VOL. XXIX.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 7p 



straggle from the rest, and be left behind, which a cowherd finding, brought to 

 a farm belonging to Count Borromeo, Canon of Padua. This beast infected all 

 the cows and oxen of the place where he was taken in, and died itself in a few 

 days, as did all the rest, except one, which had a rowel put into its neck. 



In the dead bodies of all the cattle, it was particularly observed, that in the 

 omasus, or paunch, there was found a hard compact body, firmly adhering to 

 the coats of the ventricle, of a large bulk, and an intolerable smell; in other 

 parts, as in the brain, lungs, &c. were several hydatides, and large bladders 

 filled only with wind, which being opened gave a deadly stench; there were also 

 ulcers at the root of the tongue, and bladders filled with a serum on its sides. 

 This hard and compact body, like chalk, in the omasus, the author takes to be 

 the first product of the contagious miasma. He adds a prognostic, believing 

 that, from so many experiments, and the method observed in the cure, a spe- 

 cific remedy will at last be found out, to extirpate the poisonous malignity. He 

 does not think this contagion can affect human bodies, since even other species 

 of ruminating animals, symbolizing with the cow-kind, are yet untouched by it, 

 nor was the infection caught from the air, where due care was taken in burying 

 the dead bodies. 



As for the cure: for the surgical part he commends bleeding, burning on both 

 sides the neck with abroad red-hot iron, making holes in the ears with a round 

 iron, and putting the root of hellebore in the hole, a rowel or seton under the 

 chin, in the dew-laps, he also orders the tongue or palate to be often washed 

 and rubbed with vinegar and salt. 



For the pharmaceutical part he recommends alexipharmics and specific cordials; 

 and from the vegetable kingdom, 3 ounces of Jesuit's bark, infused in 10 or 12 

 pints of cordial water, or small wine, to be given in 4 or 5 doses, which is to 

 be done in the beginning of the fever, when the beast begins to sicken. From 

 the animal, jii of spermaceti dissolved in warm water. From the mineral, 

 antimonium diaphoreticum. Against worms breeding, an infusion of quicksilver, 

 or petroleum and milk is to be given. And lastly^ as to the food, drinks made 

 with barley or wheat flour, or bread, like a ptisane, fresh sweet hay made in 

 May and macerated in fair water. In the mean time the cattle must be kept in 

 a warm place, and clothed, to keep them as much as possible from the cold air, 

 daily making fumigations in the cowhouses with juniper berries, galbanum, and 

 the like. As to prevention, he enjoins care in cleaning the stalls, and scraping 

 the crust from the walls; care also is to be taken of their food, that it be irood, 

 the hay and straw not spoiled by rain in the making, and judges their food ought 

 to be but sparing; friction, rubbing, and currying, not only with the hand. 



