Sanitary Police and the Cattle-Plague. 
in disappearing, as if it were at the express command of the 
Government. 
Contagion is thus the exclusive cause of the importation, the 
propagation, and the greater or less permanence of the cattle- 
plague in Western and Central Europe. 
From this conclusion, so certain and so incontestable, pro- 
ceeded all the sanitary measures which the International Con- 
ference decided upon, and the adoption of which they pro- 
posed to the governments of all the countries that are naturally 
exempt from the cattle-plague, and which suffer from it only 
by accident. 
But if it is certain that this disease never develops itself spon- 
taneously beyond the frontiers of the Russian empire, ought 
all the provinces of that empire to be equally suspected, and 
subject to the same interdiction? This is a question which it 
would have been very important to solve in the interests of 
commerce, but the elements necessary to the solution of it were 
not in the possession of the Conference. It is presumable, from 
the facts that the representatives of Russia made known, that 
in the Avestern provinces of the empire, the cattle-plague is pro- 
duced only by contagion, as in other parts of Europe ; and that it 
is in the Asiatic territories that the conditions for its spontaneous 
development are found ; but this is merely a presumption. It is, 
moreover, certain that the movement of beasts from the Ural 
Mountains towards the western frontiers of the empire too com- 
monly disseminate the germs of the contagion in the country 
that they traverse. Russia has, therefore, been, until the esta- 
blishment of new laws, necessarily left out of the Sanitary Con- 
vention which it was desired to establish ; and that country should 
not be allowed to export its cattle except under certain more or 
less efficacious guarantees, of which 1 shall speak presently. 
The danger of the cattle-plague is an incessant menace to 
Europe, as Russia has not yet attempted to defend its western 
provinces from its ravages. Could it not be neutralized by a 
general inoculation, rendered compulsory through the whole 
region of the Steppes? But the Steppes are of immisnse extent, 
and they are stocked with herds that may well be termed innu- 
merable. Under such conditions is inoculation really prac- 
ticable? At first sight it would appear that this question can 
be answered only in the negative. However, the objection as to 
its impossibility falls to the ground in face of the fact that the 
majority of the male beasts of the Steppes are oxen, and that, 
consequently, each of them has individually passed through the 
hands of the castrator. If castration is possible, then inocula- 
tion is equally so. But does its practice yield results of real 
economical advantage ? On this point the opinions of the mem- 
