686 
DIARRHOEA IN LAMBS. 
anxiously looked for a practical article from one of your nu- 
merous friends on this subject; but as none has appeared, I 
am inclined to adopt the opinion that we, as a body, pay but 
comparatively little attention to this branch of our profession. 
For myself, I would quite as soon have a “ cow-case ” on my 
list as one of a horse belonging to a farmer; indeed, it proves 
more lucrative, and this by-the-bye seems, now-a-days, to 
form the basis of most men’s willingness to help others out 
of their difficulties. 
But to return to my subject, and carry out my first inten- 
tion of giving you a few facts which have come under my 
observation. 
In the month of May last, most of the low-conditioned 
lambs in this district became the subjects of a disease which 
proved most fatal to them, carrying off in most instances one 
third or one half of the animals affected. It was only the 
larger or better-conditioned lambs that outrode the attack. 
The nature of the first outbreak, which, as I said before, was 
in May, extending even to the latter part of June, was alto- 
gether different to that manifested of late. 
In the commencement, diarrhoea was the first and most 
prominent feature of the malady, and it was followed by 
cough, and great weakness ; the lambs walking with their 
noses close to the ground, and their ears pendulous, and 
dragging their hind extremities after them. These symptoms 
soon became more aggravated, when the animals showed a 
great desire for water; indeed, I have seen them drink so 
much as to cause their immediate death by the side of the 
stream. Other minor symptoms were also present, but 
which I need not detail, they being similar to those described 
by me in a number of the Veterinarian for 1852, in a paper 
bearing the signature of “ Young Practitioner.” At that 
time, and until last June, 1 considered the cause of the 
disease to exist in the digestive organs, and treated it accord- 
ingly, searching throughout our manual of Veterinary Phar- 
macy for something to arrest its progress ; but all 1 tried 
seemed to be of no avail. 
From some cause or other, the lambs after June became 
more healthy until the latter part of July, when the disease 
again broke out with increased violence, and extended so 
generally as to affect almost every flock ; the strong as well 
as the debilitated ones being now affected. They were swept 
away in such numbers, that the shepherd, on visiting his 
charge in the morning, very commonly found eight or ten 
dead, and others dying. 
Symptoms . — At first, slight cough existed, but which 
