GERMAN VETERINARY JURISPRUDENCE—SHEEP. 507 
change of weather ; the chronic variety only becomes worse in dry 
weather. 
If these distinctions are compared with the testimony of several 
of the witnesses which we have just related, it will be evident, 
from the long duration of the disease they describe, from the ab¬ 
sence of all disease in the mouth, and from the necessitv that there 
was for medical treatment, that those sheep purchased from the 
shepherd G. were labouring under the chronic variety of this dis¬ 
ease, and that they spread the infection through the whole flock. 
The conduct of Dr. H. was exceedingly imprudent, to say the 
least of it. He ought not to have warranted sheep as sound which 
came from a flock, some portion of which was suffering from dis¬ 
ease in the cleft of the foot, even though he might himself have 
considered that disease as an epizootic and not as chronic or con¬ 
tagious. 
The following facts tend to prove that the disorder which broke 
out in the sheepfold of Herr T. was that disease of the cleft of the 
foot termed chronic, and that it was communicated by infection 
from the sheep purchased from G.:— 
1. The length of time that it prevailed. 
2. Its communication by infection to the yearlings and dams. 
3. The testimony of Herr K., veterinary surgeon, who stated 
that he w'as well acquainted with the disease, and that it requires 
a very energetic.course of treatment. 
4. There being no one case in which disease of the mouth was 
united with this complaint in the feet, or in which the disorder 
was communicated to caKle, or any other animals. 
On summing up the whole, we cannot but attribute the extent of 
Herr T.’s losses to his own neglect and carelessness, and that of his 
servants; since it appears from the evidence of the shepherd K., 
that he informed the book-keeper as soon as ever he observed the 
first symptoms of the disease among the flock. The evil might 
have been prevented from spreading any further if the infected 
sheep had been separated from the others at once, and proper me¬ 
dical treatment applied. 
Every sheep owner ought to make it a rule never to introduce 
any strange sheep which have been ill, or which come from a place 
where there has been any prevalent disease, into his flock. 
Magazin fur die gasammte Thierheilkunde, 
vol. vi, p. 184. 
Berlin, 
Sep. 18, 1828. 
