Foot-and-31outh Disease : its History and Teachings. 7 
the time the animal was sent away did the disease exist in the 
county. The bull was shipped from Liverpool, and doubtless 
became infected during transit either on the rail or on board 
ship. The course of this entrance of the disease into Ireland, as 
gathered from the facts published at the time, was that the bull 
arriving in Dublin on January 17, 1883, showed symptoms 
of the complaint on the 22nd ; the infection was carried to 
yards where pigs were feeding, probably by the mediate agency 
of veterinarians ; some of these pigs were exposed in Dublin 
market, and were afterwards found diseased on the quay, 
awaiting shipment for England ; and a number of store cattle, 
from the store market alongside the pig market, were driven to 
the shipping yard, where the imported bull had been landed, 
and where the diseased pigs had been found ; these cattle were 
thence embarked for Glasgow, where they landed on February 4, 
and were found diseased two days later at Edinburgh. 
I need not recapitulate the subsequent course of the disease in 
England and Scotland, with the repeated suppressions in Scot- 
land, followed by repeated re-introduction, clearly traced to 
animals from Ireland, while the latter country continued affected. 
The whole history from first to last, and especially the con- 
tamination of Ireland, which had remained free for a long period, 
in spite of conditions, always present, which might generate 
the disease, if such an origin were possible, is consistent with 
the germ theory — a subject enlarged upon later on. The only 
rational principle of combating the contagion is based on a 
recognition of the germ theory, and consequently, to be carried 
out by the most efFectiv^e measures for not only preventing 
arrivals of the contagion on our shores, but for promptly stamping 
out initial cases when it has eluded the safeguards and obtained 
a footing within the kingdom. 
(2.) LEGISLA.TION upo:n Foot-and-Mouth Disease, 
Looking back over the period from our first becoming 
acquainted with the distemper " to the passing of the recent 
legislative measures, one is amazed at the ignorance which so 
long prevailed with respect to the formidable character of the 
disease. For a long course of years, how many agriculturists 
were under the impression that the malady was a dispensation of 
Divine Providence, against which it was vain to contend ; whilst 
a greater number believed that the complaint originated spon- 
taneously, or came " in the air " ; and these notions still linger 
in some quarters ' A few eminent men. Sir Lyon Playfair, M.P., 
among the number, still uphold the existence of some occult law 
of " periodicity," which governs the re-appearance and subsi- 
