STOMACH-STAGGEES IX CATTLE. 181 



ing points for investigation to the scientific man. Some that 

 are avoided by the grazier have been proved to be contami- 

 nated with lead in a solid form, which appears to resist, for 

 a considerable time, any solution or penetration into the soil. 



The form of lead-poisoning here referred to, and which 

 by the symptoms may readily be mistaken for grass-staggers, 

 is totally different from the disease which occurs in the 

 vicinity of lead mines, and which is due to finely divided 

 lead, ' probably in the state of oxide, floating in the air or 

 being deposited on the grass. The latter is a slow form of 

 poisoning, whereas the solid lead seems to act by paralysing 

 the stomach though not at once destroying the appetite, and 

 thus animals fill themselves to repletion and manifest symp- 

 toms only slightly different from those due to obstructions in 

 the third stomach from non-poisonous vegetable foods. 



The grass-staggers, properly so called, is very common in 

 the spring months, and when cattle are first put upon good 

 strong grass. If the latter is succulent it generally induces 

 a little diarrhoea, or may give rise to hove, a disease more 

 frequently seen in the autumn months. But on certain soils 

 the grass, greedily devoured by cattle which have only 

 recently been removed from shelter and straw, gives rise to 

 a series of symptoms as severe as any observed in other fatal 

 cattle disorders. Recently we heard that a veterinary surgeon 

 had afforded a farmer the consoling information that grass- 

 staggers was as bad as the "disease" meaning the lung 

 complaint, the contagiousness and epizootic character of 

 which invest it with the importance attached only to destruc- 

 tive plagues. 



The symptoms of grass-staggers vary much at the origin 

 of the disease. Appetite continues undisturbed, though con- 

 stipation and some uneasiness may have been observed for 

 the space of twelve or twenty-four hours. Often dull, and 



