262 
PROF. DIECKERHOFF. 
stable, without reference to the originating cause from which it 
sprung. For twenty-five years prior to 1884 Dickerhoff had ob¬ 
served that the disease prevailed principally in cold and stormy 
weather, and that within the space of two weeks it made its ap¬ 
pearance in a large number of stables, more or less populated, of 
the town or suburbs of Berlin. In none of those epizootics has 
the origin of the infectious germ ever been discovered. The 
same disease often exists in other countries under the influence of 
north and east winds, in the stables of horse dealers, but the in¬ 
fection has in all cases been traced to other localities from which 
it had been conveyed. 
Pleurisy (rheumatismal) of Siedamgrotsky is also, according to 
that author, produced by exposure, and principally upon young 
horses which have traveled in rail cars. This form of pleurisy 
seems to differ from that which is found in the post-mortem of 
horses which have died from brustseuche towards the tenth day. 
At this period of the disease there are no further traces of pneu¬ 
monia, the only lesions being those of simple or double pleurisy. 
Pleuro pneumonia (infectious pneumonia) of Siedamgrotsky 
includes several affections of the essential organs of respiration, 
and is due to various causes, such as foul stable, miasmas, etc. 
The word Brustseuche seems well selected as a designation of 
contagious pleuro-pneumonia in the horse, since it specifies the 
inflammatory group of the lung as that of the pleura. It applies 
also to eroupal pneumonia, though Friedberger seems ready to 
recognize in it a peculiar character and a special contagiousness. 
But, from the symptoms and lesions sometimes described, it seems 
but just to believe that he has not always met with the true 
eroupal pneumonia. The contagion of brustseuche may take place 
directly from the sick to the healthy, and the infectious germ may 
retain its virulency for a longer or shorter period outside of the 
organism. Still it is not rare to see healthy animals continue to 
be located with diseased subjects without being contaminated. 
This anomaly is well known in pathology. 
But though it must be admitted that eroupal pneumonia is 
contagious only in peculiar instances, it must be conceded, never¬ 
theless, that the contagiousness does exist. Distemper (gounnes) 
