The Rut in Sheep. 



97 



tinuance of this sad state of things, and ever must while the 

 produce of six or seven acres is annually carted off the farm into 

 London to bring back manure enough for only one. 



Let these farms, however, be effectually under-drained, let the 

 impoverished meadows be moderately limed to begin with, let 

 them be subsequently dressed with farmyard and well-selected 

 artificial manure — and thus made fit for the keeping of better 

 sheep and for the profitable feeding of them with cake and 

 corn — and soon the whole district will wear an altered appear- 

 ance, and rot be almost unknown. 



We cite this condition of a neighbourhood with which we are 

 practically familiar, as an example of what we frequently see in 

 our professional travels, and it is not too much to say that were 

 good drainage generally adopted thousands of sheep whose lives 

 are yearly sacrificed to rot and other diseases would be saved to 

 the benefit of the community. 



Parkinson has a case so much to the point that we transcri be 

 it. Lie says : — 



"The very farm on which I was born, at Abey Grange, Lincolnshire, 

 deemed so rotten that the oldest inhabitants advised my lather, when he took 

 it, not to keep sheep, but to breed horses and cattle. The greatest portion 

 was a poor, sour, hungry clay, so tenacious as to hold water in most parts 

 like lead ; but when drained properly with open drains, I question if there- 

 was a sounder farm in the kingdom. I acted as shepherd lour years, and as 

 we killed our own mutton, J officiated as butcher during that time, and also 

 for four years after, but do not remember seeing a single fluke in any one 

 liver. Even during the year when nearly all the sheep in the neighbourhood 

 were rotten, my father lost but seven out of about four hundred on that farm. 

 Therefore it appears certain, that were lands properly drained, they would 

 seldom produce the rot in sheep; for though water of itself will not occasion 

 the disease, yet on over-moist lands something is bred that will/' 



It will be observed that Parkinson alludes to open drains, a 

 system now rightly exploded. The allusion, however, is valu- 

 able, because if by so imperfect a plan of drainage much benefit 

 was produced, none can doubt that, by a more perfect system, 

 the gain would lie far greater. In another place he tells us that 

 these open drains were often made '1 feet wide and L4 inches 

 deep, so that the loss of land alone must have been considerable. 



We may now pass to another principle in preventing this 

 disease, namely, that of destroying the immature forms of the 

 fluke after they have entered the stomachs of the sheep. This 

 brings us again to the question of the administration oi sail as 

 an effectual agent for this purpose. Its combination with sul- 

 phate of iron and aniseed will materially increase its prophy- 

 lactic power. Indeed no better medicinal compound tor this 

 purpose can be employed than the one named under the heading 

 of the "Treatment <>f Diseased Sheep." The daily use ol 



these agents will not only arrest the last metamorphosis ot the 



II 



