RELATIONSHIP OF WHITE SNAKEKOOT AND MILKSICKNESS. 13 



pound (226.8 grams) of the fresh plant and also some milk extract of 

 the plant, more of the plant than the first (a larger cat) received. 

 The cat was dull and showed tremors at times after the first feeding, 

 but the appetite remained good, and eleven days later trembling could 

 still be seen. Eighteen days later the animal was fed on the carcass 

 of a rabbit which had died after eating the same plant (see experi- 

 ment No. 6). This rabbit had died three days before the feeding of 

 the cat began. Some tremors were seen in the cat, but it ate and con- 

 tinued active for three days, when it was killed. This experiment is 

 open to the objection that nothing was known of the cat previous to 

 the feeding, and cats often show slight tremulous movements of the 

 cutaneous muscles. Then again, granting that the tremors were due 

 to eating the meat, no record is made of having preserved the rabbit 

 meat on ice, and decomposition may already have begun, and the mere 

 presence of muscular tremors of unknown origin without the other 

 clinical symptoms does not indicate the disease known as " trembles." 



Experiment No. 3. — A cat whose previous history was not given 

 was fed on the same carcass given to the cat referred to in experiment 

 No. 2, and on that referred to in experiment No. 7, after it had stood 

 two days, and the feeding was continued three days ; then it was fed 

 on a similar rabbit two days after death. This animal showed tre- 

 mors and died in twenty days. The temperature of this animal rose 

 about 2^° F. on the third day before death. The buttocks were re- 

 ported soiled, so evidently it had no marked constipation. Now, con- 

 stipation is a symptom which Kimmell, Drake, Chesney, Graff, and 

 others had previously noted in animals affected with the " trembles," 

 and is one of the characteristics of milksickness. a Post-mortem ex- 

 amination showed two ounces of acid fluid in the peritoneal cavity. 



Experiment No. If. — A cat which was sick before beginning the 

 experiment was fed with a milk extract of the plant, but only showed 

 light symptoms (diarrhea) and " was seen to tremble only a few times 

 and then under conditions which might probably have produced trem- 

 bling without the aid of any poison." This animal was then fed on 

 meat from one of the rabbits used in previous experiments. Moseley 

 said that " the meat seemed to affect him more than the milk." 



Experiment No. 5. — A dog was fed on an aqueous extract of the 

 plant mixed with milk and some chopped-up plant mixed in hash and 

 showed some trembling and weakness, but Moseley adds " he was not 

 so different from usual except in the early morning but what all these 

 things might have escaped notice if he had not been watched." In 

 other words, an animal which Graff had shown to be very susceptible 



« Chesney, J. P. Milk Sickness. St. Joseph Med. and Surg. Rep., vol. 1, p. 

 99, 1880.— Kimmell, J. A., 1. c, p. 51.— Drake, D., 1. c. ; cow,, p. 170 ; horse, p, 

 173; dog, p. 174.— Graff, G. B., 1. c, p. 360. 



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