132 
ACORN-POISONING. 
the fields after having well satisfied themselves with food in 
the sheds.” 
All the details w r hich have been recorded by the various 
members of the profession who have communicated with us, 
agree with our own observations and experiments, and point 
to the conclusion that the mischief is done in the early part of 
the acorn season, at which time the seeds are certainly want- 
ing in the sweetness and nuttiness of flavour which they sub- 
sequently possess, even if they do not contain some acrid or 
volatile principle which is afterwards changed or dissipated. 
Symptoms and morbid appearances, in the cases which were 
investigated during the last outbreak, were in all respects 
identical with those which have been recorded as characterstic 
of acorn-poisoning in 1868. At first the animals were observed 
to be “doing badly;” the movements were tardy, and there 
was the peculiar dreariness of aspect apparent. Constipation 
was generally present, the coat was rough and harsh to the 
touch, and the skin tightly adherent to the sides. This con- 
dition of things continued for some time at least, without any 
modification which was apparent to the herdsman, until one 
or two animals became suddenly worse, or, perhaps, were 
found dead in the field. 
If the nature of the disease was at once discovered or sus- 
pected, the rest of the herd was removed from the pasture ; 
this precaution, however, was in very many instances adopted, 
too late to save the majority of the animals. After an inter- 
val of a few days others would become sick, notwithstanding 
their complete abstinence from acorns, and, indeed, from all 
kinds of food save that which was given with the drenching 
horn ; so by degrees the greater part of the herd would in 
many instances succumb, some of the animals being attacked 
with fatal illness ten or twelve days after their removal from 
the acorn pasture. 
One very remarkable instance of the progress of the disease 
after the removal of the cattle from the pastures on which 
acorns were scattered came under our observation in the 
beginning of November last. A herd of nearly thirty Scotch 
steers was turned into a park in the spring of 1870, and con- 
tinued in the pastures all the summer. The herbage during 
the long dry season was very scanty, but the animals remained 
in good health until after the fall of acorns, during the high 
winds which prevailed about the middle of September. 
From this time all the herd became unthrifty in appearance, 
and the animals generally presented those symptoms of lassi- 
tude and debility which have been described. About the 
second week of October five of the young stock died in quick 
