30 THE NATURE AND TREATMENT OF 



appearance of weakness and unthrivingness, a capital subject 

 for phthisis. A cough occurring in such an animal, of a feeble, 

 painful, hoarse, rattling, or gurgling character, shows conclu- 

 sively that disorganization of the lungs has commenced. The 

 cough will also be accompanied by a sound which gives us an 

 idea that it is deep-seated. 



Causes of Consumption. — Aside from the well-known direct 

 hereditary causes, which are known to exist in breed, there are 

 others, operating insidiously to produce disease, and altered 

 structure in the lungs. The climate may be prejudicial. I have 

 known this disease to make its appearance among cows unsuited 

 to our New England climate ; the Alderneys, for example. On 

 the other hand, if cows be removed from a warm, comfortable 

 location or barn, to a region involving a material difference in 

 temperature, a derangement of the respiratory system is very 

 apt to occur. It may appear at first under the guise of a sim- 

 ple bronchial affection, which insidiously steals on until the 

 substance of the lungs is affected. Animals shut up in close 

 and hot stables, as is the case at the " swill milk " establishments 

 in New York, where they cannot obtain sufficient oxygen to 

 vitalize or decarbonize the blood, are apt, after a short time, to 

 die of tuberculated lungs, or perhaps a worse form of disease, 

 known as infectuous pleuro-pneumonia, soon terminates their 

 wretched existence. Impure air is at all times operative in ex- 

 citing pulmonary affections ; the least deviation from purity may 

 occasion very serious difficulties. Therefore, it should be the busi- 

 ness of the farmer to see that his cattle have constantly an abun- 

 dant supply of pure, uncontaminated air — the breath of life. 



Treatment of Consumption. — In the first place the patient 

 must be removed to a comfortably warm and well-ventilated 

 barn ; should the weather be chilly, a blanket may be thrown 

 over the body, and it will be expedient, also, to clothe the 

 limbs up to the knees and hocks with strips of flannel ; by this 

 means we promote cutaneous and sub-cutaneous circulation, and 

 every drop of blood invited and maintained,-at the surface in 

 the extreme vessels, tends to prevent internal congestions. 

 "Without proper attention to these matters, we naight as foolishly 



