702 
REPORTS OF OASES. 
an entirely different breed were found to be affected. Now, 
two ideas, that of a peculiar manner of breeding and inher¬ 
ited disease, have been dispensed with. Next the pastures 
were examined, and no cause found, the animals running on 
blue grass pasture and high rolling, well-drained land, no 
swamps or low land being accessible. These pastures have 
not been ploughed for twelve or fifteen years. Failing so 
far, the next step was that of supposed microbic origin, the 
disease lately seeming to be infectious or contagious, so fre¬ 
quent have been the new cases developed. So far there have 
been no positive results in that line of research. Having de¬ 
cided to try and find the real cause by means of the micro¬ 
scope, an animal near death was selected and destroyed. 
Post-mortem .—Before speaking of the post-mortem proper, 
I will call attention to the method used to throw the animal. 
Being very bad, locomotion was necessarily slow and irregu¬ 
lar. He was urged along very slowly to a point where we 
wished to destroy h:m. Just at this point I walked up closer, 
and as 1 did so the excitement was increased, which in the 
same ratio decreased the speed, until finally the poor beast 
was unable to move, and looked as though it were tied to the 
spot. Then by laying the hand upon the animal’s back with 
a light tap, it would drop over as though it were knocked 
down, its muscles being perfectly rigid. At this stage it is 
unable to rise until after some minutes have elapsed. The 
post-mortem revealed nothing, all the internal organs appear¬ 
ing normal, and the different apparatuses appearing perfectly 
healthy. This was a disappointment. The nerves, together 
with the spinal cord and brain, with their meninges and 
substance, failed to show any change so far as gross anatomy 
was concerned. After the post-mortem, portions of the 
nerves, the spinal cord, the whole brain substance, together 
with its meninges, were obtained, from which cultures were 
made and of which a microscopic examination was made. 
This examination revealed an atrophy of the nervous 
structures, and in some parts only the axis cylinder remained, 
existing as a string. These experiments are still in progress, 
though no positive results have so far appeared. 
