SELECT COMMITTEE ON CONTAGIOUS DISEASES BILL. 657 
This general redness is in a few hours followed by the forma- 
tion of what are technically called papulae. These papulae 
pass on gradually into a stage in which vesicles are produced 
on them, and these vesicles contain the materies morbi of the 
disease. Nature has purified, as it were, the system by the 
formation of these vesicles, and the consequence is, that, by 
taking the contents of them, we can propagate the disease 
from one animal to another, as we do in the ordinary process 
of inoculation. Subsequently to the formation of the vesicles, 
ulcers will be found upon the skin. These ulcers will extend 
more or less deeply into the skin, and the animal frequently 
dies in the ulcerative stage of the disease ; but it is more 
likely to die in the papular stage, from the circumstance that 
no purification of its system lias as yet taken place. The 
disease becomes contagious as soon as the papulae show 
themselves. It is difficult to say when it ceases to be con- 
tagious, and consequently I consider there should be in a 
Bill to prevent the spread of contagious diseases a regulation 
that no animal should either be sold by auction, or sent to a 
fair or market within four weeks from the time of the occur- 
rence of the last case, because I believe that about the wool 
of these animals the infection will hang, and that they can 
thus propagate the disease through the country. 
131. Was this disease imported from a foreign country? 
— It was imported into this country in 1847. 
132. Has it been prevalent since? — It was very prevalent 
for three or four years ; it subsequently ceased, and I believe 
at the present time we have no case of small-pox in the 
country. 
133. To what do you attribute that? — 1 attribute it in 
part to the inspection of animals at the Customs ; in part to 
the non-occurrence of the disease on the continent ; in part 
to our own legislation on the subject ; and in part also to 
the fact that the foreign sheep sent into the country are 
usually slaughtered within a few days of their being brought 
to market. When the system existed for the purchase of 
these sheep by farmers as store sheep, then there was a much 
greater risk run of the outbreak of the infection ; but it is 
known that for the last ten or twelve years no part of the 
continent of Europe from which we have had sheep has been 
infected with small-pox. It was generally found that these 
foreign sheep did not pay sufficiently well for their keep in 
this country, and consequently they are now sold to the 
butchers when they come in ; then we have had in operation 
the Act which practically has isolated these sheep from 
healthy ones. (To be continued .) 
xxx. 87 
