"Veterinary Department, 23, New-street,
Spring-gardens,
Sept. 25th.
"Sir,—I beg to report that, acting on the instructions received from you to investigate without loss of time the statement received at your office relative to an outbreak of the cattle plague in a remote part of the county of Norfolk, supposed to have arisen from cattle having been in contact with some diseased sheep, recently brought to the premises, I have visited the district in question, and inquired into all the circumstances of the case.
"It appears that as far back as the 17th of August Mr. C. Temple, farmer and merchant, of Blakeney, received on his farm 120 lambs which he had instructed a dealer to procure for him for feeding purposes.
"The lambs were bought at Thetford-fair on the preceding day, and were immediately sent by rail to Fakenham, from which place they were driven to Blakeney, a distance of about ten miles. On their arrival they appeared to be fatigued to a greater extent than ordinary, which was, however, attributed to the heat of the weather and the exertion the animals had undergone.
"In addition to this, the shepherd observed that several of them seemed unwell, and he remarked to his master that they did not appear to be a 'very healthy lot,' and that he thought it would be better to return them to the dealer. Within a day or two of this time the symptoms of illness were more marked in all the original cases, and many more of the animals had been attacked. On the 24th two of the worst cases were removed from the field to the farm premises, and were placed in a shed for treatment, in which afterwards a cow was put. On the 25th two of the lambs died, and in consequence of this, and of the large number which were now affected, the whole were brought, on the morning of the 27th, into the same yard where the shed previously alluded to was situated. There is also another shed, separated from this yard only by some old furze faggots, into which the cows were driven night and morning for being milked. The lambs remained in the yard till the morning of the 28th, when having had some medicine administered to them, they were returned to the fold and never came again near the cows.
"While in the yard three died, two on the 27th, and one on the 28th, and on the following day two others died in the field. From this time the disease went on, so that by Friday last, the 22nd of September, the day of my visit, forty-six had either died or been killed, and twenty-seven were in a very precarious condition.
"On the 7th of September, ten days after the last exposure to the sheep, a cow gave evidence of being affected with the cattle plague, this animal being the one which had been put into the shed occupied by the diseased sheep on the 24th of August. A second cow was attacked on the 11th of September, and a third shortly afterwards, which was followed by others; so that by the 16th all the cows, six in number, a heifer, and a calf, were all dead.
"My examination of the lambs showed that they were unmistakably the subjects of the plague. The symptoms agreed in almost every particular with those observed in cattle affected with the malady, and the post-mortem appearances were also identical.
"With a view to ascertain the true nature of the changes produced in the system prior to death, I had four of the lambs killed, and from these I took some diseased parts and forwarded them to the Royal Veterinary College without note or comment. These parts were examined by my colleague, Mr. Varnell, who at once recognised the special changes of structure which are caused by the cattle plague.
"The whole facts of the case leave not the least doubt of sheep being liable to the disease termed the cattle plague, and that when affected they can easily communicate the malady to the ox tribe; and moreover, that when so conveyed it proves equally as destructive as when propagated from ox to ox in the ordinary manner.
"The case is also more important from having occurred in a place no less than fourteen miles distant from any other where the cattle plague exists, thus placing beyond a doubt the fact of the malady being introduced among the cattle by the sheep alone.
"I regret to add that this is not a solitary case of sheep being affected by the cattle plague. I learned that some sheep were supposed to be similarly affected belonging to Mr. R. J. H. Harvey, M.P., on his estate at Crown Point, near Norwich. This place I also visited, and found a large flock of upwards of 2000 lambs, among which the malady was prevailing. A large number had been separated from the diseased, and gave no evidence of the malady. Very many, however, had died, and the disease was making rapid progress. I also examined many of the dead, and found the post-mortem appearances to be identical with those seen in the other cases spoken of in this report.
"In this instance the malady was brought into the estate by the purchase of some cattle, which afterwards died from the disease, and which were unfortunately pastured with the sheep at the time the disease manifested itself.
"The whole matter is one of the greatest importance, and which I lose no time in submitting to you for the information of the Lords of the Council.
"I have the honour to be, Sir, your most obedient servant,
"Jas. B. Simonds."
IV.
General Considerations on the Ox-Typhus, and the Recapitulation of the Symptoms.
