740 
SMALLPOX AMONG SHEEP IN WILTSHIRE. 
remainder of the flock; for it should be borne in mind that the earlier cases 
are generally mild, and the disease increases enormously in virulence and 
fatality as it extends. The advantages in favour of this plan appear to be 
these : we may select the most favorable weather for the operation, and in 
the course of six weeks are free from further anxiety about the matter ; the 
utmost care can be taken of the flock during the period, and the greatest 
vigilance exercised to prevent the spread of disease to other flocks—care 
and vigilance which it may be difficult to adopt through so long a period as 
the system of continual turning might demand. Besides which, it should 
be remembered that there are at least three ewes to one wether sheep, and 
these ewes being kept for breeding, it is of the utmost importance to select 
the earliest and most favorable time for receiving the disease, and not to 
run the risk of their getting the disease naturally just previous to lambing. 
It is quite a mistake to suppose that the risk of spreading infection is 
increased by inoculation; in fact, it is lessened, for the disease becomes 
milder, having a mortality ranging from 2 to 10 per cent. It is also cir¬ 
cumscribed, and necessarily entails the utmost vigilance, and prevents the 
sale of sheep from the flock for a given period—of twenty-one days.” 
The course here so clearly and, in our opinion, convincingly 
advocated, would appear to be substantially the same as that 
adopted by Professor Simonds in Wiltshire. 
The advantages to be derived from the practice of inocu¬ 
lation under the circumstances recommended are so well set 
forth in the extract we have just quoted from the f Book of 
the Farm/ that it seems almost superfluous to reiterate them. 
It may he as well, however, to examine a little more spe¬ 
cifically the objections advanced against the practice. The 
objection most persistently urged at the present moment is, 
that by inoculation the disease would be largely multiplied, 
and the chances of its spread and naturalisation among our 
flocks increased. The answer to this is, that the measure is 
not to be had recourse to, neither is it advised, except when 
the disease has actually broken out among a flock, when 
separation and isolation have failed, and when there is a high 
probability of the malady running through the whole of the 
sheep. That, as a consequence, it substitutes a milder form 
of the disease for the natural disease, and limits the duration 
to a brief period of three or four weeks, obviating a probable 
duration of three or four months. In both ways, by the 
mitigation of the severity of the disease and the limitation 
of its prevalence, it diminishes the risk of spreading—a risk 
still further diminished by the more complete and thorough 
care which can be exercised over an entire inoculated flock 
than over a flock passing through the natural disease, and by 
the almost impossibility of an inoculated sheep being passed 
into the market or otherwise disposed of. 
It is also urged that inoculation proves disadvantageous by 
giving the disease to animals which might otherwise escape, 
