374 History of Animal Plagues. 



was that another special cause was in operation; certain it is that 

 a malady accompanied by dysentery, and all the symptoms which 

 characterize a putrid, pestilential, and exanthematous fever, such 

 as that which had prevailed among horned cattle, was observed 

 in Languedoc at the same time by M. de Sauvages^ in the goats 

 and sheep. The most favourable crisis for these animals was an 

 eruption of small pustules about the nostrils and the other parts 

 of the head, which became converted into scabs. As in the 

 cattle, after death their lungs were found emphysematous, and 

 their viscera bore the same marks of disease. It appears that 

 these animals were treated in the same manner as the cattle, 

 modifying, however, the doses of the remedies according to the 

 age, the natural feebleness of the creature, and other circum- 

 stances. In general, the moiety of a dose of medicine suitable 

 for an ox was that which sufficed for a sheep, if the remedy was 

 not a violent one; when it was, a third, or even a fourth part 

 was sufficient. M. Hastfer, in his" Instructions for the Improve- 

 ment of Sheep," p. 154, strongly recommends a preservative 

 powder for these animals, in all cases of pestilential or epizootic 

 diseases; it consists in taking two ounces of crude antimony, 

 the same quantity of nitre, four ounces of sulphur and laurel 

 berries, mixed with ten pounds of common salt. This mixture to 

 be put in the mangers so that the sheep may lick it at pleasure/^ 



Amongst the precautions taken by the States and the Parlia- 

 ment to arrest the spread of the infection, it was ordained that 

 the dead should be interred in their skins; but they did not sus- 

 pect the cupidity of the merchants, who purchased at a low price 

 the hides which the farmers could smuggle away, and thus was a 

 most important object frustrated. 



Much that is interesting will be found in the Journal of the 

 Marquis de Courtivron, some of whose observations have been 

 already alluded to.^ He saw the malady in Burgundy, Eastern 

 France, in 1747. 



Blondet" thought the disease was due to bad food and a low 



' Nosologia Methodica, vol. v. p. 88. "^ Paiilet. Op. cit., vol. i. p. 256. 



^ De Courtivron. Journal sur la Naissance, le Progres, et la Terme de la 



Maladie du Gros Betail a Is-sur-Tille, ville du Duche de Bourgogne. Paris, 1747. 



* Blondd. Dissertation sur la Maladie Epidemique des Bestiaux. Paris, 1749. 



