OBSERVATIONS ON THE LUNG PLAGUE OF CATTLE. 709 
incidental ones as the losses of pasture, fodder, buildings, cur¬ 
rent business, and prospective increase of stock. The items 
referred to are the depreciation of our beef in the English 
market, and the losses by deaths in our home herds. The dif¬ 
ference in value of American cattle, when, as at present, com¬ 
pulsorily slaughtered at the port of debarkation, and when they 
can be moved inland and held for a market, is variously stated 
at seven dollars to ten dollars per head in favour of the latter. 
Erom the port of New York alone the shipments during 1879 
amounted to 95,380 head, which are therefore depreciated in 
value to the extent of 800,000 dollars. If we add the exports 
from Portland, Boston, Philadelphia, and Baltimore there must 
be a gross depreciation of no less than 1,500,000 dollars per 
annum. The yearly losses from deaths in our herds cannot be 
less than 500,000 dollars more, so that in these two items alone 
we are probably losing 2,000,000 dollars per annum, though the 
plague has invaded but the merest fragment of our immense 
territory. 
Mediate Contagion. —As our observations throw some light- 
on this disputed question, a few illustrations may be given to 
show that direct contact is not essential to infection. 
Infection through the Air .—It has long been noticed that 
successive victims in the same buildings are not attacked in the 
order in which they stand, but that the plague usually passes 
over two or three cattle to strike down a more susceptible sub¬ 
ject at a greater distance. We have also noticed repeatedly that 
when the cattle of different owners stood under the same roof, 
but separated by a board partition, that infection spread quickly 
from the one to the other, though it was impossible for them to 
come in contact. 
And yet a free dilution in the air seems to destroy the con- 
tagium in a very short distance. At Bidgewood, Queens Co., 
in the spring and summer of 1879, the herd of T. Byan was 
almost exterminated by the lung plague, as many as twenty 
head having perished, while over the fence in a building not 
over forty feet distant, the herd of George Van Size kept healthy 
throughout. Boll quotes instances of infection at fifty and 100 
feet, and others at 200 and even 300, but in such cases there is 
always the possibility of the conveyance of the virus on light 
objects like paper, hay, straw, &c., blown by the wind, or on 
the surface of men or animals. 
Contagion through the Clothes of Attendants. —1. In February, 
1879, Ditmas Jewell, of East New York, interested himself in 
the cause of the suffering milkmen, and daily visited several of 
the worst infected stables in the locality. He also paid a good 
deal of attention to a favourite Jersey cow of Ms own, which 
