EPIDEMIC CATARRH. 
117 
there was not a mews in Marylebone which did not contain some 
patients, while Westminster was exempt from disease; and in 
Marylebone I have known it to be confined to a district not a fur¬ 
long square. In one extraordinary case a fifth part of the horses 
in a certain mews died, while there was no vestige of disease else¬ 
where. I recollect that, in pne of our barracks, the majority of 
the horses on one side of the yard were attacked by epidemic 
catarrh, while there was not a sick horse on the other side. 
Most prevalent in crowded Stables .—These prevalences, and 
these exceptions, are altogether unaccountable. The stables, 
and the system of stable management, have been most carefully 
inquired into in the infected and healthy districts, and no satis¬ 
factory difference could be ascertained. One fact, however, has 
been established, and a very important one it is to the horse pro¬ 
prietor as well as the practitioner. The probability of the disease 
seemed to be in a tenfold ratio with the number of horses in¬ 
habiting the stable. Two or three horses shut up in a compara¬ 
tively close stable would escape. Out of thirty horses distributed 
through ten or fifteen little stables, not a horse would be affected; 
but in a stable containing ten or twelve horses the disease would 
assuredly appear, although it was proportionally larger and well 
ventilated. It is on this account that postmasters and horse- 
dealers dread its appearance. In a sickly season their stables are 
never free from it; and if perchance it does enter one of their 
largest stables, almost every horse will be affected. Therefore it 
is that grooms have so much dread of a distempered stable, and 
that the odds are so seriously affected if distemper has broken 
out in a racing establishment. 
Contagious .—Does this lead to the conclusion that epidemic 
catarrh is contagious? Not necessarily, but it excites strong sus¬ 
picion of it; and there are so many facts of the disease following 
the introduction of a distempered horse into an establishment, 
that we can hardly refuse to rank this disease among those that 
are both contagious and epidemic. It is strange what contrariety 
of opinion there is here between the theoretical and the practical 
man. I never met with a well-informed groom, or an extensive 
owner of horses, and who was much among them, or a country 
veterinary surgeon of much practice, that entertained a doubt 
about the matter. The shrewdest and most successful calcu¬ 
lators are they who are most alarmed at and influenced by the 
report of this disease in a favourite stable; yet there are veteri¬ 
nary surgeons, and of deserved eminence too, who stoutly deny 
the contagiousness of distemper in horses. It. is a subject that 
merits more attention than has hitherto been paid to it. 
Precautions .—I would, however, advise you, gentlemen, to 
