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achieved by every method which will render the 
soil dry and the herbage sound. Whatever tends 
to improve the value of pasturage, and the gen- 
eral health of sheep, tends also to prevent the rot. 
Thorough-draining, the extirpation of weeds, the 
increase of the choicest grasses, the reclamation 
of all waste corners and boggy spots, the promo- 
tion of uniform cleanness and sweetness through- 
out all the area of a farm, the careful exclusion 
of sheep from every field and lane where they 
might be likely to encounter dead herbage or 
putrid puddles, and the keeping of cattle stock 
to eat all the aftermath of low and dangerous 
pastures, and to consume all esculent herbage 
anywhere which might be somewhat hazardous 
for sheep, are eminent preventives, and may be 
regarded as essential to success. Draining alone, 
without due regard to the drying of the deep 
subsoil and of every nook and square-yard of the 
ground, may not, in even the most favourable 
situations, be sufficient. A very little more than 
the average amount of rain upon heavy and 
tenacious land, no matter how regularly under- 
laid with ordinary drains, or only a few minutes’ 
trampling upon some undrained or neglected 
nook of a field, all whose other area is perfectly 
dry and sound, may defeat very elaborate pre- 
cautions, and give rise to very disastrous rot. 
“It is surprising,” remarks Clater, “how soon 
the animal is infected. The merely going once 
to drink from a notedly dangerous pond has been 
sufficient,—the passing over one suspicious com- 
mon in the way to or from the fair, and the 
lingering only for a few minutes in a deep and 
poachy lane. Then it can easily be conceived 
what mischief one or two of these neglected cor- 
ners, in which there may be little swamps _per- 
haps only a yard or two across, may do in a farm 
in other respects well-managed, and perfectly free 
from infection.” 
One of the best known means both of preven- 
tion after contact with infected ground and of 
cure in the early stages of the actual disease, is 
the use of common salt. This substance, besides 
promoting the general health of domesticated 
animals, and aiding the salubrious qualities of 
their sound food, both counteracts the putrefac- 
tive tendency of dead and fermenting herbage, 
and kills the eggs and the young of all such 
small animals as flukes. See the article Saur 
(Common). The natural presence of salt disarms 
wet pastures of all the power which they would 
otherwise possess to create the rot; and the 
artificial administration of it, regularly and judi- 
ciously along with food, protects sheep from 
danger in many an occasional situation or during 
many a critical season in which they might other- 
wise be overwhelmed with infection. “ Salt- 
| marshes, or low lands by the sea-side or on river- 
sides near the sea, which districts are alternately 
washed by high-tide sea-water and flooded with 
foul inland water charged with flukes’ eggs, are 
proverbiali,4¢ ound sheep - walks. Situations 
which, further inland, would be regarded as the 
worst or most sure kind of rotting land, become, 
from being washed occasionally with sea-water, 
not only perfectly sound sheep-land, but are some- 
times said to benefit animals already diseased. 
The salubrity of such situations is presumed to 
depend upon the action of sea-salt, of which a 
small deposit will be left upon the grass, as, after 
the subsidence of the last tide, the aqueous part of 
sea-water is evaporated by the wind and sun. 
Any small impregnation of iodine in the sea- 
water is not looked upon as operating in the 
case. It would seem, therefore, desirable to keep 
a moderate supply of common salt in the stomach 
of sheep, whilst and for a few days after they 
are using unsound or suspicious pasture. The 
practical herdsman would probably do well, when 
his flock may have accidentally or unavoidably 
grazed upon rotting land, to give his sheep an 
hour’s run, twice or thrice a-day, upon acknow- 
ledged sound pasture of the most commingled 
herbage, that the animals may pick up some 
plant which stimulates their digestive organs. 
If he would improve upon this, he might give, 
with some prospect of advantage too, as often as 
twice or thrice a-day, a little barley meal, with 
chaff and salt, or good hay whetted with strong 
brine as food, or hay tea with salt for drink.” 
A cure is seldom effected when the disease has 
advanced far, but may be very hopefully at- 
tempted when the disease is only in an early 
stage, and especially when it is detected through 
the internal appearance of a killed sheep, and 
has not yet shown itself in any very perceptible 
external symptom. The infected flock should 
be removed either to a good salt marsh or to an 
artificially salted dry pasture. A piece of pas- 
ture, of sufficient extent to allow one acre to 
every ten sheep, may be hurdled off, and sprinkled 
equally with salt at the rate of one bushel for 
every sheep; and the flock may be turned into | 
it about three weeks after the sprinkling, and | 
may continue in it till they eat the grass quite 
close; and another piece of the same size, and 
similarly prepared, ought then to be ready for | 
their reception. As much salt as they are dis- 
posed to take may be given also with their hay 
or their other food. An aperient of two ounces 
of Epsom salt in warm gruel or water must be 
given to each sheep at the commencement of the © 
treatment, and should afterwards, at some dis- | 
tance of time, be once or twice repeated. Food 
of as nutritious a kind as convenient, such as a 
pint of beans daily, and a large allowance of good 
hay, and a quantity of good gruel, onght to be 
constantly allowed. Many kinds and combina- 
tions of medicine, comprising mercurials, balsams, 
essential oils, anodynes, tonics, aromatics, and mis- 
cellaneous drugs, have been recommended ; but, 
for the most part, are either useless or positively 
objectionable. Calomel, at the rate of 4 grains 
or so a-day to each sheep, is confidently pre- 
scribed by some veterinarians, but pronounced 
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