SECRETARY'S REPORT. 75 



should like to know how it can be cured. A man has a heifer 

 almost covered with warts. If any one has had experience in 

 curing theni I shall like to know how it can be done. 



Mr. Stedman, being asked to give his views on that subject, 

 said : I should not be able to give any light on that point. I 

 keep a bottle of oil of spike-root which I use. But I have never 

 had but little experience in diseases of cattle. If my cattle 

 have warts I let them alone and they come off themselves. 

 I think our cows are more liable to diseases than other stock, 

 some arising from difficulties connected with parturition. I 

 have not been troubled, however, with such diseases as have 

 prevailed in some places, and as they have had in the State of 

 New York, where they lose their calves by shrinking or abor- 

 tion. I have rarely had anything of the kind, and when I do, 

 and suspect a repetition of it, I slaughter the animal. 



With regard to the cattle plague, I was very glad to hear the 

 remarks of the Secretary. I saw an article in the " New York 

 Independent," by Hon. Amasa Walker, in which he seemed to 

 speak of the cattle plague as identical with the pleuro-pneu- 

 monia, I thought he was mistaken. 



Mr. Flint. — It was certainly a mistake. There is scarcely 

 any reseml)lance between the diseases. 



Mr. Whiting Gates, of Leominster. — When warts come on 

 young stock, they will generally go off the third year, as I 

 have observed ; and I have heard others remark the same thing. 

 I know of a case where a man bought a valuable cow at a low 

 price, because she had warts. He cured her by washing the 

 warts in copperas water, dissolved in an iron kettle. The cow 

 had several large warts on the lower part of the abdomen. 



Mr. C. 0. Perkins, of Becket. — I have had some experience 

 in curing warts. Sometimes they are of a kind called blood- 

 warts, and at others they are more of a scurvy nature. I have 

 seen warts as large as a two-quart measure. There are three 

 or four ways in which I get rid of them. One is to cord them 

 tightly with a small string, so as to stop the circulation of the 

 blood. Sometimes, when they have only a small attachment to 

 the body, I pull them off. They do not bleed enough to do any 

 harm. I have never seen an animal that had so many as the 

 one described by the Secretary. Fish oil will sometimes destroy 



