544 
GEO. H. BAILEY. 
Shattuck, who telegraphed to Dr. Thayer to come at once to 
Portland, as the imported cattle had developed foot and mouth 
disease. Dr. Thayer arrived on the 6th, when he made a differ¬ 
ential diagnosis, and authorized the publication in the daily papers 
of the following notice: 
A FALSE REPORT CORRECTED. 
The rumors that the foot and mouth disease has broken out 
among the cattle at the government quarantine station at East 
Deering, is incorrect. Dr. Thayer, the government veterinary in¬ 
spector, yesterday made a careful inspection of the entire herd 
of Herefords now there, and says that there is no contagious dis¬ 
ease among them. The talk about the “ foot and mouth disease” 
arose from the fact that one or two of the herd were suffering 
from the common ailment known among farmers as “ foul in the 
feet ” which readily yields to treatment. 
The herd of twenty-eight Herefords now there are very valu¬ 
able. One of the cows recently gave birth to a calf, which was 
sold for $3,500, and five heifer calves have since their arrival 
been sold, for delivery when the quarantine period is over, at $500 
each. 
On February 8th, Mr. West, who had followed the Hereford 
cattle with his team, traded his black oxen to Mr. Lemuel 
Rolfe, who lives upon the Gerry farm at Deering, and they wefe 
placed among his other cattle, ten in number. Mr. Rolfe soon 
sold them to Mr. Charles Horton, at Allen’s Corner, who imme¬ 
diately returned them to Mr. Rolfe, as he found they were sick, 
and Mr. Rolfe in turn drove them back to West’s, [some three 
mile beyond where they now are. On the road they were met 
and passed by a yoke of oxen belonging to Mr. Jas. L. Pierce of 
Falmouth, and on these three farms, as the sequal proved, their 
animals, thirty-two in number, are all attacked with aphthous fever, 
as well as the entire herd at Shattuck’s, including his own cattle, 
making a total of sixty-two head now affected. The imported 
cattle are convalescent, however, and will all recover. The mild 
form of the disease exhibited in these cattle allowed them to “run 
the gauntlet” of Dr. Thayer’s inspection, and the fatal mistake 
