132 DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 



our domestic gallinaceous birds, as well as pheasants and partridges, are 

 subject, and which often occasions great mortality. In the first in- 

 stance it appears to arise from a cronpy or catarrhal affection, which is 

 indicated by running at the nostrils, watery eyes, alteration of voice, 

 and loss of appetite and spirits. The bird dies. If the trachea be 

 examined, it will be found replete with narrow worms, about' half an 

 inch in length, imbedded in slimy mucus. This singular worm is the 

 Syngamus trachealis, or Distoma lineare. It consists of a long and a 

 short body united together; the long body is the female, the short body 

 the male ; each, were it not that they are permanently united together, 

 being an animal distinct and perfect in itself. Whether these parasitic 

 worms are the cause or consequence of the disease, we pretend not to 

 say, nor can we tell how they become introduced into the trachea ; this, 

 however, seems to be certain, that their removal is requisite to give the 

 feathered patient a chance of recovery. This can be done by means of a 

 feather, neatly trimmed, which is to be introduced into the windpipe, 

 and turned round once or twice, and then drawn out. It will dislodge 

 the worms, and bring back many of them adhering with slime unto it. 

 This plan requires great dexterity, and some knowledge of the anatomy 

 of the parts ; a slow, unskillful operator may kill the already half-suffo- 

 cated bird, instead of caring it. Another mode of destroying these 

 worms is, by putting the birds in a box, and making them inhale the 

 fumes of tobacco, thrown into it through the stalk of a tobacco-pipe. 

 Some recommend the forcing of tobacco-smoke down the bird's throat, 

 and others that the mouth be crammed with snuff; while many place 

 faith in the efficacy of a pinch of salt, introduced into the back part of 

 the ■mouth. Something like a scientific mode of treatment may, how- 

 ever, be suggested. Give a grain of calomel, made up with bread into 

 a pill, or two or three grains of Plummer's pill (pil. hydr. suhmur co., 

 London Pharmacopoeia) ; after which let flour of sulphur be adminis- 

 tered, with a little ginger, in pultaceous food composed of barley-meal. 

 In the mean time let the bird be kept in a dry warm shed or room, 

 apart from the rest of the fowls, as the disease may be infectious. Let 

 the mouth and beak be washed with a weak solution of chloride of 

 lime. A correspondent, who dates his letter from Wootton, Christ- 

 church, speaks of turpentine as the only remedy on which to depend. 

 His words are : " Half a teaspoonful of spirits of turpentine, mixed 

 with a handful of grain, is a certain cure in a few days, giving a hand- 

 ful of such grain to a couple of dozen young chicks each day. It is the 

 most perfect and unfailing remedy. I communicated this'reoeipt to the 

 'Gardeners' Chronicle' (No. xxix., July 17, 1847, p. 476), and I under- 

 stand it has been. found by other persons besides myself to be successful 

 — ^perfectly so. In this part of England it is the only disease of chick- 

 ens ; and for two seasons the number that died of it was very great." 

 The rationale of this mode of treatment is as follows : — the turpentine 

 is absorbed into the system, and so brought into contact with the para- 

 sitic worms in the windpipe, to which it is speedily fatal; they are then 

 ejected with the mucus; and the cause of irritation being thus removed, 

 the bird speedily recovers. Wet, ill-feeding, an ill-ventilated fowl- 

 house, confinement on a spot or plot of ground tenanted year after year 



