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that annually carry off a certain per cent of Mr. Dunphy's cattle and 

 those which killed the cattle near Stockton identical with that which 

 yearly shows itself on the ranges farther south? Mr. Dunphy losl 

 thirty head in October last, but, unfortunately, I reached the ranch after 

 the last death had occurred and decomposition was bo Ear advanced that 

 a post mortem was of no service, nor was I able to see a case on the more 

 southern ranches. The disease had run its Length previous to my v 

 so I have no means of comparing the symptoms and posi mortem ap- 

 pearance of the disease, as manifested in the two cases, other than the 

 statements of the non-professional men who examined them. Tl. 

 descriptions I have had from at least fifty men. and tiny all agr 

 nearly, that the only conclusion is that the disease must he the same. 

 Yet, here is the very important feature of inoculation from contact with 

 a dead animal in the one case, and total exemption in the other. 

 The disease in one case is similar in character and in surround _ 

 circumstances to what we all understand of the splenic fever east 

 of the Rocky Mountain-. One of the most distinguishing fea- 

 tures of our true Southern splenic fever is that cattle from south 

 of the line of infection, when brought in contact with cattle north 

 of that line, give off the disease, hut do not themselves take 

 it on. Another feature equally well established is the fact thai the 

 cattle which sicken and die will not give off the disease while suffering 

 with it, or after death. I have seen hundreds of cattle die in Kansas 

 and the Pan-handle of Texas with the splenic fever, and have seen 

 many of them opened after death. After listening to the description of 

 the disease on the Pacific by fifty or more men, as stated above, there 

 remains no doubt in my mind as to the identity of the two diseasi s, hut 

 there are some conditions materially different, and these may account 

 for the apparently different results. There are different t \- p<- of splenic 

 fever, and a post mortem of cattle on the San Joaquin may establish 

 the fact that the disease is of a different type from that experienced on 

 the Salinas and near Stockton. My investigations this year were begun 

 sixty days too late to enable me to lay all the facts bare. The different 

 conditions above referred to may he briefly stated thus: In the case of 

 the cattle near Stockton, it was extremes meeting cattle full ^<i the 

 fever germ coming in contact with those thai were totally exempl from 

 such infection. The same is true of the Salinas trouble. The Nevada 

 cattle were free from the disease germs, and on coming in contact with 

 them on their new range they were so susceptible that death resulted, 

 while the located cattle were proof againsl it by virtue of a sort of 

 every-day inoculation. < hi the other hand, the San Joaquin cattle 

 sickened iii what lias, for many years, been an infected country, on their 

 own range, and under such conditions as. perhaps, made the disease 

 more virulent. This is not given as a satisfactory explanation, bul 

 merely to show the different conditions. Nothing shorl of a thorough 

 post mortem will determine the true relations of the disease as it mani- 

 fests itself every year in the different localities. Mr. Dunphy thinks his 

 losses are occasioned by his cattle eating some kind of poisonous weed, 



inasmuch as the deaths always occur after the range is dry, and a green 



weed, though poison, would he tempting. Why, then, would not the 

 native cattle die from the same cause'.' I spent two days on his range 



and rode all over it searching for the poisonous weed, lull failed in find 

 it. It is not t here. 



