756 TRANSLATIONS FROM CONTINENTAL JOURNALS. 
number of detractors, in common with many other valuable 
discoveries which have not been universally adopted until 
after many obstacles have been encountered. It is always 
easier to condemn a new method than to confirm its utility, 
or to support it by positive facts ; but the unfavorable cases 
of inoculation are very few, particularly when the season and 
other circumstances have been taken into account, com¬ 
pared with those cases which have been successful. 
In the natural course of the malady the losses amount from 
one third to one half or two thirds; by the inoculation one 
must be very unfortunate if they amount to one tenth of the 
animals operated on. Sometimes no loss is sustained, par¬ 
ticularly if the inoculation is performed before the malady has 
invaded the flock,a circumstance which should always be taken 
into consideration. In a treatise on the inoculation and vacci¬ 
nation of sheep, which appeared in 1822, it is shown that of 
32,317 inoculated, 32,121 proved successful, and 196 unsuc¬ 
cessful: of which 31,851 recovered, and only 270 died, which 
amounts to about 3 in 400. From 31,851 successfully inocu¬ 
lated cases 7697 were afterwards submitted to divers experi¬ 
ments, in order to ascertain their immunity, by cohabitation, 
&c., with infected flocks, at various stages of the malady, which 
all went to prove thepreservative power of inoculation. M.Guil¬ 
laume inoculated twenty-seven flocks of sheep, amounting to 
10,626 in all; 1883 had had the malady before the inoculation, 
therefore 9443 were inoculated; of this last number 9077 
were successful. This, however, did not prevent the breaking 
out of the malady amongst those on which the inoculation 
had been unsuccessful, the majority of which died, while only 
fourteen died from the effects of the inoculation. Results 
like these speak for themselves. They are all decisive in 
favour of inoculation, and are not the results of isolated cases 
or incomplete experiments. They are deduced from prac¬ 
tical obervations on more than 40,000 individuals, and we 
are indebted for them to men of the highest standing. 
The best remedies lose much of their efficacy by being- 
applied too late; the same holds good when a flock of sheep 
in which the malady has already made its appearance is 
inoculated ; it often causes the latent virus to develop itself, 
and inconveniences—less^ grave, however, than those conse¬ 
quent on the natural development of the malady—cannot 
always be prevented. It is, therefore, advisable that every 
sheep-owner, when the malady prevails in the neighbourhood, 
should inoculate his flocks before the malady has invaded 
them, in order to prevent by that means the heavy losses 
caused by this dreaded epizootic. 
