Foot-and-Mouth Disease. 
479 
was seriously advanced. Ireland is our great source of supply 
of store stock, and whether the animals are healthy or diseased,, 
we must have them. This fact is well known, and both in 
theory and in practice admitted. The prevalence of foot-and- 
mouth disease in Ireland recently did not in the slightest degree 
affect the price of Irish stock, nor lessen the demand for them in. 
this country ; and those who were loudest in their demands for 
stoppage of importation or the adoption of restrictions which 
would have amounted to the same thing, would have been the 
most appalled had their suggestion been accepted and acted on. 
The Irish cattle-trade cannot be placed on the same footing as 
the foreign cattle-trade, for the paramount reason that the cir- 
cumstances are essentially different in the two cases. Foreign 
animals are in no way under our jurisdiction or control until 
they are landed on our shores ; we cannot regulate their treat- 
ment in the countries whence they are exported, and therefore 
our only chance of safety lies in the establishment of severe 
restrictions, which shall deter the exporter from sending diseased 
stock, and protect us, as far as possible, from infection if dis- 
eased animals are landed. Regulations framed on this principle 
have been in force for some time past, and it is sufficient to 
say of them that they have been generally effectual in securing 
the object for which they were established. 
In the United Kingdom we possess the power to apply 
sanitary regulations to our flocks and herds, and our aim should 
be to attack such an affection as foot-and-mouth disease in its 
centres ; in fact, it should be the care of every stock-owner to 
deal with the malady in such a manner that the risk of propa- 
gation should be reduced to a minimum. Legislation on the 
subject may well be limited, as it now is, to those sections of the 
Act which provide that diseased animals shall not be exposed 
in public places or otherwise dealt with so as to inflict injury on 
healthy animals. Further than this, sanitary law, as respects foot- 
and-mouth disease, it would seem from our experience, cannot 
be successfully carried ; and the actual details of measures of pre- 
vention must be left to the energy of the individual who is most 
concerned, the stock-owner, directed by the veterinary surgeon. 
Two words, isolation and disinfection, taken in their extended 
sense, include all that can be said on the subject of prevention. 
The disease is not fatal, and therefore there is no justification 
for the adoption of the stamping-out system, as it is applied to 
cattle-plague. Considerable loss is, however, inflicted on the 
grazier and the dairyman, and therefore it is important to 
employ all sanitary means to regulate the course of the disease, 
to moderate its severity, and to prevent its extension. 
Veterinary science is quite competent to deal effectively with 
