268 
EDITORIAL. 
All the veterinary associations we know of in the East have 
promised to select their delegates, and there cannot be a doubt 
that our Western confreres will appear in goodly numbers to 
meet them. Let us, then, have a good and a large meeting; and 
if the officers have respectively performed their duties, we are 
sure to have also a very interesting one. 
THE SPREAD OF CONTAGIOUS PLEURO-PNEUMONIA—ITS 
APPEARANCE IN ILLINOIS. 
We hear the startling announcement, “ There can be no 
longer any doubt that contagious pleuro-pneumonia has broken 
out in Illinois.” The lofty Alleghanies, whose ridges, it has 
been boastfully claimed, formed an impassable barrier to its west¬ 
ward progress, have not hindered its transit, and the West is at 
length suffering from the presence of the dreaded infection. Act¬ 
ing-Commissioner Carman has telegraphed to “ take all means 
deemed necessary,” but the absorbing question confronts ns, can 
any means be expected to succeed, in view of the reported fact 
that already twenty-one animals from infected herds have been 
carried into other States ? 
The facts attending the history of the connection of the veter¬ 
inarians of the United States with this disease are of very pecu¬ 
liar character, and cannot fail to serve, to a great extent, to make 
the profession in America a laughing-stock for the veterinarians 
of other countries. 
That contagious pleuro-pneumonia existed at some points in 
the New England States, was a fact within the knowledge of all. 
The commission of Gen. Patrick and Prof. Law and his able 
body of inspectors had established it beyond the denial of the 
strongest skepticism; but its limitation within the Eastern ter¬ 
ritory had been proved by the Commissioner of Agriculture, and 
the report of Prof. C. P. Lyman. But to what advantage were 
their labors, and what has been the fruit of the liberal outlay of 
money involved in the work, beyond the organization of the U. S. 
Treasury Cattle Commission, with Prof. J. Law as the president, 
to stand sentinel over the evil, as well as to guard against the 
importation of other animal diseases ? • 
