PAUL PAQUIN. 
394 
this or other maladies. Occasionally calls could not be attended 
to for several days after their receipt in this office. He says : 
During my official labors in the past three years, I have had 
opportunities of observing this dreadful and destructive affection 
under a variety of circumstances. It is probably the most fatal 
malady that attacks cattle in this climate, and by far the most 
damaging in this State. The estimation of the losses it causes 
in Missouri alone must go up high into the thousands of dollars. 
The number of deaths recorded by one man alone, in the dis¬ 
charge of his complicated duties during three months, would 
amount to more than $14,000, at a very reasonable estimate. 
This does not include the great number of deaths reported by 
correspondence, nor the number that occurred in St. Louis alone, 
which would swell the sum to more than double that amount. 
Besides all those, how many cases have occurred that were 
indirectly reported, or not reported at all ? 
In view of the errors committed in dealing with Texas fever, 
I respectfully submit to the people a few suggestions which, if 
studied without bias (putting in practice what is practicable), 
cannot fail to prove beneficial, and diminish the loss to a great 
extent. This is one of the diseases that our laws fail to keep 
out; therefore, until we have them improved, it behooves every 
stock owner to be well acquainted with its nature and peculiari¬ 
ties. Let every stock man and farmer study them. I will write 
without technicalities. I do it for the layman’s benefit, and not 
for the professional or scientific. 
1. Texas fever, or splenic fever, .so called, may be termed a 
deadly blood disease of a dangerous character and due to the in¬ 
troduction into the organism of native cattle of a “germ” brought 
here generally by certain Southern cattle, which take them on 
Southern soil. 
2. Southern (or other) cattle born on Southern soils where 
those germs exist, acquire immunity against the disease, and thus 
may, without danger to themselves, carry the germs of the mal¬ 
ady in their bowels and deposit them on our land where natives 
may injest them and become inoculated, just on the principle that 
a man vaccinated against small pox has acquired immunity 