We have seen the causes, the symptoms, and the cadaveric alterations of the Bovine typhus, and we may therefore apply ourselves at present to the consideration of its pathogenia and its nature. Only, the limits of this book will not admit of a complete discussion of every point of this important question of pathology; for if we desired to show in what respect the typhus differs from, and in what respect it resembles, such and such a morbid entity, febrile, infectious and contagious like it, such a dissertation would require a whole volume for itself; we are therefore obliged to keep within certain limits.
Like every watchful physician who has applied himself to the study of comparative pathology, we entertained our own preconceived opinions as to the nature of this Cattle Plague. Arguing à priori from what we knew, from the laws of the pathogenia of those exanthematic diseases which we have alluded to in a former chapter; from the identity of variola in various animals; from the preventive treatment to which this identity has led; believing that animals and man have each their typhoid fever, as they have their variola or small-pox; considering with the Ecole de Tours, typhoid fever as a variola of the intestinal mucous membrane, and having proposed, in 1855,[Q] to adopt inoculation as a preventive treatment, drawing an easy comparison between the typhus we are now observing and the typhoid fever in man; hoping, we may say, indeed, to find in this typhus the inoculative and preventive virus which is required for our typhoid fever, all will understand with what eager and vivid curiosity we have examined the entrails of the victims struck down by this epizootia. For, if this typhus had been a genuine typhoid fever, the bovine species which has already provided the preventive virus for small-pox, would equally have afforded us the preventive virus for typhoid fever. In this hypothesis, our proposal to inoculate the typhoid fever, which up to this time has been tried on horses only, and in experiments badly conducted, by pupils of the Veterinary School of Lyons, was perhaps on the eve of being realised. But we regret to say, we have been forced to submit to evidence, and to acknowledge that the present infectious typhus is not the one we require to provide us with the anti-typhoid virus.
In the same manner as pathologists disagree as to the question, whether the typhus and typhoid fever in man are one and the same disease, so should we long debate, without coming to an agreement, as to that which relates to the typhus and typhoid fever of the ox. We cannot pretend to produce a reconciliation between these dissentient schools; all we desire, is to sum up what observation has suggested to us, on account of the practical and therapeutic interest belonging to the subject.
For ourselves, the typhus and the typhoid fever of the ox are two diseases of the same order, but nevertheless distinct; and the reasons upon which we ground our opinion are suggested to us by the nature of the intestinal lesions, the symptoms, and causes of these distempers.
As we have already seen, the contagious typhus of the ox, at least that of the present epizootia, is an infectious disease, which varies in the intensity of the functional disorders and the cadaveric lesions to which it gives rise. The typhoid fever, we mean the real one,—for there are other intestinal exanthematic fevers which simulate it,—always localize on the small intestines a pustulous exanthem, and in the typhus of the ox, this pustulous exanthem and the ulcerations by which it is succeeded, are frequently wanting.
The real typhoid fever springs up in every country under the influence of local causes, and is not in the same degree infectious and contagious as the typhus proper. In fine, the typhoid fever smites many species of animals—the horse, the pig, etc., without transmitting its contagion with the same intensity.
The contagious typhus of the ox appears to be more especially proper to that animal; for in those latitudes where it developes itself other animals are not affected by it.
For these reasons, then, to which we could easily add many others, we consider the typhus of the present epizootia a special and distinct type of typhic diseases, and differing from the typhoid fever: it is the highest expression of its class, and occupies the first degree in the scale of infectious typhic diseases. Next to it we should place the typhoid fever, which we admit is not often found in the ox. But veterinary pathology is still less understood than human pathology, and typhoid fever may perhaps be recognised in those diseases which the former science has described under the names of adynamic and ataxic fevers. Besides, a persistent research among the veterinary memorials and reports might possibly enable us to discover some instances in which the real typhoid fever in the ox had been traced, apart from the epizootic conditions. Here is an instance of it:—
Gellé, in vol. i. page 245 of the Pathologie Bovine, quotes the following abstract which had been forwarded to him by one of his brethren, on the dissection of an ox, which was made on the 10th of May, 1824:—
"Duodenum.—Uniform redness of the mucous membrane, with thickening, softening, and petechial spots. In the middle portion were discovered some of Peyer's glands, small round pustules, whitish at the top, with a reddish circumference. In some parts contiguous to these pustules lay ulcerations somewhat extensive, which seemed to be the result of the softening of the pustules which had preceded them. A dark pus issued from these ulcerations. The inflammation by which they were attended was diffused in some places, whilst in others it was circumscribed. In some parts the intestinal mucous membrane was utterly destroyed. The mesenteric glands were red and soft."
