166 DISEASES OF THE HOG, 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

 ERYSIPELAS. 



This is a constitutional disease characterized by 

 inflammation of the skin with fever. 



Causes: Some animals have a predisposition to 

 this disease and it only needs some exciting cause 

 to develop it. It is usually caused by a wound of 

 some kind by which the poison enters the tissue. 

 There is a difference of opinion as to what this poi- 

 son consists of, but there is no doubt but that it is 

 an organism as it has been found, still the results 

 of experiments are very conflicting. It also make« 

 its appearance without any wound being found on 

 the body and is supposed to be the result of some 

 undue excitement of the skin as from the direct 

 heat of the sun or exposure to severe cold. It has 

 also been ascribed to the kind of food the animal 

 has been fed upon, to a deranged condition of the 

 digestive organs and to rheumatism. Erysipelas 

 has been caused in the human being by stings or 

 bites from insects and the scratch of a pin has pro- 

 duced it, and no doubt but some of the cases of it 

 which we find in pigs are the results of such slight 

 injuries, 



