Wl 
' the continuance of it impossible. 
| the butcher. 
| a blank in the number of live stock to be brought 
4 ABORTION. 
An abortion 
among live stock is, in popular language, some- 
times termed a miscarriage, and sometimes a 
| casting or warping, but more commonly a slip- 
ping or slinking. The indications of approach- 
ing abortion are sometimes the sudden filling of 
the udder as in the approach of parturition, 
_ sometimes the flow of bloody matter from the 
vagina, and more generally great restlessness 
and languor. The precurrent circumstances are 
the death or mortal disease of the foetus, and 
the disturbance or derangement of the functions 
of the womb; and the usual causes—though 
these, as well as the symptoms, exhibit modifica- 
tions in the different classes of animals —are 
falls, bruises, or other accidents,—over-driving, 
sudden exertion, or unwonted fatigue,—such ex- 
cess or deficiency of food as to occasion fatness 
or emaciation,—such severe fright as violently 
to agitate the nerves,—and even such feetid 
smells or putrid sights, as excite disgust, or in- 
duce a morbid sympathy. 
Abortion in the Cow.—Abortion occurs oftener 
and more readily in the cow than in any other 
/ animal; and is one of the most vexatious classes 
of occurrences on a farm. A cow which has 
once been afflicted with it can never be de- 
_ pended on for further breeding, but would very 
probably miscarry on every future occasion as 
on the first; and hence, to prevent repeated 
disappointments and losses, she must be dis- 
carded from the cow-house, and fattened for 
The loss of her calf also occasions 
up during the season, and obliges the farmer 
to procure a young animal by purchase. Yet 
| any farmer who happens to be tried with the 
| occurrence, must have a fair knowledge of the 
numerous causes of abortion, and must exercise 
considerable assiduity and skill in the use of pre- 
ventives and remedies, in order to his probably 
| escaping far worse consequences than the mis- 
carriage of a single cow, and the necessity of 
purchasing a single calf. 
Abortion sometimes becomes remarkably fre- 
quent, and even appears to assume an epizootic 
or epidemic character, in particular districts, or 
upon particular farms. Chabert, in his Veter- 
inary Instructions, relates an instance of a farmer 
at Toury, who unwittingly introduced an abor- 
tive habit among his cows by the purchase of a 
strange cow at a fair—who witnessed the trans- 
mission of the habit, apparently from that one 
animal, to all his breeding-cows, during the long 
period of thirty years——who could discover no- 
thing in either the previous condition or the 
current treatment of any of his cows to indicate 
a predisposition to the habit,—who sold off cows 
that had aborted, purchased seemingly sound 
cows in their stead, rebuilt his cow-house, altered 
the whole economy of his live-stock, repeatedly 
changed his bull, and tried every other expedient 
he could think of to put an end to the pest,— 
—— 
and who was baffled at every step, and tortured 
to see the abortive habit as prevalent and power- 
ful as ever, until at last he sold his whole herd, 
and introduced an entirely different set of ani- 
mals, altugether free from sympathy with any 
individual of his former set of cows. Both this in- 
stance and many other instances of a similar char- 
acter seem, at first sight, to indicate the existence 
of some contagious of infectious virus in the cow’s 
abortion; but, when more carefully considered, 
they show the disorder to be propagated rather 
by the sympathies of a delicate smell, by the, 
keen power of an irritable imagination, or by 
some other influence of an equally subtle nature,. 
“A more 
and altogether peculiar to the cow. 
common cause of slinking than any others,” says 
Mr. Skellett, “and which is peculiar on the in- 
fluence of this animal, is a disagreeable, nauseous 
smell. The cow is remarked to prepossess a very 
nice and delicate sense of smelling, to that de- 
gree, that the slinking of one cow is apt, from 
this circumstance, to be communicated to a great 
number of the same herd: it has been often 
known to spread like an infectious disease, and 
great losses have been suffered by cow-feeders 
from the same.” “Some,” says Mr. Youatt, “ have 
imagined abortion to be contagious. 
structively propagated among cows; but this is 
probably to be explained on a different principle 
than that of contagion. 
the cow is an animal considerably imaginative, 
and highly irritable during the period of preg- 
nancy. In abortion, the foetus is often putrid 
before it is discharged ; and the placenta, or 
after-birth, rarely or never immediately follows 
it, but becomes decomposed, and, as it drops 
away in fragments, emits a peculiar and most 
noisome smell. 
annoying to the other cows—they sniff at it, 
It is de- | 
It has been stated that | 
This smell seems to be singularly | 
and then run bellowing about. Some sympathetic | 
influence is produced on their uterine organs ; 
and, in a few days, a greater or less number of 
those that had pastured together likewise abort.” 
These views, though not demonstrable nor even 
tolerably certain, are very far from being unphi- 
losophical; and as they possess quite as much 
force as any plausible theory, they ought to in- 
duce every farmer and cow-feeder to keep the 
cow-house of breeding cows in a clean, sweet, 
and well-ventilated condition,—to attend to the 
frequent and thorough cleansing, not only of the 
feeding-troughs, but of the urine gutters,—to 
protect the straw or other material for the litter 
of the cows from any stain of blood or putridity,. 
—to cut off, promptly and finally, all vicinity of 
an aborted cow from other breeding animals of 
the cow-house,—and to remove and inhume, with 
all speed, every vestige of the uterine discharge. 
Such practices, however, as the fumigation of 
the cow-house, the burning of feathers, tar, and 
sulphur, and the smearing of the parts of the 
cow with tar or fetid oils, as means of destroying 
smell and preventing contamination, ought either 
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