Gellé adds:—"I have recorded this interesting narrative, as it may perhaps serve hereafter to throw light on a point of doctrine."
The intention which Gellé nurtured at the time, is, we see, now fulfilled conformably with his object.
The contagious typhus of the ox not being a real typhoid fever, we shall not, consequently, be able to borrow from it the preventive virus for that disease in man. But if these diseases differ, and if it is difficult, in the present state of science, to assign to them such distinct characters as to produce a perfect agreement among all medical writers, we must, however, admit, that to designate the ox-typhus now before us by the generic name of plague, after the Germans, who have given it the name of rinderpest, would carry us too far back.
Let us acknowledge also, that the denomination of contagious typhus, adopted by the French veterinary doctors, is not, any more than the designation of typhus fever, applied to it by English physicians, totally free from objection.
In truth, the various species of typhus whose characteristics we have already given (see p. 73), are all of them febrile and contagious. Whoever uses the word typhus, speaks of a contagious and febrile malady, inasmuch as we cannot conceive typhus without its accompaniments, fever and contagion. But as the prevailing characteristic of this infectious disease is, above all, its contagion, we have preferred to adopt the name of contagious typhus, without, however, deceiving ourselves as to the value of the denomination. The final elucidation has not yet been found for these diseases; at some future day they will be methodically divided and arranged, and each of them will then receive a special title, which will remove from the mind that vague uncertainty which at present we regret.
But if some faults of doctrine are open to debate, no doubt whatever can exist in the mind as to the morbid individuality of ox-typhus, or the general conditions of its pathogenia; and we are able to deduce from the preceding explanation, the following conclusions as so many propositions definitively settled:—
1st. The typhus of the ox is a disease essentially infectious, which is produced by the absorption of the morbigenous miasma in the air.
2nd. This typhic miasma is absorbed and engendered by the ox, under the influence of a number of special deleterious causes.
3rd. When the miasma has been absorbed and incubation produced, the disease itself is but a supreme effort of nature—a struggle between the vital forces and the morbid evolution of the poison, in order to guard and defend life against the danger which threatens it.
4th. A malady essentially general, totius substantiæ, it directs its action, in different degrees, over the whole structure, but chiefly on the nervous centres, on the organs of respiration, and on the digestive apparatus.
5th. Its progress is regular; to the latest period of incubation it succeeds that of the general poisoning of the blood—that of the pyrexia of general fever—which for a time stops up all the secretions. Then, the morbid flux is localized according to particular predispositions: either on the nervous centres, when the animal is struck down at the outbreak; or on the lungs, when the respiratory derangements become the leading symptoms; or on the digestive channels, when the train of typhoid phenomena is observable.
6th. The period of acute inflammation, which had dried up the sources of secretion, gives place to that of the depurative and critical exhalations or secretions; from every mucous membrane, from every outlet, there issues a mucous discharge, which at first is thin and clear, but afterwards becomes thick and purulent, and endowed with the most infectious properties. The intestinal mucous membrane, smitten with a particular lesion, becomes the seat of a flux extremely copious and intolerably fetid. Gases, and occasionally purulent deposits, are developed in the cellular tissue beneath the skin.
7th. The organism or physical frame, disturbed in the very centres of life, undergoes a general transformation, a kind of organic decomposition beforehand, and all the symptoms of reaction are followed by a period of wasting atony and adynamia, which usher in dissolution or life's extinction.
8th. Finally, throughout the whole course of the distemper, one special functional derangement—stupor—has been witnessed as the predominant symptom, the nervous system being in a manner annihilated in its functions in consequence of the general infection.
Such are, in a brief outline, the principal symptoms of this typhus, which, when once engrafted on the economy, pursues its fatal march, and no treatment can then arrest its evolution. As in small-pox, so in typhoid fever and in most general disorders, Nature for a time must be allowed to exercise her new functions, which succeed each other in due course, and which the physician must not stop; for if he did, he would accelerate death; but he must watch with a vigilant eye, in order to assist the vital powers.
