92 



The Rot in Sheep. 



could only arise from a portion of the solution of salt being 

 absorbed into the general circulation, and exerting its secondary 

 effects on the secretory organs of the body. The liver would be 

 chiefly concerned in this process ; but we imagine that any 

 flukes which might perchance be inhabiting the biliary ducts 

 would escape all injury, and still cling to their habitat with 

 undiminished tenacity. 



Considering the importance of the question involved — for we 

 have known three ozs. of salt, dissolved in a pint of warm water 

 and given to a sheep after two days' fasting, to produce imme- 

 diate efforts to vomit and speedy death — we have looked closely 

 into the matter, but after considerable research have been unable 

 to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion as to the exact size of the 

 bushel in Mascall's time. It seems by the statutes of Henry III., 

 1216-72, and also of later kings, to have been enacted that the 

 gallon should contain eight troy pounds of dry wheat from the 

 middle of the ear, and that all ale, wine, and corn should be 

 measured by the same gallon, but which nevertheless appears 

 not to have been done — ale and wine being measured each by a 

 different and a smaller gallon than corn. 



Sir H. Spelman (born 1562, died 1641), and therefore con- 

 temporary with Mascall, says that the bushel contains "four 

 gallons of wine;" while Dr. Barnard, who was born in 1638, 

 three years before Sir H. Spelman's death, and who wrote on 

 ancient weights and measures, asserts the bushel to be rather 

 more than 59 lbs. avoirdupois of common corn (triticum), or, 

 allowing for the difference between troy and avoirdupois, to be 

 about double the size named by Spelman. 



It further appears that in 1650, the gallon for measuring " drie 

 things as come, coals, salt," &c, contained 272-25 cubic inches, 

 which would give the content of the bushel then in common 

 use as 2178 cubic inches. By the Act of 1697 " The Win- 

 chester round bushel was to be eighteen and a half inches in 

 internal diameter, and eight inches deep," thus fixing the gallon 

 at 268*6 cubic inches. 



In 1824 the Imperial bushel was fixed at 2218*2 cubic inches, 

 so that it would appear that the bushel of 1 650 was intermediate 

 in size between the Winchester and the now Imperial bushel, 

 containing in round numbers about a pint more than the former, 

 and a pint less than the latter ; but whether this was the size of 

 the bushel, or one of half that capacity, in use in 1587 is not 

 clear. 



The weight of salt varies in proportion to the amount of its 

 dryness and pulverous condition ; but taking an average speci- 

 men of table salt of ordinary dryness, an Imperial bushel will 

 weigh 64 lbs. avoirdupois, while of rough salt, such as in all 



