PLEURO-PNEUMONIA IN AUSTRALIA. 171 
The disease itself, in its first stage, is not of an inflammatory 
character, whatever it may resolve into afterwards. 
Zymotic is a term applied to diseases caused by the intro¬ 
duction of minute foreign matter into living bodies, thus pro¬ 
ducing very formidable effects, and may be inducted by 
inoculation (as the smallpox), or by natural causes through 
means of the lungs, the skin, or the blood. Pneumonia, 
therefore, is considered to rank under that category, is local 
and specific, and subject to similar laws as other zymotic 
maladies. We are aware that the presence of such a disease 
is denied by various members of the community, who very 
likely, on a cloudy day, would also deny that the sun was in 
the firmament because they could not see that luminary. But 
in face of so much testimony, it is waste of words to attempt 
farther proof, because facts do not require them. It is use¬ 
less to attempt convincing ignorance; whether learned or 
unlearned, both are equally obstinate to be convinced or 
converted. 
Nature of the disease .—We have strong evidence, says the 
learned professor already quoted, that pleuro-pneumonia is 
highly contagious; and, unhappily for the country, this fact 
has entirely been lost sight of. The disease is an epizootic, 
and was first introduced into Britain a little before the 
alteration of the tariff in 1842. It was then a new disease 
there, but not new in foreign countries. 
The history is obscure. Various authors have written on 
this subject. Silius Italicus describes one similar to the 
existing malady, with great accuracy, as appearing 212 years 
b.c. In France an epizootic pneumonia prevailed in one of 
its departments, through droved cattle, and spread over a 
wide extent of country; indeed, soon after it extended over 
the greater part of Europe, and manifested itself suddenly in 
Holland. In two years, the Dutch lost 28,000 cattle. It is 
now ascertained that pneumonia raged at different periods 
over Asia, Africa and Europe; now America and Australia 
begin to suffer by its pestilential introduction. 
The modern progress in Britain is well ascertained. It 
was brought from Holstein by some cattle imported into the 
north of Scotland—as if the farmers in that country did not 
possess better breeds of their own; and the disease spread 
with amazing rapidity by means of cattle driven from north 
to the southern markets; not one in a hundred recovered, 
and skill was tried in vain. The “ terms of contagion and 
infection,” says an eminent author, “we shall not scrupulously 
endeavour to discriminate. In strictness, contagion is 
applicable to communication by contact.” Without dis¬ 
cussing the ingenious arguments by which some writers have 
