IS IT A VEGETABLE TOXICUM ? 
835 
The other three animals have so far convalesced that thera¬ 
peutics are discontinued, judicial care being considered fully 
sufficient to restore them. 
At the outset I suspected contagion or infection to be the 
agent of .this loss, but the symptoms failed to verify such a sup¬ 
position, consequently the cause must be attributed to the food, 
consisting of corn, cornstalks, hay and malt, which the cattle 
had been fed on some days prior to their taking sick. 
Dr. H. claimed the hay could not have been better, but as 
the cattle had not received any for a week or more, they ate 
hastily, not chewing it properly. The malt, which was all con¬ 
sumed, had been stored through the summer and may have been 
defective. The stablemen’did not consider the cornstalks faulty, 
but allowance must be made, as these people do not attach 
much importance to quality. 
I was suspicious that the stalks, not a vestige of which was 
left, was tainted with ustilago maidis, the poisonous virus gener¬ 
ally hidden either in corn, cornstalks, meadow-grass or hay, 
which, when eaten, is very apt to attack the sensorium and 
spinal cord almost simultaneously with the ganglion nerves, 
developing such ailments with but’few if any premonitory signs. 
The herd of cattle, together with another lot, were watered 
from the same creek, and not one of the latter took sick, a 
proof that the food alone is responsible for the harm done. 
Dr. H.’s description of some of the symptoms of the cattle 
which died within the first twelve hours, is as follows : They 
would become wild and frantic, break chains and ropes with 
which they were tied ; rear, plunge about, fall down ; roar, bawl, 
and moan piteously, and discharge a dry manure every little 
while until death relieved them. 
We are aware that these symptoms are not characteristic. 
Some of them are often exhibited in suffocation, brought on by 
tympanitis. Rut Dr. H. says that none of the animals under his 
charge were tympanitic enough to produce suffocation. 
If we would have had but one case to judge by, it would 
have been a difficult task to find criterions upon which we could 