The medical man, satisfied with these facts, will therefore abandon the chimerical hope of finding a specific remedy for such a disease. The virus once absorbed, the frame will endure, and fatally endure, all the morbid phenomena which must produce and succeed each other. Against such a poison no other antidote exists than the poison itself. And this will be easily understood. What necessity have we for a specific remedy to resist a distemper, which carries within itself its preventive treatment? If it germinates and is propagated, let us not accuse Nature and render her responsible; our own blindness, the lack of a community of interests among the people, our social institutions, the still imperfect state of the exact sciences, &c., amply explain how it is that we have not yet employed the effectual means we possess, not of curing it, but preventing it. If we could have our choice between prevention and cure, should we not naturally take the former?
Indeed, the sources, the causes which generate the typhic miasma, are thoroughly well known to us, and these we can avoid. The developed miasms hang suspended in the air; we may, perhaps, one day destroy them, if not in the outer atmosphere, at least in the stalls and sheds where the animals inhale and absorb them. In fine, if we are powerless to arrest the fell disease when its periods revolve, we may hope at some future time to act with greater efficiency upon it during its period of incubation.
On the other hand, if this formidable disease cannot be stopped in its progress, does it follow that we should not treat it at all? Certainly not! Far be such a heresy from our thoughts. What would be the consequence, if we left to their fate the sufferers from the small-pox, from typhoid fever, and from typhus itself, instead of watching over them with the utmost solicitude? If the physician, the enlightened interpreter of morbid phenomena, did not direct them with a bold and fearless hand, but abandoned Nature to her helpless course, why, necessarily, every patient would die, whereas a large number are now saved.
That which is true in the case of man, is likewise true in the case of animals: we are bound to treat them when they are ill. If to-day we think it more expeditious and more profitable to exterminate them, we certainly neglect our duty. We are the sovereign masters of animals; they are the companions of our toils and pleasures, their lives must be given to preserve our own; but on their well-being and their happiness our own well-being and happiness also depend. They will return to us the sufferings and diseases of which they die a hundred times over. Like ourselves, they die of consumptive, tubercular, cancerous, eruptive, typhoid, and parasitical diseases. And who can tell whether they have not communicated these disorders to man, who was, perhaps, originally exempt from them; and whether they do not continually communicate them to him?
What noble pages might be written on the close connexion which exists between all organized beings, both physically and morally! Let us love these animals, let us treat them with kindness, and all our other qualities will be raised by so doing.
But as a man must belong to the time he lives in, we will take up for a moment with the doctrines of the economists; we will tolerate the extermination of diseased animals, as a painful necessity. Our duty is to seek in the study of the diseases of animals and in their cure, the cure of the disorders which afflict the human species. We shall, therefore, now proceed to consider the subject of the treatment of horned cattle, both as relates to preventive and curative medication.
[O] Mr. Simonds has for three months had under his observation a cow which has lived with impunity among animals sick and dying of the typhus. And a young calf did not contract the disease for more than three weeks.
[P] Another instance of the fatal effects of the terrible disease now ravaging our flocks and herds of cattle, and resulting in the death of a veterinary surgeon, has just occurred in the town of Sudbury, Suffolk.
Last week the epidemic made its appearance in the stock-yard of Mr. Ruffell, farmer, Melford, and the cases were attended by Mr. Robert John Plumbly, veterinary surgeon, Sudbury. On Thursday a cow, which was evidently suffering from the disease, was brought out and shot by Mr. Plumbly, who afterwards made a partial post-mortem examination of the carcase. In doing so with a small scalpel his shirt-sleeves became saturated with blood, &c. from the animal. He returned home, and the same day was attacked with sickness and acute pains in the head and chest, accompanied with a soreness in the bones generally. On the following day he appeared somewhat better, and was able to attend to his duties, but became worse towards evening, and was confined to his house on the following day. He considered that he was merely suffering from the effects of a severe cold, and did not call in medical assistance till Saturday night. He slept well that night, and seemed somewhat better on Sunday morning. About two o'clock in the afternoon he got out of his bed to have it made, when he appeared comparatively strong and in good spirits; but almost immediately afterwards he was taken in what seemed to be a fit, and expired in a few minutes, before the surgeon, who only lived next door, could come to his assistance. It was thought that death had resulted from apoplexy, and a medical certificate to that effect was given. Rumours, however, soon becoming current that Mr. Plumbly's death was caused by the cattle plague, the borough coroner (R. Ransom, Esq.) directed a post-mortem examination to be made. But, by this time, so rapid was the spread of the virus through the system that the body appeared perfectly plague-stricken, and by Tuesday morning, when the surgeons arrived to examine it, and it was taken out of the coffin, the corpse scarcely retained the semblance of a human being, the head and trunk being much swollen and black in colour, the features quite undistinguishable, and all the flesh converted into a putrid jelly-like mass. The tissues were completely disintegrated, so that it was utterly impossible to make any examination.
