920 
EDITORIAL OBSERVATIONS. 
and pleuropneumonia are in the country, and yet no serious 
extension of them occurs, no one is alarmed at the presence of 
the affections among cattle, and no suggestions are made in 
respect of their prevention. Suddenly, without any change 
in the general arrangements, the diseases manifest the in¬ 
fectious character to a remarkable extent, and prevail to an 
alarming degree. That foot and mouth disease and pleuro¬ 
pneumonia are exclusively of foreign origin, and due to the 
importation of foreign stock, is an article of faith so firmly 
established in the agricultural mind, that to oppose it, or 
even to venture upon a suggestion to the contrary, is now a 
hopeless task. Nevertheless we must, in passing, plead the 
well-known fact, that foot and mouth disease appeared in 
England, and pleuropneumonia in Ireland some years before 
foreign stock were admitted. It is said that animals were 
landed from the Continent both in England and Ireland 
before 1842, but, after careful inquiry, we have failed to 
discover any reliable evidence of the truth of the statement. 
An outbreak of pleuropneumonia is rarely traced to foreign 
animals, while it is frequently communicated to English 
cattle by beasts brought from Ireland, and, in all probability, 
cattle in Ireland receive the infection back again from diseased 
animals sent from this country. 
In the whole space of the United Kingdom we possess the 
means of perpetuating this disease, and also eczema, quite 
independently of foreign stock, and the more complete and 
extended the means of transmitting cattle and sheep from 
one part of the kingdom to another become, the greater will 
be the risk of spreading infectious diseases among our stock. 
We have never hesitated to express our conviction that a 
separate waterside market for the sale and slaughter of all 
imported animals would not prevent pleuropneumonia and 
foot and mouth disease in this kingdom; both of them have 
been too long established to yield to preventive measures of 
so very indirect a kind; and if they are to be eradicated, 
they must be dealt with quite independently of foreign im¬ 
portations. 
Speaking entirely with reference to the sanitary aspect of 
the question, we recognise as a matter of course the necessity 
for preventing the movement of diseased and infected animals. 
