Abortion in Cows. 193 



not widely — particularly in the neighborhood of cheese 

 factories, and inflicted such heavy losses of calves, and 

 the use of cows, that the dairymen of New York procured 

 the appointment of a commission, composed of skillful 

 physicians and surgeons, with Dr. J. C. Dalton, the 

 eminent physiologist and writer, at its head, to investi- 

 gate the subject. But, after a vast amount of intelligent 

 labor, extending over the three seasons of 1867-8-9, the 

 inspection of 1,577 or more farms, and of 14,000 or more 

 cows, and reading and scrutinizing 4,250 reports, sent in 

 by dairymen from ten States, chiefly from New York, 

 Massachusetts, Iowa and Ohio, this able commission re- 

 linquished its extended search for the origin of this 

 peculiar disorder, promptly admitting the "negative 

 results" of their investigation, and stating that "no claim 

 was made that any of the predisposing causes pointed 

 out, nor any one of them, gives a rise to this trouble."* 



Causes of Ordinary Abortion Ruled Out. 



These strange — but not inconsistent — results take place, 

 while there are no marked symptoms of disease in the cow, 

 nor i7i the embryo, " other than the stoppage of its circula- 

 tio^," and the "consequent arrest of growth," causing its 

 death. 



The fact that nearly all the embryos are dead when de- 

 livered also strongly indicates their starvation^ previous to 

 their abortment. 



*It muet be as clearly admitted tkat several of the significant facts estab- 

 lished by the Commission have been suggestive to us, while studying out its 

 peculiarities, and tracing this extraordinary malady to its origin. Most of 

 the facts established by them point in the true direction ; but the Commis- 

 sion failed to think of the fact that the size and normal condition of the 

 udder supply arteries must be as much affected by increase of blood as the 

 udder evidently is by increased milk-yield, and its expansive force. 



t Said Mr. W. D. Hoard, then President N. W. D. A., at Ft. Atkinson, Wiscon- 

 sin, November, 1879: "My father used to say, 'They— the aborted calves- 

 look as though they were starved to death.' " I replied, "He was right, for 

 all that are dead when delivered— which is nearly all that are aborted — 

 certainly are starved to death. And I have discovered the cause and mode 

 of this extraordinary consequence." 



