630 ON THE VARIOLA OR SMALL-POX OF SHEEP. 
seeds of a scrofulous diathesis and consequent consumption in its 
thousands ; and it is a well-known fact that many children have 
ever after vaccination been subject to breakings-out of a scrofulous 
tendency, where nothing of the kind previously existed in their 
families. 
Our neighbours the French have, to diminish the ravages of the 
small-pox in sheep, adopted the system, to a certain extent, of 
inoculating their flocks, by which means, some say, it lessens its 
fatality, and saves time, by getting them through the disease in 
two or three months, whereas, when it takes its natural course, it 
occupies six ; this to the flock-master is of the greatest import- 
ance : however, they are divided in opinion as to its advantages 
and disadvantages, and in many districts where it has been tried 
it has again been abandoned. I should, myself, question its po- 
licy, as it tends to perpetuate a disease in the country, which by 
sanitary regulations on the part of government, and the active co- 
operation of local authorities and agriculturists, might be arrested 
in its course, and thus die out of the country. 
The French have tried how far, by inoculating the human sub- 
ject with the small-pox matter of sheep, it would protect them from 
the human small-pox. The experiment was tried upon some 
children ; but there was no susceptibility evinced in their consti- 
tution to take the contagion : it merely produced a little local 
inflammation, which died away in a few days, without producing 
any pock or constitutional fever. Sheep were then inoculated 
with the same matter as was employed upon the children, and it 
produced the variola ovis well and fully developed. 
In inoculating sheep, the operation should be performed either 
on the inside of the thigh or fore-arm, or, still better, under the 
belly, as it does not then interfere with the progression of the ani- 
mal, and is, consequently, attended with less pain. The operation 
consists simply in introducing the point of the lancet carefully 
under the cuticle, betwixt it and the true skin, but so as not to 
occasion any loss of blood; as it might, by carrying the matter out 
along with it, or diluting it too much, render it of non-effect. You 
then arm another lancet with the matter recently taken from the 
pock, and introduce it under the cuticle, pressing gently upon its 
point as you draw it out, that the matter may be retained. Some 
simply make slight scratches with the point of the lancet, and rub 
the matter on; others soak a little cotton in the matter, and pass it 
under the cuticle, leaving it there. 
The general treatment of the disease is the same as when naturally 
taken. The matter selected should be taken from the pock in its 
limpid state, about the seventh or eighth day : after that period it 
