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POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
were conducive to the well-being of their hosts, or in any way 
necessary to their existence in the face of the fact that they 
are not present in the majority of healthy beasts ? On the 
other hand, it seems more probable that the development of 
such bodies in the elementary fibres of the muscles may be 
an indication that the beast has not been brought up under 
the conditions most favourable to health and vigour. 
There is reason to believe that the nutrition of our cattle is 
far too much artificially forced ; and, as a consequence, many 
of them die, cut off by disease, long before they have attained 
their full growth, and are fit for the butcher. It is scarcely 
necessary to observe that scientific inquiries in connection 
with the health and nutrition of cattle are likely to lead to 
important practical conclusions, and it is possible that 
very careful and detailed observations upon these entozoon- 
like bodies might lead to results, not only of scientific interest, 
but of some practical importance. 
Although, as I have said before, the existence of these 
bodies has been known, no helminthologist has yet succeeded 
in determining their nature. Indeed, it is not yet decided if 
they should be regarded as animal or vegetable, though the 
structure of the largest and most fully developed seen in the 
voluntary muscles is hardly such as would justify any one in 
regarding them as of a vegetable nature (pi. XI., fig. 4). 
Attention was first called to these curious, worm-like bodies 
in connection with the Cattle Plague by Dr. Fenwick in the 
Times of January 3rd, 1866. And, although some of his 
statements have since been called in question, the main facts 
he stated were correct, and have been confirmed. 
These bodies are exceedingly distinct; and I have found 
them in the muscles of every animal dead of Cattle Plague 
which I have examined, with one exception. And in all the 
different muscles examined from a single carcase many have 
been found. They vary much in size, but exhibit the same 
general characters (pi. XI., figs. 1 to 4). Those found in the 
heart, however, do not exhibit the characteristic peculiari- 
ties invariably present in the worm-like bodies (except- 
ing the youngest) in the voluntary muscles. There is little 
difficulty in finding them if only very small pieces of muscular 
tissue be subjected to examination; but, being very trans- 
parent, they are easily hidden from view if surrounded by 
several elementary muscular fibres, and may thus escape 
detection. They vary in number, and I should think that, in 
some cases, I have seen them as numerous as one to (at the 
most) twenty muscular fibres ; while in others, perhaps, they 
may not be found in greater number than in the proportion of 
one to a hundred muscular fibres. The smallest are oval; but. 
