380 [Assembly 



du Gros Betail coniiue Sur le nom de Peripneumonia Contagieuse, 

 par 0. Delafond, Professeur de Pathologie. de therapeutique, de po- 

 lice Sanitaire, de medicine legale et de chirurgie pratique a 1' ecole 

 royale Veterinaire d'Alfort, &c., Paris France, 1844." From the 

 distinguished reputation of the writer, at the head of the finest Vete- 

 rinary school in Europe, from his great experience and remarkable 

 opportunities for observation, his opinions if not conclusive, are at 

 least of very great value. 



In the preface he states that this disease, after typhus, and what 

 he styles "les maladies charboneuses," is the most serious known; 

 that it is rarely sporadic, often local, sometimes general, ahoays con- 

 tagious; that it is not one of the class of great diseases which appear 

 occasionally, and which are of a limited duration, but it thows itself 

 annually in certain places where it is produced by local causes. At 

 the present time (1844) this disease affects the cattle of nearly every 

 country in Europe and in a great number of the departments of France, 

 producing greater or less mortality. For the last 16 years, he has 

 specially attended to this disease, going into every part of France 

 where the animals are raised, fatted, and where they are kept for milk. 



There are various opinions in regard to the contagiousness of this 

 disease, but Mr. Delafond has arrived at the conclusion, after much 

 study, that it is highly so, and the French government so considering 

 it have passed numerous sanatory decrees regulating the treatment 

 and use of animals, thus diseased. The kingdoms of Hanover, Wur- 

 temburg, Sardinia, and Switzerland have adopted similar regulations. 



This disease is variously styed "putrefaction des poumons" by the 

 Germans, "new disease" by the English, pneumonia, b) the Hollanders 

 and French. 



Our author in his zeal has gone back to the year 354 A. C, and 

 found this same affection described by Aristotle, and from that pe- 

 riod he traces it down, through various countries, till our own day. 

 In many places it is never known, and that it never spreads unless 

 by contagion. "The seat of pneumonia is now well known. The 

 bronchia, the pulmonary tissue, the interlobular cellular tissue, the 

 pleura are the organs attacked either simultaneously or separately 

 by this malady. Opinions differ upon the character of the disease. 

 * * * As for myself, I consider pneumonia as a specific disease, 

 because it gives birth to a jieculiar virus, susceptible of reproduction, 

 a characteristic which distinguishes it from ordinary and sporadic 

 pneumonia; that it exists sometimes in (he lungs, sometimes in the 



