History of Animal Plagues. I'j'^ 



recover their milk again as their appetites mend, but they arc 

 observed to have scabby eruptions come out in their groins and 

 axillce, which itch much, for a cow will stand still, hold out her 

 leg, and show signs of great pleasure when a man scratches these 

 pustules or scabs for her. I am informed that some cow-leeches 

 had given coloquintidce and salt of tartar, each one ounce, in a 

 quart of warm ale; but I imagine it must be too griping a 

 purge, and improper where the guts are inflamed. Indeed, I 

 have not heard of any cows recovering which took it. 



'As for the cause of this distemper, I am still at a loss. I 

 think it cannot be owing to the food, because the cows which 

 had it first in Essex eat only grass, turnips, and hay or straw ; 

 the cows about London eat, some grass; all, grains and hay; 

 some, little or no grass, but live chiefly on grains, turnips, off- 

 falls from the garden grounds, and hay. I am in doubt as to the 

 air ; the spring and summer were very wet and the ground very 

 damp, the autumn was very dry and cold, the beginning of win- 

 ter very damp and cold. The cows in Essex had the distemper 

 in summer; it first began about London in autumn; it has 

 spread itself equally among cows which have lain in the fields 

 a-nights, and those which stood in stables or sheds ; it spread 

 itself in Essex, at first into such farms where they bought in 

 strange calves, or lean cows, at market, which they did not know 

 where they came from, but most probably from the hundreds 

 where the disease first broke out; but how it got thither, whether 

 by importing any cattle from Flanders, I know not, for surely 

 there is too wide a tract of sea for any infectious miasmata to be 

 wafted over to that part of the country by the winds ! This is 

 certain, the viscera concerned in respiration are the parts chiefly 

 affected. Its spreading here in England has been progressive, 

 and therefore one may reasonably think it is not constitutionary 

 in the air, for then it ought to be universal everywhere; but 

 that it is contagious, and propagated by infected cows being 

 mixed with well cows, therefore the not buying-in calves or 

 strange beasts, but every farmer keeping his herd by itscll, must 

 be a great means of preventing the propagation ot it. And 

 housing the cows a-nights may be a proper preservative against 

 it.' 



