SHEEP HUSBANDRY. 571 



might not the lye of ashes, of the proper strength, make an adequate sub 

 stitute for lime and water 1 



Some Northern farmers drive their sheep over dusty roads as a remedy 

 for hoof-ail ! Opposed as it would seem to be to sound theory — sadly as 

 it is at variance with the practice of foreign veterinarians who employ 

 "tow-pledgets," "gaiter boots," etc., to exclude all dirt from the diseased 

 surface, it does actually seem in cases of ordinary virulence — especially 

 where the disease is chronic — to dry uj) the ulcers and Iccep the maladrj under! 

 There is an important point to be regarded in exhibiting remedies for 

 the hoof-ail, the mention of which I have reserved until now, as it concerns 

 all remedies equally. Many farmei's select rainy weather to " doctor" the 

 sheep. Their feet are then soft, and it is therefoi'e on all accounts good 

 economy, when the feet are to be pared, and each separately treated, pro- 

 vided they can be kept in sheep-houses, or under shelters of any kind, 

 until the rain is over and the grass again dry. If immediately let out in 

 wet gi'ass of any length, the vitriol or other application is measurably 

 washed away. This is avoided by many, by dipping the feet in warm tar 

 — an excellent plan under such circumstances. The tar is probably a good 

 application at any time, but I do not consider it necessary, in ordinaiy 

 cases, unless the sheep must be turned out into wet grass. 



A flock of sheep which have been cured of the hoof-ail, are considered 

 more valuable than one which has never had it. They are far less liable 

 to contract the disease from any casual exposure — and its ravages are far 

 less violent and general among them. 



I am strongly disposed to believe that hoof-ail is propagated in this 

 country only by inoculation — the contact of the matter of a diseased foot 

 with the integuments lining the bifurcation of a healthy foot. That it is 

 propagated in some of those ways classed under the ordinary designation 

 of contagion is certain. I could indisputably authenticate more than a 

 hundred cases, where the sheep on a farm, indeed through a neighbor- 

 hood, had been notoriously exempt from hoof-ail from the first settlement 

 of the country — so that the inhabitants did not even know what the disease 

 was — until some diseased flock was introduced from abroad. It was so in 

 the region where I live, and I well recollect when a flock of Saxons, driven 

 from a neighboring county, first introduced it among our sheep. There 

 has not been a diseased flock in the county which could not trace it back 

 to that flock. And the contagion wa* spread by them as readily on our 

 dry hill-farms as on low and moist ones. 



That it may be propagated by inoculation I hnow by direct experiment. 

 I have placed the matter of diseased feet on the skin lining the cleft of a 

 healthy foot under a variety of circumstances — sometimes when that skin 

 was in its ordinary and natural state — sometimes after a very slight scari- 

 fication — sometimes when macerated by moisture. The disease has been 

 communicated under each of these circumstances, and in a majority of all 

 the instances, amounting to sixteen or seventeen. 



That there is not even a supposed or pretended case, to my knowledge, 

 on record where the disease has originated spontaneously, in the Northern 

 States, I have already asserted.* I regard Professor Dick's statements 

 of the manner in which the disease originates, which I have quoted, t as 

 wholly inapplicable to our country with its present breeds of sheep, and I 

 cannot sufficiently express my surprise that this eminent veterinarian 

 should nave adopted — what I deem so unqualified an absurdity — the non- 

 contagion theory. 



I have been disposed to trace the propagation of the disease exclusive- 



«In the beginning of Letter XIV. t^b. 



(1051) 



