PALSY IN SHEEP. 
127 
existence, yet the suitableness of their locality, to damp and un- 
healthy pastures, neglect, starvation, or hereditary predisposition. 
I have treated of this at length when speaking of the hydatid 
in the brain of sheep ; and while we must not abandon the indi- 
vidual cases that come under our notice, we must found our hope 
of eradicating the disease from the farm or the district on the 
adoption of a more rational, and humane, and profitable way of 
managing our sheep. 
Connected with cutaneous Disease. — Girard speaks of palsy as 
very common among the sheep in various departments of France, 
and in Germany ; but he connects it with other complaints — the 
sheep pox, of which fortunately we know but little in England, 
and the scab, of which we occasionally see too much. He de- 
scribes it as preceded by intolerable itching. The animal violently 
rubs himself against every object with which he can possibly 
come in contact. He works himself into a perfect rage and 
fever ; he stands and shivers from head to foot, and sometimes 
falls into an epileptic fit, but of no great violence or length- 
ened duration. This pruritus commences about the tail and the 
croup ; it rapidly spreads over the loins and the back, it extends 
to the head, and reaches to the very feet. He bites himself, 
he tears away the wool, he abandons himself to every kind of 
violence. By and by his intellect is evidently affected — he has 
a wild and wandering look, and the slightest disturbance frightens 
him beyond measure. He strays hither and thither; he stops 
every moment in order to bite or rub himself; his walk is va- 
cillating, staggering; the uncertainty of gait is sometimes re- 
ferrible to the fore extremities, sometimes to the hind ones, and, 
at other times, both are affected. Every motion is attended by 
an increasing degree of uncertainty. He falls on his knees ; he 
falls completely down, and remains a considerable time before he 
is able to rise ; at length he falls to rise no more, but even then he 
seeks for something to eat, and, if it is brought, he will live in 
this miserable state eight or ten days. 
Pathological Explanation . — How shall we account for the pa- 
ralytic state of the patient, which forms the closing scene of this 
sad disease? Is the nervous system completely exhausted by the 
long continuance of intolerable irritation? I can readily conceive 
of the spinal cord and its membranes sharing in this intense in- 
flammation, spread everywhere around them, and invading every 
part to which the nervous fibrils are sent. I can conceive this 
ultimate exhaustion of sensorial power to be the natural or ne- 
cessary consequence of cutaneous, and, perhaps, deeper seated 
erythism like this. 
The repelling of cutaneous Eruptions. — Among the causes of 
