commonly known as Dropping after Calving. 
2G3 
recognise her calf and present indications of recovery, no more 
medicine should be given ; but every care and attention be 
paid to the animal by good nursing and a careful selection of 
easily digested food. 
Preventive Measures. — The great fatality of the disease, 
notwithstanding the best directed efforts of cure, gives an in- 
creased value to the means of prevention, as on them reliance 
has to be placed for diminishing the number of attacks. The 
basis on which prevention rests is that of bringing the pregnant 
animal into as healthy and natural a condition as possible, by 
the adoption of hygienic and dietetic principles. Cows of a full 
habit of body or plethoric tendency are, as we have seen, the 
most predisposed to the disease. To lessen this, restricted diet, 
selection of food containing less nutritive matter, but good in 
quality and easy of digestion, daily walking exercise, clean 
lairage, the occupancy of well-ventilated buildings, and the 
keeping of the secretory and excretory organs active by the ex- 
hibition of medicinal agents, may be said to be among the 
most effective of these means. 
The value of prophylactics, great as it may be, is sometimes 
diminished by causes over which we seem to have little or no 
control. This position may be illustrated by the following 
particulars. For five years, 1838-42, we had under our care 
a very valuable herd of English-bred Jersey cows — twenty-five 
in number — among which parturient apoplexy had prevailed to 
a most serious extent, the annual losses by death averaging 
not less than 20 per cent. The animals, which were the pro- 
perty of a nobleman, were well cared for, and never allowed to 
leave the park in which the ducal mansion was situated. Being 
a so-called self-supporting herd, the annual losses were filled 
up by the bringing in of the in-calf heifers. We had full 
authority to use any means thought right for the purpose of 
preventing the occurrence of the disease, and did not fail to 
make good use of the privilege. Hygienic principles were 
adopted throughout the whole period of utero-gestation, and 
these were added to by the exhibition of aperient and other 
medicinal agents both immediately before and after parturition. 
In selected cases bleeding was had recourse to, and, when the 
state of the mammary glands permitted or required, milking 
before calving was also adopted. From the time of the birth 
of the calf till the expiration of the third day a cowman was 
kept night and day watching the animal, ready to take ad- 
vantage of the slightest appearance of ill-health by the exhi- 
bition of medicine with which he was furnished. As may be 
supposed, many attacks were avoided and more lives were 
spared ; but it was a remarkable circumstance that, during the 
five years alluded to, the mortality was never reduced below 
