238 DISEASES OK CATTLE. 



Europe, at least, no such transformation takes place. Smallpox 

 remains smallpox and cowpox, cowpox. Again, smallpox is com- 

 municable to a person who visits the patient in his room but avoids 

 touching him, while cowpox is never thus transferred through the air 

 unless deliberately diffused in the form of spray. The demonstration 

 of a protozoan germ in smallpox implies a similar microbe in cowpox. 



The disease in the cow is ushered in by a slight fever, which, how- 

 ever, is usually overlooked, and the first sign is tenderness of the teats. 

 Examined, these may be redder and hotter than normal, and at the end 

 of two days there appear little nodules, like small peas, of a pale-red 

 color, and increasing so that they may measure three-fourths of an inch 

 to 1 inch in diameter by the seventh day. The yield of milk diminishes, 

 and when heated it coagulates slightly. From the seventh to the tenth 

 day the eruption forms into a blister with a depression in the center 

 and raised margins, and from which the whole of the liquid can not be 

 drawn out by a single puncture. The blister, in other words, is cham- 

 bered, and each chamber must be opened to evacuate the whole of the 

 contents. If the pock forms on a surface where there is thick hair, it 

 does not rise as a blister, but oozes out a straw-colored fluid which con- 

 cretes on the hairs in an amber-colored mass. In one or two days after 

 the pock is full it becomes yellow from contained pus, and then dries 

 into a brownish yellow scab, which finally falls, leaving one or more 

 distinct pits in the skin. Upon the teats, however, this regular course 

 is rarely seen; the vesicles are burst by the hands of the milker as soon 

 as liquid is formed, and as they continue to suffer at each milking they 

 form raw, angry sores, scabbing more or less at intervals, but slow to 

 undergo healing. 



The only treatment required is to heal the sores; and as milking is 

 the main cause of their persistence, that must be done as gently as 

 possible, or even with the teat tube or dilator. (PI. XXIV, figs. 3 and 4. ) 

 It is essential to check the propagation of the germ, and for this pur- 

 pose the sore teats may be washed frequently with a solution of half 

 an ounce hyposulphite of soda in a pint of water. This will usually 

 check the inflammation and cut short the malady. 



SUPPRESSION OP MILK. 



The absence of milk in the udder may result from ill health, debility, 

 emaciation, chronic disease of the bag, wasting of the gland from pre- 

 vious disease, or insufficient food, but sometimes it will occur suddenly 

 without any appreciable cause. The treatment will consist in remov- 

 ing the cause of the disease, feeding well on rich albuminoid food made 

 into warm mashes, and giving ounce doses of aromatic carminatives, 

 like anise-seed, fennel-seed, etc. Rubbing and stripping the udder 

 are useful; and the application of oil of lavender or of turpentine, or 

 even a blister of Spanish flies, will sometimes succeed. 



