Small-Pox in Sheep. 557 
poor children aro thus exposal to tho disease, instead of having 
recourse to vaccination to protect them, goes amongst them day by 
day, and questions them as to whether they have a headache, feel sick, 
and so on ; and that on finding a child who says it docs not feel well, 
he sends it away ; that on the following day he finds another child 
making a similar statement, and this he treats in a similar manner. 
Is it not obvious that a system of the kind, so long as it is carried out, 
will be tho means of keeping up the disease, whether among children 
or sheep ? So much, then, for the separation, or keeping apart, of in- 
fected animals. 
The next suggestion, which rests entirely on the same ground, is 
that of taking away the affected animals and killing and burying them 
with their skins on, so as to prevent their doing any further mischief. 
I can imagine that under certain circumstances a man might go on 
killing his sheep, one after another, until he had destroyed his entire 
fiock, and during the whole time be keeping up a source of infection 
that would spread far and wide. I am, therefore, no advocate of a 
system of this kind. 
The Vaccination of Sheep. 
Tho vaccination of sheep as a preventive measure is a very im- 
portant question ; and I am happy to say that it has now been set at 
rest, if not for ever, at any rate for a considerable length of time, in 
consequence of the measures adopted by the Government, arising out 
of the recent outbreak of disease in Wiltshire. In order to deter- 
mine the prophylactic value of vaccination, the Government purchased 
200 sheep, which were placed under the care of Mr. Marson, the 
Surgeon of the Small-Pox Hospital, and myself. Those sheep were 
placed on a farm then in my occupation, in the immediate neigh- 
bourhood of London, that we might carry out a series of experiments 
upon them, to ascertain whether vaccination was protective or not. 
The Government had this question forced upon it by communications 
which appeared in the public papers at the time, from some leading 
agriculturists in the counties of Norfolk and Cambridge, and also 
from surgeons in the latter county, who strongly recommended the 
vaccination of sheep. Foremost among the Norfolk agriculturists, 
was Mr. Henry Overman, of Weasenham. That gentleman said 
in effect that during his late father's life the small-pox showed 
itself in their neighbourhood, and that his father vaccinated the whole 
of his flock ; that the sheep took the vaccine disease ; that they were 
protected from the small-pox ; and that any man who preferred inocu- 
lation to vaccination was little better than a madman. Statements 
also came from other persons, to the effect that they had vaccinated 
their sheep, and that they did not take the small-pox : but many of 
tho parties did not even say whether or not the sheep had ever been 
exposed to the disease. Coming back, however, to the late Mr. Over- 
t man : this gentleman stated, at a meeting of an agricultural society, 
held in Norfolk in 1848, that as a letter of sheep (Southdown rams), he 
conceived it to be his duty to send them out as free from disease 
as he possibly could, and therefore, when the sheep-pox showed itself 
VOL. XXV. 2 Q 
