TTPB OP AMEKICAN SHEEP DISEASES. 263 



structure, the diseases of the sheep are much less likely to 

 take an inflammatory type than those of the horse, .(and he 

 might have added the ox,) and that the character of. its 

 maladies is generally that of debility. * Mr. Spooner wrote 

 with his eye on the mutton sheep of England -^ constantly 

 forced forward by the most nutritious food, in order to attain 

 early maturity and excessive fatness. Still more strongly, 

 then, do his remarks apply to the ordinarily fed wool- 

 producing sheep of the United States. 1 long ago remarked 

 tnat the depletory treatment, by bleeding and cathartics, 

 resorted to in so many of the diseases of sheep in England, is 

 inapplicable and dangerfxus here. The American Sheep, 

 which has been kept in the common way, sinks from the 

 outset, or after a mere transient flash of inflammatory action ; 

 and in any stage of its maladies, active depletion is likely to 

 lead to fatal prostration. i 



It is not purposed here to enter upon any explanation of 

 the anatomy of the sheep, further than is necessaiy to give 

 a general view of the principal internal structures which 

 determine the form, discharge some pf the principal animal 

 functions, and become the seats or stibjeets of disease. And 

 in treating of maladies, I shall aim to adapt both the language 

 and the prescriptions to the degree of knowledge already 

 possessed on the subject by ordinary practical men, instead 

 of learned veterinarians. 



On the next page is given an illustration and description 

 of the skeleton of a sheep, and on the following page the 

 skull of a hornless sheep is represented and described. 



» Spooner on Sheep, pp. 269, 271. ' 