An inquest was held on Tuesday afternoon, at the court room, Town Hall, before the coroner, R. Ransom, Esq., and a jury; Mr. Joseph Barker, chemist, being chosen foreman. The mayor (S. Higgs, Esq.) and other gentlemen were present during the whole of the inquiry, which lasted four hours.
The jury went and viewed the body, which lay in an outhouse, but were so overcome with the fearful spectacle that they were permitted by the coroner to retire to partake of stimulants before they could further proceed with the inquiry.
The first witness called was Mr. William Brown, veterinary surgeon, and partner with the deceased, who deposed to having gone with him to Mr. Ruffell's farm at Long Melford, on Thursday last, to examine several cows down with the cattle plague. One was brought out and shot by the deceased, who proceeded to examine the intestines and viscera, which did not present the appearances usually observable in advanced stages of the disease, there being but slight ulceration of the coats of the stomach and bowels. The lungs were not examined, as the deceased had only a small scalpel with him. In making incisions in the body the shirt-sleeves of the deceased became covered with blood, but he did not prick or cut himself.
Henrietta Dansie, nurse, was examined, and said that deceased had been suffering from boils on his right arm, one of which she had poulticed on Wednesday, the day before he had examined the diseased animal. He removed the poultice himself, but declined to put on a plaster as the place was a small one, although not healed. He changed his linen on his return from Melford; but the same afternoon he was taken with sickness and vomiting, and complained of acute pains in his head and bones. On Sunday afternoon, shortly before he died, he wished to have his bed made, and got out and stood whilst it was being done. He then complained of faintness, and got into bed again, and witness to revive him washed his face and hands; in doing so she observed that the nails of one of the hands which had lain in the bed were turning black. She was about to give him some pills when she noticed a sudden change come over him; and thinking he was going to faint or have a fit, she rang for assistance and went herself for the doctor, who, being from home, another surgeon residing next door was called in, but by this time the unfortunate gentleman was quite dead.
Mr. Maurice Mason, surgeon, said he was called in to see the deceased the night before he died, and visited him again on Sunday morning, and ordered him a lotion and leeches for his head and effervescing drinks (the leeches were not applied). From the appearance of the body and the evidence which had been adduced, witness was of opinion that the death of the deceased was caused by the absorption of poisonous virus from the dead beast.
Mr. W. B. Smith, surgeon, gave similar evidence, and added that the tissues of the body were so disintegrated that it would have been utterly impossible to have made a post-mortem examination.
After half an hour's consultation the jury returned a verdict, "that deceased died from the effects of the absorption of virus or poison into his system upon the occasion of his making a post-mortem examination of a cow which had died from a certain disease called the cattle plague."
The sad occurrence has caused much sensation in the town, the deceased, who was only 23 years of age, being well known and much respected.
[Q] "Appel à des Expériences dans le but d'établir le Traitement Préservatif de la Fièvre Typhoide et des Maladies infectieuses inrécidivables, par l'inoculation de leurs produits morbides." Memoire lu à l'Institut, le 8 Octobre, 1855. Inséré dans la Gazette Hebdomadaire de Médecine. Paris.
Treatment and Cure of the Ox-Typhus.
In now addressing ourselves to the treatment, and, as far as human agency can effect it, to the cure, of this insidious distemper, we cannot conceal from ourselves, that this is the most difficult, the most delicate, and, at the same time, the most important division of our work; for it is to this part, above all, that attention will be directed. This portion of our task, therefore, will prove especially arduous; and nothing can give a better notion of the difficulties we shall have to encounter than the many fruitless attempts which, for several months past, have been made to overcome them by many ardent inquirers, stimulated by the best possible intentions.
