98 
WAKBLES. 
“ My experience of warbles in the cattle is now this much:—In 
1884 the majority of the cows and heifers had each from five to twenty 
in their backs. I got mercurial ointment, put some on myself, and 
showed the stock-man how to use it. In 1885 there was much less, 
and now there is hardly a case among sixty head ; so I think that, 
thanks to your advice, my animals have now more ease. When I 
first began to talk to the men about it they said that it was nothing,— 
cow-stock always had these things; it did them no harm, and, as a 
rule, those which were in best condition were more likely to have 
them, and, in fact, that it showed the animal was healthy and 
thriving. Curious argument.” 
On April 4th, Mr. E. E. McBride, of Glendonagh, Midleton Co., 
Cork, wrote as follows :—“ You will remember our correspondence of 
last year on the warble. I went carefully over all my cattle and 
poisoned the grubs with mercurial ointment, and I gave several of my 
neighbours some, and their' cows were also treated. So careful was I 
with my own beasts that I do not think a single live grub escaped on 
this farm. The result is that this season the warbles are decidedly 
fewer, many of the cows being quite free from them.” 
It has now been proved by the information contributed during 
three successive years (for which I am indebted to cattle owners, dairy 
farmers, and others well acquainted, veterinarily and practically, with 
the management of cattle) that by a little care bestowed in the early 
part of the season, in destroying the maggots before they leave the 
warbles, that warble-attack may be so lessened as to be of no serious 
injury,—in fact, may be almost “stamped out”; and further, as 
before mentioned, that, from the nature of the warble-flies, this is one 
of the attacks in which each man benefits by his own work. 
Communications have been sent in from tanning and hide firms, 
notably from such centres as Newcastle, Wigton, Birmingham, Here¬ 
ford, Bristol, Taunton, Exeter, and from elsewhere, with mention of 
great extent of the losses sustained, and often urging strongly on 
myself to take all measures in my power to draw attention to the 
public loss. I have also information from those inconvenienced by 
the damage to the injured hides, affecting (that is to say, causing 
both trouble and loss to) manufacturers of goods from the perforated 
leather. 
But still there is enormous difficulty in getting action taken to 
destroy the pest. I believe that the root of the difficulty is ignorance 
u'nd carelessness. Until a very few years ago the history of the attack 
was not generally known ; now, through the observations taken in 
Great Britain and Ireland, not as abstruse scientific points, but as 
simple everyday facts, all can know, and see exactly for themselves, 
how the matter lies ; but there is still (and necessarily and without 
