578 
Foreign Department. 
INOCULATION FOR CONTAGIOUS PLEURO-PNEUMONIA. 
Contagious pleuro-pneumonia, as its name indicates, is a 
disease of the lung and its envelopes, having the sad pro- 
perty of transmission from the diseased animal to the sound 
one ; it is confined to the ox species, though it has been 
known to attack the pig, and some say, the goat ; its charac- 
teristic symptom, its progress, terminations, and the post- 
mortem lesions it leaves behind, are too well known to need 
repetition. A great number of proprietors unfortunately 
have but too much reason to be acquainted with it ; and the 
numerous publications on the subject, are sufficient to inform 
those who have not had such opportunities. Nevertheless, 
there are some points on which, public opinion is not suffi- 
ciently made up to assist renewed inquiry. Contagion is 
beyond doubt established by correct observers, and yet 
everywhere incredulous persons are met with among those 
of superficial observation. This disease, it is true, is not 
contagious the same as typhus, the rot, the itch, &c., but is 
so after a manner peculiar to itself, being special in its mode 
of transmission; and so, people say, how does it happen that 
the beast standing next to one dead of the disease, does not 
contract it, but remains even exempt, although one standing 
at the bottom of the stable becomes affected. This is easily 
explained. The contagious virus of this epizootic is volatile, 
and consequently floats in suspension in the atmosphere; 
all animals in the same habitation absorb it without excep- 
tion, and if some contract it more readily than others, it is 
owing to the disposition of their temperaments ; they must 
remain for a certain time, in such cohabitation, that the air 
respired by the diseased animal be inhaled by the healthy 
one, and that for a certain time and in indeterminate quan- 
tity. Some animals there are so refractory to its action, 
that I have seen cows resist two successive invasions of it, 
and yet fall victims to a third. This fatal property is so 
strongly confirmed by experience, that I fear not to say, 
that out of tw.enty cases, but one was spontaneous to nineteen 
caught by contagion. This dreadful disease appeared for 
the first time in 1840, in the department of Murat. 
An animal cured of pleuro-pneumonia is no more liable 
to the disease : to this general rule I have seen no exception. 
What may in some cases have given rise to a contrary belief 