This, then, is the moment—if we may be allowed the metaphor—to take the bull by the horns; and we do so without hesitation. If, like so many others, we are baffled and overcome in this unequal struggle—if our strength is not on a level with our desires—we trust we shall be pardoned.
Several paths leading to the same end may be followed in this exposition of the treatment of ox-typhus. After mature reflection, we shall adopt the one, which will allow us to take the disease at its birth, ab ovo; to study it in all its phases, in its first and second causes, and then in the successive periods of its development.
In this manner, we shall be able to give an account of each fact of real importance mentioned in the foregoing pages, and to comprise within the treatment whatever is connected either directly or indirectly with the disease.
Thus we will relate in so many separate articles,—
1st. The means and measures to be employed to meet and resist the first local causes which may generate the typhus, then the secondary causes which serve to propagate it.
2nd. The means of preventing the spread of the disease to animals still in good health.
3rd. The means of treating it at its different periods, from the period of incubation to that of its decline.
4th. Finally, we shall insert the laws and sanitary regulations which have been published in England relative to this disease.
As will be seen, by adopting this method, the whole matter will be considered consecutively and in regular order; and the reader will understand that when such a phase of the malady is developed it is because the preceding one, which is the cause of it, has not been effectually contended with.
I.
Means and Measures to be employed to resist the Causes of the Contagious Typhus of the Bovine Species.
We have shown fully and explicitly in what countries of the globe, and in what particular conditions, the typhus is generated among oxen. We know that this dire disease has its focus on the banks of great rivers or lakes, which are periodically overflowed, and on which is deposited a slime teeming with organic matter; in marshy plains, where the same natural impurities are fostered; and that these first hotbeds of the evil are found in China, in India, in America, in Africa, as well as on the shores of the Black Sea. A spirit of observation which delights in measuring the phenomena of nature with the contracted compass of its own short views and conceptions, could alone have imagined that the ox-typhus was only to be found originally in the steppes of Hungary and Russia, and that the bovine species of those countries, thanks to a special organization, was alone capable of generating the typhus.
Since we know, then, in what conditions this disease is developed, and especially in what manner it is propagated in Europe, it is not impossible now, when nations are united by the means of quick and easy communication, by commercial treaties, and by the mutual relations of science, to examine what measures might be taken to modify and control these conditions. A commission formed for this purpose, a scientific congress, would be able to make on the spot a study of all the circumstances which favour the development of typhus, and the result of their reports would enlighten the peoples as to the causes which produce it and from which they are first to suffer. They would be recommended to choose as pastures the healthiest places, to withdraw their cattle at certain seasons from those plots of ground which are baleful to them; new systems of agriculture would be planned and tried, &c. These questions being carefully examined, might lead to important results; nor can we understand how, in the age in which we live, the same indifference and apathy as prevailed in the past should be maintained in presence of the positive and permanent causes of this infectious disease, whose contagion, as we now see by many proofs, may extend at once to so large a portion of Europe. There is now something to be done in this matter; it is the duty of the governments to deal with it effectually, and to take serious measures to destroy the evil radically, if radically it can be destroyed, and, if not, to alleviate its pernicious effects as much as possible.
Moreover, many breeders of cattle have not waited until now to guard against some of the first causes of the typhus: already they give the animals rock salt, ferruginous and arsenical preparations, but all this is done without method, and according to each man's will and pleasure. It would, therefore, be necessary to institute regulations, and to see them carried out and practised under the superintendence of public functionaries, armed with sufficient power and authority.
These measures having been taken, others no less indispensable ought to follow. They should determine for the herds of cattle intended for exportation, the ways and channels they must travel by to go to any central part or to any railway station; and there the inspectors on duty should mark every animal that passes out of the district he is leaving. Heavy penalties should be inflicted on all who might infringe these rules.
These precautions would contribute in part to arrest the propagation of the complaint; but there is another measure more radical and effectual, which should be taken in order to prevent its extension—we mean inoculation, which has met with complete success in some of the governments of Russia.
