specific Contagious Diseases. 85 



the poison, after it enters the system, is from three to six 

 days in summer, and from ten to twelve in winter. Then 

 there is loss of appetite, dullness, dropping behind the flock, 

 and stiffness of tiie hind parts. This is followed by trem- 

 bling, increased temperature, very manifest on the bare and 

 delicate parts of the skin on which the eruption usually 

 takes place, loss of appetite and rumination, costiveness, red, 

 weeping eyes, a discharge from the nose, and the appear- 

 ance of red patches inside the limbs and along the abdomen. 

 Soon minute red points appear and increase to papules, with 

 . a firm base extending into the deeper parts of the skin. 

 These are flat on the summit (rarely pointed or indented), 

 and become pale or clear in the centre, from the effusion of 

 liquid beneath the scurf -skin, with a red margin. With the 

 appearance of the eruption the fever moderates, but in- 

 creases again in three or four days witli the development 

 and irritability of the vesicles. These may remain indi- 

 vidually distinct {discrete), in which case the attack is mild, 

 or they may run together into extensive patches iconfiuent), 

 when the result is likely to be serious. The pocks will even 

 appear on the visual, digestive, or respiratory mucous mem- 

 brane. The eruption passes through the same course of exu- 

 dation, suppuration, drying, and dropping off as in cow-pox. 

 TJie duration of the disease is tliree weeks or a month. 

 The mortality in the milder forms may not exceed seven 

 per one hundred, in the more Severe it may destroy almost 

 the whole flock. But the losses of lambs by abortion, of 

 wool, sight, hearing, hoofs, digits, flesh, and general vigor 

 often render recoveries anything but unmixed blessings. 

 The germ is a micrococcus. 



Treatment. Keep in cool, dry, well-aired and littered 

 sheds, shelter from rain, and feed roots, or, if very weak, 

 oat- and bean-meal gruels, witb a drachm of saltpetre to 

 each sheep. Common salt may be supplied to be licked, 

 and the drinking-water may be slightly acidulated with 



