GLANDERS. 
646 
periodic ophthalmia and grease. Supposing the existence of a 
virus in each one of these diseases, nobody would contend they 
Madness, to the question, “ Have the goodness to state what (in the course 
of many years’ experience) has occurred to you ?” he gave the following 
answer : — 
“ I have made up my mind on one point, in which many people, however, 
are of a different opinion, — that the disease is often produced without conta- 
gion.” 
“ Spontaneously ?” — “ Yes ; but when I say spontaneously, I believe that to 
arise in consequence of the fact of their being exposed to their dung and 
urine, and to confinement, too much feed and too little exercise. I do not 
believe that carrion flesh is capable of producing it, but I think it arises more 
from being confined, tied up, and exposed to their own dung, and their own 
urine, and their own breath, and also from the want of proper exercise. I be- 
lieve that, with hounds in kennels that are properly attended to, it is rather 
an uncommon disease ; but when the kennel has not been attended to, canine 
madness sometimes takes place, of which I know one instance in particular : 
the subscription pack of fox -hounds in Surrey had the disease to a consider- 
able extent, and there was one remarkable fact, that the dogs did not bite the 
bitches, nor the bitches bite the dogs. The kennel had been very much 
neglected ; there was no water flowing through the kennel : I suggested im- 
provements in that respect, and the disease for a length of time disappeared.” 
“ In the cases you are now speaking to, have you examined the dog after 
its death in any case where the dog has not been bitten ? ” — “It is impossible 
to prove the negative : we cannot say the dog has not been bitten ; but if it did 
always arise from the dog being bitten, how came the first dog to he mad? 
But, independently of that fact, it will be found, that in different parts of the 
country you hear nothing of hydrophobia, and then you hear of it in different 
parts of the country pretty nearly at the same time. Now there are many 
diseases highly contagious in themselves, but which are capable of being pro- 
duced without contagion. The glanders can be thus produced — it is a con- 
tagious disease ; and so is farcy ; and yet it is a fact that these diseases are 
more frequently generated than propagated by contagion. The itch also is 
notoriously produced by filth, and, when produced, becomes contagious ; so 
with ship fever and gaol fever, which, when they break out, become conta- 
gious ; but they can be generated.” 
“ Would the glanders be produced by inoculation in the case you refer to ?” 
— “ I can mention one extraordinary instance, which was in the Quiberon ex- 
pedition, There were a great many horses examined prior to their going out, 
and not one of them had any apparent disease : they were put on board dif- 
ferent transports ; they encountered a hurricane ; they were obliged to put 
down the hatches ; several horses were suffocated, and great numbers of 
them became glandered in consequence. At Dover, in the year 1796, where 
there was a great encampment, the government could not get stables to 
receive them late in the autumn : they built close and confined stables ; 
and the most healthy horses went into those new stables, and a great number 
became glandered, affected with farcy or diseases : a great many of them died. 
Many of the horses were sent to Hythe and placed in an open shed ; not one 
of these horses became affected. It was certainly intended that animals with 
lungs should have an element to breathe once, and but once, and that the air 
should receive something from the blood, and impart something to the blood ; 
but that, when made to go several times into the lungs, it produces a disease 
which becomes infectious. In the human subject it produces fevers and the 
plague, and farcy and glanders in horses, the pip in fowls, and the husk in 
pigs.” 
