SHEEP DISEASES : CAUSES, NATURE AND PREVENTION. 321 
To summarize the remarks 1 have so far made I may say that 
all diseases which have their origin in an altered state of the 
blood—and such form the vast majority of the diseases from 
which sheep suffer—may be arranged under four heads. 
1. Those marked by deficiency in the quantity of blood, or of 
certain important elements thereof, and especially diminution of 
its red cells {anaemia), in which debility is the marked feature, 
and in which blood medicines (phosphates, iron, and cod-liver oil) 
are required. 
2. Those marked by excess of the normal elements of the blood, 
either of its fat-forming or flesh-producing materials, or both 
{hypercemia), and in which congestion, inflammation and hemor¬ 
rhage are apt to occur in one or more of the important organs of 
the body, as the liver, lungs, and intestines; and in which some 
exciting cause, such as cold, is alone required to determine an at¬ 
tack : in these, depletives (as bleeding with laxative and saline 
alteratives) are required. 
3. Impoverishment and degradation of the blood {spanaemia) 
the degraded matter being passed out by the glands of the 
bowels, producing diarrhoea or dysentery ; or by the kidneys, 
producing albuminous or bloody urine or diabetes; in which 
the navel-string of the lamb should be tied with a silk or cotton ligature and 
thoroughly dressed with some antiseptic lotion or liniment immediately after 
birth. 
Lambing Fever. —Septic or erysipelatous inflammation of the womb (metri¬ 
tis) has its origin also, in the vast majority of instances, in a depraved condition 
of the blood. In some instances the affection is undoubtedly due to the local 
access of septic germs by the contaminated skin of the hand of the shepherd, by 
wounds, or by retention and subsequent decomposition of the after-birth. But, 
while I make this acknowledgment, I cannot too strongly express the opinion 
that in most cases the disease is primarily of systemic origin, aud this is proved 
by the fact that its progress can generally be arrested by the adoption of judi¬ 
cious alterative treatment, by the fact that when the disease is prevalent amongst 
ewes, their lambs are the subjects of joint-ill and navel-ill, and by the further 
fact that the udder is frequently the seat of septic or erysipelatous inflammation; 
and, after death, by the existence of effusions and extravasations into the various 
tissues of the body. 
Notwithstanding that I hold this opinion, I must insist upon the necessity of 
the application of some antiseptic lubricating agent to the hands and arms of 
shepherds engaged in delivering ewes, as also to the passage (vagina) of the ewes 
after delivery, i. e. , when artificial aid is required, or the ewes are unhealthy. 
