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A LECTURE ON THE DISEASES INCIDENTAL TO 
CATTLE DURING PREGNANCY, 
AND ON THE OCCASIONAL DIFFICULTIES PRESENTED AT THE TIME OF 
CALVING ; WITH PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS ON THE MEANS OF 
RENDERING ASSISTANCE. 
Delivered by Mr. T. J. Merrick, Veterinary- Surgeon, of Bridge- 
street, Northampton, to the Members of the Northampton Agri- 
cultural Book Club, at the Angel Hotel, on Saturday, the 14th 
of June, 1851. 
(Printed at the request of the Club, with the consent of the Author.) 
Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen, 
It is a full sense of the importance of my subject to you, as 
breeders and agriculturists, that has induced me to trespass on 
your time, whilst I submit for your reflection the following re- 
marks on the diseases incidental to cattle during pregnancy, and 
on the occasional difficulties presented at the time of calving. 
Without alluding to the principles or art of breeding (of 
which the nature of my subject might, perhaps, admit), or other- 
wise digressing by anatomical descriptions, I shall at once 
proceed to the consideration of the most formidable of the 
affections to which the cow is subject during the months of 
utero-gestation, viz., abortion. Most of you, I doubt not, have 
been occasionally troubled by the prevalence of such cases, 
and have at such times, probably, experienced the difficulty and 
uncertainty of arresting its progress through your in-calf stock ; 
therefore as sufferers I shall insure your interest and attention, 
and in my subsequent remarks, although I cannot hope to point 
out the means of arresting its progress in every instance, yet I 
trust I shall be enabled to convince you that its propagation 
may very frequently be prevented by paying close attention to 
the exciting causes, and by the application of remedies adapted 
to the various incentives, which at different times and on dif- 
ferent farms are known to predispose animals to the affection. 
The cow, of all our domesticated animals, is by far the most 
subject to abortion, yet the mare and sheep are occasionally so 
affected ; and the period of gestation in the cow at which this 
most frequently occurs is from the fourth to the seventh month, 
but not invariably so. 
Such cases are known to be far more common in some seasons 
and districts than in others ; hence many parties have been in- 
duced to believe that it assumes an epizootic character, and is 
