is not the grass which rots the 

 sheep, but the gaseous or aqueous vapours 

 which emanate from such places, more copi 

 ously as the weather becomes warmer in the 

 summer; but, then, against such a conclusion 

 we have the fact, well known to owners of the 

 water meads, that when sheep are soiled even 

 upon fine dry elevated soils (such as never 

 render sheep rotten), with the second crop of 

 grass from water-meads that then the sheep 

 become as equally rotten as if they had been 

 pastured on the very meadows from whence 

 the grass was carried. It would seem, there- 

 fore, that there are more watery matters, or 

 other sources of disease in the second crop 

 than in the first. 



That the grass of the second crop varies 

 very materially in its chemical composition 

 from that of the first, has been clearly shown 

 by the analysis of the late Mr. George Sinclair 

 He found that rye-grass (Lolium perenne) at the 

 time of flowering, taken from a water-meadow 

 that had been fed off with sheep till the end of 

 April, afforded of nutritive matter 72 grains. 

 The same grass from the meadow that had not 

 been depastured in the spring, afforded 100 

 grains. The same weight of this grass, taken 

 from a rich old pasture that had been shut up 

 for hay about the same time, afforded of nutri- 

 tive matter 95 grains. That from the rich pas- 

 ture that had not been depastured, afforded 120 

 grains. (Hort. Gram. Wob. p. 384.) And in the 

 great majority of instances, the aftermath of 

 the upland grasses is considerably less rich in 

 nutritive matters than that of their first or 

 spring crop. 



Such, then, are the supposed causes, symp 

 toms, and treatment recommended for the cure 

 of this disease. For the cure, both turpentine 

 and common salt seem to have sometimes been 

 successfully used. But the effect of salt seems 

 to be much more decided when employed as a 

 prevention, rather than a cure. As a preventive, 

 too, the use of aromatic vegetable substances 

 seems to be excellent. It is the kind of pre- 

 vention also which might be supposed to be 

 efficacious from following the order of nature, 

 and observing the habits of the sheep in their 

 wild state, browsing as they invariably do up'on 

 the aromatic plants, and the shoots of moun- 

 tain shrubs; and never descending to live upon 

 the rank and watery grasses of the valleys, 

 until compelled by the severity of the weather. 

 Every farmer is aware with what avidity they 

 consume such domestic herbs the parsley, for 

 instance as abound in essential oils. An 

 attempt has indeed been recently made to culti- 

 vate this herb in r the fields as feed for sheep; 

 and I have little doubt that if some attention 

 were paid to the cultivation of such plants (if 

 the parsley will not bear the browsing of the 

 sheep, they might be occasionally soiled with 

 it), by way of condiment or change ; if the 

 flock were allowed, at all times and seasons, 

 access to common salt -(and this might be 

 mixed, if necessary, with aromatic substances 



