1 88 2.] A Pathogenic Schisophyte of the Hog, 197 



death. But as all this is on record, published in works and peri- 

 odicals just as accessible to my readers as to myself, or perhaps 

 more so, as my present residence is in a country town, I shall not 

 dwell upon it any longer. 



It is now fourteen years ago, when so-called Texas fever was 

 decimating the cattle in Central Illinois, the peculiarities of that 

 disease, the characteristic morbid changes, the long period of in- 

 cubation, and particularly the manner in which the disease was 

 said to be communicated by Texas cattle to native animals, led 

 me to think that some microscopic organism, endowed with life 

 and power of propagation, and subject to changes and metamor- 

 phoses, must constitute the cause and the means of infection. I 

 communicated my views to the Hon. John P. Reynolds, then 

 Secretary of the Illinois State Board of Agriculture, and now 

 Chief Grain Inspector of Chicago. My communication, written 

 in verypoor English, and coming from an unknown person living 

 in a country town in Northern Illinois, was published in two Chi- 

 cago papers, but did not procure me an opportunity to make an 

 investigation. Still, even if it had, the investigation, very likely, 

 would not have resulted in anything. In the first place, I had 

 neither the means to procure, nor the necessary experience to 

 use, a first-class microscope, and moreover doubt whether, at that 

 time, fourteen years ago, an instrument was in existence in Amer- 

 ica that could have successfully coped with the question. Our 

 first-class homogeneous immersion objectives were not known 

 then. My suggestions to Hon. John P. Reynolds, whether known 

 or unknown to them, I do not know, were partially carried out, 

 or acted upon, by Professor Gamgee and his associates, and by 

 the Commissioners of the State of New York (cf. New York Agri- 

 cultural Report of 1867), but no satisfactory results were obtained. 

 The New York Commissioners even went so far as to send some 

 bile to Professor Hallier in Jena, who, of course, found and culti- 

 vated a great variety of fungi, and left the whole thing in a more 

 confused state than it ever was. At any rate, the whole investi- 

 gation, as far as the aetiology of Texas fever is concerned, did 

 not throw much light upon the subject. 



A little over three years ago I was requested by the late Com- 

 missioner of Agriculture, Hon. Wm. G. Le Due, to investigate a 

 very fatal disease of swine, known to the farmers as hog cholera, 

 and from the reports of the Department of Agriculture as swine 



