574 
THE VETERINARIAN, AUGUST 1, 1879. 
Ne quid falsi dicere audeat, ne quid veri non audeat.—ClCERO. 
INOCULATION IN PLEURO-PNEUMONIA AND THE TRANS- 
MISSION OF THE DISEASE BY MEDIATE CONTAGION. 
Referring to our leader in the last number of the 
Veterinarian on the subject of mediate infection in the pro¬ 
duction of pleuro-pneumonia, the Mark Lane Express has 
the following remarks on the editorial which appeared in 
the Veterinary Journal: 
“ An editorial in the Veterinary Journal deals with ‘ the 
mode of transmission of bovine contagious pleuro-pneumonia, 
and the value of protective inoculation.’ And here we find 
very different opinions expressed from those quoted above. 
The Veterinary Journal says:— f The notion that the 
contagium could only be conveyed by the breath was, we 
believe, founded on one or two imperfect experiments by 
those who appear to have been but little acquainted with 
the nature of the disease, or of what had been ascertained 
with regard to it by scientific investigators, and whose 
knowledge of contagious disorders in general, and their 
mode of dissemination in particular, was rather vague. 
.We are quite ready to believe that 
this serious disorder can be only conveyed by the breath 
of the sick animal, when we are furnished with evidence 
sufficient in quantity and quality to outweigh that of the 
clinical observers who maintain the opposite opinion.’ 
The Journal points out that the experiments at the Brown 
Institution f do not fulfil all the demands of pathological 
investigation, and are consequently incomplete and un¬ 
reliable and warns f agriculturists and the veterinary pro¬ 
fession against receiving with implicit confidence ’ the 
conclusions arrived at in the report. It is quite true that 
the experiments were incomplete, and therefore inconclu¬ 
sive ; but they have not been represented as proving any¬ 
thing further than to the extent they were carried. And we 
