274 DISEASES OF SHEEP. 



235. This disease is not incurable, as has been supposed, but it is 

 only relieved by a manual operation. In France it has been success- 

 fully treated by the application of the actual cautery : a pointed 

 iron, heated red hot, is forced through the skm and skull, to the 

 surface of the brain ; the principal nicity of which, is in penetrating 

 the hydatid with the hot iron without wounding the brain itself. 

 In England, some shepherds are very dexterous at wiring, which 

 they do by thrusting a wire up the nostrils till it rests against the 

 skull. In the passage of the wire, the hydatid is usually ruptured ; 

 others elevate the skull (by means of a trephine, or even a knife) 

 opposite to the soften portion, and extract the hydatid, if possi 

 ble, whole, which a little care will effect, by drawing it away 

 with a blunt pincer, gently moving it from side to side. Tapping 

 is merely letting out the fluid contents of the hydatid by an awl, 

 which is practised by some shepherds with success ; and if the 

 instrument be not thrust too far, the animal is never injured ; to 

 avoid whicli, it is passed obliquely. A well hardened gimblet is 

 a proper instrument, with which the skull is easily penetrated, 

 and an opening by the twisting of the instrument is made, suffi- 

 ciently large in the hydatid itself, to discharge its contents, which 

 IS all that is sufficient to insure its destruction, and which, if no 

 other exist, is followed by immediate recovery. 



236. Frontal worms. Sheep are observed to gather together, 

 with their noses thrust inward to avoid the attack of the oestrus 

 ovis, or fly, that lays its eggs on the inner margin of the nose, 

 which, having become hatched, the larva creep up into the fron- 

 tal and maxillary sinuses, to the torment of the sheep. It is re- 

 commended to cover their nostrils during the short stay of these 

 insects, with a gauzy substance, through which the animal can 

 breathe, and keeping it on with some adhesive plaster, «S6c. or 

 daubing the nose often with tar, train oil, or mercurial ointment, 



-&c. Remedy — Take half a pound of good Scotch snuff, pour two 

 quarts of boiling water on it, stir it and let it stand till cold, inject 

 about a table spoonful up each nostril, with a syringe ; repeat three 

 or four times at proper intervals, from the middle of October to the 

 first of January. Half an ounce of assafoetida pounded in a little 

 water added to the snuff will make it more effectual. The owner 

 need not be alarmed after the operation to see the sheep very 

 drunk, &c. as they will soon recover. 



237. Fluke worms are a parasitic animal, found in the biliary 

 sinnses, not only of the sheep, but of the horse, ass, goat, deer 

 &c. and whose existence is rather a consequence than a cause of 

 morbidity. 



