284 DISEASES OF TRUE INFECTION 



acute hemorrhagic inflammation of the intestinal mucous membrane 

 and frequently accompanied l)y an ulcerative stomatitis. This disease 

 attacks animals of all ages; occasionally a milder form is observed, in- 

 dicated by severe pharyngitis and gastric catarrh and is differentiated 

 from simple gastric catarrh by the more acute symptoms and the fact 

 that it does not respond to the ordinary treatment used in simple catarrh. 



The disease was described by Hoffer in 1850 as dog typhus; and dur- 

 ing the latter portion of the nineteenth century it spread over the greater 

 part of Europe and destroyed numlicrs of animals. Then the outbi'eak 

 lessened in severity and only sporadic cases were observed, but recently 

 it appears with increased severity. 



Etiology. — The disease attacks animals of all ages, but seems to pre- 

 dominate in older animals. Klett made a record of 100 cases and found 

 five cases in animals under one year, sixteen in second year, twenty-one in 

 third year, eleven in fourth year, nine in sixth year, seven in seventh 

 year and eighth year, two in ninth, six in tenth, etc. Sex, constitution 

 and breed do not seem to hinder or have any bearing on the course or 

 severity of the disease although Rabus observed the delicate, highly 

 nervous animals that are very carefully housed seem to be more suscepti- 

 ble and succumb to attacks of the disease. 



The actual cause of the disease or medium of infection has not been 

 definitely described. Some oliservers think the faeces is the medium of 

 the infection, some the urine, some the vomited material, others the 

 urine, blood, or other tissue fluids, but the majority of observers agree 

 that the disease gains entry into the system by means of the digestive 

 tract. It is not definitely known if it is directly transmissible to 

 another animal, and the direct inoculation of the disease is only accom- 

 plished with great difficulty and after repeated experiments, and even 

 then it is governed l)y certain favorable circumstances. Albrecht injected 

 a healthy dog with blood taken from an animal affected with the disease. 

 Into a second dog he injected subcutaneously a certain amount of bile 

 from the gall-bladder of another infected animal. Into the third animal 

 he administered a quantity of the contents of the stomach of a diseased 

 animal. The animal that had the subcutaneous injection of bile developed 

 a severe abscess at the point of puncture and made a good recovery. 

 The other animals were not afTected at all. Scheibel fed finely cut up 

 portions of the stomach and intestines of affected animals without any ill 

 affects, but when he had given an animal a solution of bicarbonate of soda, 

 rendering the mucous mem]:)rane of the stomach alkaline, the animal 

 developed the disease two days later. Scheibel came to the conculsion 

 that a mixed infection of the coli-bacteria and micrococci was more apt 

 to reproduce the disease. Pirl found in the blood taken from the heart 

 of the diseased animal an oi'ganism which was similar to the bacterium 



