THE ROT IN SHEEP. 



Introductory Observations. 



We repeat but a truism when we assert that the health of the 

 animals of the farm, especially that of cattle, sheep, and pigs, 

 influences to a considerable extent the amount of wholesome food 

 which is available for the people ; besides which, that it is an 

 abiding source of solicitude to the agriculturist himself, for upon 

 it very frequently depends his own success in the practice of his 

 profession. Whenever, therefore, disease assumes an extraordi- 

 nary type, spreading far and wide, and destroying in its progress 

 many of the animals which supply our daily wants, anxious 

 inquiries are made on all sides as to the means which are best 

 calculated to effect a diminution either of the extension or fatality 

 of the malady. 



During the year 1860 an event of this kind occurred in the 

 immense losses which took place among sheep from rot, which 

 had, as one of its minor but immediate results, the delivery of a 

 lecture on the disease before the members of the Royal Agri- 

 cultural Society by the author of the present thesis. The views 

 then expounded with reference to the pathology of the malady and 

 its causes were thought of sufficient practical importance by the 

 Council to warrant their publication in a form available for 

 future reference ; and accordingly the author was requested to 

 arrange the matter both for a pamphlet and the pages of the 

 Society's 6 Journal.' 



Again, in 1879 another similar outbreak of the disease having 

 taken place, and the supply of the Pamphlet being exhausted, the 

 Council at its December Meeting decided to republish it, with 

 the Author's emendations and additions. 



Antiquity and Extent of Rot. 



The frequent occurrence, insidious progress, and fatality of 

 rot, place it at the head of the most serious affections to which 

 sheep are liable. In this country no single disease produces 

 such destructive effects ; but on the Continent its fatality is 

 probably now and then equalled by ovine small-pox, a malady 



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