488 AMERICAN CATTLE. 



The COW must be milked clean at the time the above drink is 

 given, aud two hours after may be turned mto her pas ure 

 About four days after, If her udder appears hard and tuU let her 

 be brought out of the pasture, milked clean, and the drmk be 



'^^ This is%ntr°any sufficient to dry any cow of her milk ; but as 

 some cows give so much that it renders them very difficult to 

 dry it is therefore frequently found necessary to repeat the drmk 

 and milking every fourth day, for three or four times, before they 

 can be completely dried. 



MURRAIN, OR PUTRID FEVER.* 



Murrain, or pests, are undoubtedly the most serious epidemic 

 fevers that ever have appeared among domestic animals, owing 

 to their violence and fatality ; they have occasionally raged, from 

 the earliest historical accounts. From the several statements 

 that have been made concerning the disorder, it seems to_ have 

 varied in its symptoms and effects, according to the countries in 

 wliich it appeared, the various seasons in which its ravages were 

 commenced, and some other circumstances not perfectly ascer- 

 tained. It is evident that this disease was infectious, since it 

 was easily propagated among the species of animals which it 

 attacked ; but it is not certain that it has the power of spreading 

 to other species ; as men, horses, sheep, and dogs, that live in the 

 neighborhood of the cattle infected by it, evinced no signs of 

 having received the contagion. Nineteen out of twenty cattle 

 attacked by this disease are said, by Mr. Savage, to have died. 

 Causes. — The causes and nature of this disorder have not 

 been precisely ascertained. Some have imagined it to be con- 

 nected with a peculiar state of the atmosphere, and that it did not 

 originate in contagion. Many consider the principal cause of the 

 disease to be previous hard winters, obstructed perspiration, 

 worms in the liver, and corrupted food. 



* This disease is, no doubt, analagous to, or the same as the Pleuro-pueuraonia, or 

 possibly, Rinderpest, hereafter noticed. The disease had not, probably, appeared of 

 late, in England, when he wrote, as it has, in a few years since, with such fatal \io- 

 lence. It is evident that, personally, Mr. Lowson had little or no experience in its 

 treatment. We give his notice of it, however, as valuable in contributing somewhat 

 of knowledge concerning it. — L. F, A. 



