THE DIGESTIVE ORGANS 



217 



same condition for two or three days and ultimately recover. It is 

 only in these latter cases that there is any chance of recovery. 

 When an animal is found dead in the byre or field, and very much 

 swollen, with the rectum slightly turned out, and a bloody, watery 

 discharge oozing from the various openings of the body, on no 

 account should it be either skinned or opened into, as on examina- 

 tion of these discharges, from an anthrax subject, under the microscope 

 they are found loaded with bacilli. In all such-like cases a drop of 

 blood taken from the tail or ear should be microscopically examined, 

 when the anthrax rods will be readily observed amongst the red 



Fig. 11. — Anthrax Bacilli and Red Corpuscles. 



i. Red corpuscles of blood. 2. Anthrax bacilli rods. 



corpuscles of the blood. This can be further verified by adding a 

 little methylene blue to another drop of blood, when the dark rods, or 

 the bacilli, will be seen {see Fig. u). No time should then be lost 

 in informing the nearest police officer of the case, while all the 

 openings into the body of the animal should be immediately plugged 

 up with pieces of cloth saturated with some disinfectant or tar and a 

 sack pulled over the head, while the body must be protected from 

 the approach of other animals. Should the carcass have to be 

 buried, the hole must not be less than 6 feet deep, and dug in some 

 remote place clear of drains and watercourses. A plantation makes 



