114 
FLEURO-PNEUMONIA. 
The pair of oxen kept at the Box Tavern stable over night on the 24th of 
March, as before stated, were driven to the farm of Levi Smith, in Ashby. 
Eighty-six days after, one of the herd of Mr. Smith was attacked. A bull belonging 
to another party was kept at the farm at the time the ox was taken sick. A few 
days after the owner sold him, and he was driven to Sharon, N. H., where, after 
exposing two herds, he died, as did several animals so exposed in those herds. 
Much has been said about the disease being generated by bad ventilation. Un¬ 
less the mountain pastures in New Hampshire, the hills of Ashby, the large, 
clean barns (the doors of which had not been shut for mouths before the disease 
broke out) and the hills and valleys of Deer Island require better ventilation, 
the theory that the disease is caused by bad ventilation must be abandoned. 
The Commissioners visited New Hampshire to learn if the reports were true 
that the disease had broken out in the pastures of that State. On arrival at 
Peterborough, information was received that a board of Cattle Commissioners had 
been appointed by the Governor and Council, and that Albert G. Scott, Esq., a 
resident of that town was a member, who stated that the reports were too true, 
and much alarm existed among the farmers of that section. On the following 
day, by invitation of the New Hampshire Commissioners, several herds were 
examined in Hancock and Peterborough. Two animals were selected and 
slaughtered. The autopsies proved that it was the same disease as in Massa¬ 
chusetts. Au arrangement was made with the New Hampshire Commissioners 
that no cattle affected with pleuro-pneumonia should be allowed to go to Massa¬ 
chusetts, or that cattle which had been exposed in pastures where the disease 
had existed, or in adjoining pastures, should not be transported otherwise than 
b> lailioad, and on arrival in this State to be sold for beef, thereby protecting 
the farmers on the line of road usually traveled in both States, and preventing 
the spread of the disease in the localities where the cattle were owned. 
Much credit is due the New Hampshire Commissioners for their energetic 
and faithful co-operation in the endeavor to prevent the spread of the disease in 
their own State, and in enforcing such rules as would tend to keep it from en¬ 
dangering the herds of neighboring States. 
Indeed, it appeared to the Commissioners that far less apathy in relation to 
a matter so serious and vital prevailed in New Hampshire than in many portions 
of our own State. It is easy for newspaper writers to hold up any subject to 
ridicule, and for careless and unobservant persons to sneer at what they do not 
understand; but it remains, nevertheless, true that no one has seriously and candid¬ 
ly examined into the character of this disease, no matter what their preconceived 
notions and opinions, who have not been forced to confess that no measures for 
its eradication or its prevention should be left untried, or any care or attention 
intermitted that may possibly arrest this scourge to farmers, and this fountain 
of disease to our people. 
By order of the honorable Council, the Commissioners were “ requested to 
cause such cattle as may be infected, or which have been exposed to infectiou, 
with pleuro-pneumonia, to be isolated to determine the question of the conta¬ 
giousness and curability of the disease; also, whether for the purpose of working, 
milking or breeding they have been injured, and to what extent they have been 
injured by exposure to disease, or by having had the disease; and also to ascer¬ 
tain, by slaughtering them at a sufficiently remote period, whether, and to what 
extent, their fattening qualities have been injured.” 
