188 DISEASE IN WILD MAMMALS AND BIRDS 
large gut made by the insertion of the small intestine 
above the tip of the colon, is suggested in all families, 
although, as in the bears, it may be quite insignificant or 
rudimentary. Theoretically no stasis should occur at this 
point. The colon is short in all carnivores and, like the 
small gut, with a heavy wall. The comparative simpUcity 
of the carnivorous gut tract, the ability of many of these 
animals to disgorge, the suggestion of high resistance of 
the upper end of the tract to infection and the ease with 
which diarrhoea can clear out the tube, would seem to 
warrant the expectation that inflammation would not be 
serious. Such, however, is not the fact for, on the con- 
trary, they have shown a higher incidence than any other 
order for which we have adequate comparison. Anatomi- 
cally considered their stomach occupies the second place 
in vulnerability, next to the marsupials, and their 
intestines the highest place ; this indicates of course that 
combined gastric and intestinal disease has often occur- 
red. Involvement of the colon occupies the second place, 
in ordinate susceptibility, being exceeded only by the 
monlveys, due to heavy parasitic infestation, but would 
occupy the first place were the eleven amoebic dysenteries 
in monkeys subtracted from their total, a subtraction 
which might be allowed since it represented an epi- 
zootic outbreak. 
Etiologically considered, it would seem as if the 
influence of incorrect feeding were of little importance, 
and from one standpoint this is probably the case. Acute 
fermentative or irritative processes are not common at 
all, while more inflammatory pictures, catarrhal, erosive 
or ulcerative, are the rule. There is another phase to the 
term incorrect food, that is incorrect in its cleanness. 
During 1912-15 there was an increasing mortality among 
the cats and dogs fed upon horse meat, mutton and fowl 
heads. Early in 1916 the butcher shop was reconstructed 
and thoroughly cleaned and covered galvanized pans 
supplied in which to transport the food ; these pans were 