Thus we see, there are powerful means of withstanding the production of the disease in its focus, or generative bed, and likewise its extension among the herds of neighbouring countries; and these latter might render them in some sort obligatory, by refusing most rigidly to admit to their markets, as in Italy has sometimes been done, every head of cattle which was not marked as inoculated or which was not furnished with a permit of health.
It is easy to conceive that those countries wherein the ox-typhus has its birth, and for which the breeding of cattle and their exportation are a great source of wealth, would soon feel that they are more interested than any other in stifling the contagion in its focus, and in affording to those countries that receive their herds, every security and guarantee which they have a right to expect. Interest in this case coming to the help of common sense, very satisfactory results would in course of time be obtained.
Moreover, we are conscious that we are here dealing with very complicated questions; for, though in a book they may seem simple and easy, their application is a matter of extreme difficulty. We know too well that these preventive measures for protecting animals will meet with many obstacles, and only be adopted at last with tardy reluctance, since man himself continues in some respect indifferent to the causes which spread about the fearful epidemics to which he falls a victim in consequence of his neglect.
In truth, it is well known that the cholera of the present day—that much more serious plague—had its origin on the banks of the Red Sea, amidst the infectious miasmata developed near Mecca, where thousands of pilgrims who had died of fatigue and privation, and hundreds of thousands of sheep butchered and religiously offered up in sacrifice, have, beneath a torrid heat, generated the choleraic miasma, which formerly was supposed to be produced exclusively on the banks of the Ganges. This fact duly ascertained and proved, we might suppose that the governments of the different nations among which the cholera is about to extend its ravages, were indignant and had complained at thus being smitten with a scourge, due to the careless ignorance and sordid avidity of some official of the Turkish Government. But we should be mistaken.
No! every one hoped at first that he, at least, would be spared by the contagion, and the authorities did nothing to resist the evil but adopt the old course of quarantine—a remedy more illusory now than ever, since the nations are in constant communication, either in their own persons or by the exchange of their commodities; and consequently, the epidemic is pursuing its invading course from week to week.
That which is being done for the cholera gives us a scale by which we may estimate the efforts which will be made to arrest the generation and the contagion of the cattle typhus.[R]
We are certainly bound to resist the introduction of horned cattle tainted with typhus; but in the conditions amidst which they live, some of them may bear the seeds of the distemper, even whilst they appear in perfect health, and therefore able to endure the fatigue of a long journey.
Now, in order to avoid exciting the incubation of the typhus during their transit either to Finland, Holland, France, or England, it must never be forgotten that these animals are gifted with a nervous sensibility of wonderful acuteness, joined to the weakest vital resistance. Care must be taken to husband their strength, to give them a choice distribution of food easy of assimilation; barley-meal, or other grains, must be mixed up with their drink; they must be protected from the changes of weather; they must have room enough and air enough in the locomotive stalls on the railway trains and on board ship.
We pass over in silence the hygienic measures to be taken in order to keep these vehicles of transit in a proper sanitary state: the sanitary police regulations inserted further on will make them sufficiently known.
All these measures having been taken to meet and withstand distant causes and dangers, let us now direct our attention to those local causes which strike our eyes, and which likewise have their share of influence in propagating the disease. Thus, whenever an inclement season comes to deprive the herbivorous animals of sufficient pasture, or to deteriorate its natural qualities, we are bound to remedy this change, and to increase the cares we devote to them; for these frail and helpless creatures, immediately feel and suffer from the effects of a sustenance less than usually restorative. Under such circumstances, we must make exceptional sacrifices; when they return from feeding on the grass, we should give them some additional fodder, or roots of a generous quality. We must imitate the regimen used in the country of the steppes, by adding to their forage a solution of marine salt, or a solution of sulphate of iron. Day by day we must give to the weakest and least fed cattle, a ration consisting of bruised oats, pounded juniper berries, gentian, sulphate of iron, and carbonate of soda.
For, if we neglect to take those measures which are required to prevent among herbivorous animals the development of those ordinary epizootias, which every year are generated on our own soil, they will certainly afford a favourable seat to the typhic miasma transmitted by foreign animals, or exceptionally generated by themselves. These cares and attentions must be greatly increased, when the foreign epizootia, has spread itself, as in the present instance, among our flocks and herds. Then, indeed, we must be careful not to load these creatures with pampering food for the purpose of fattening them. For it may be profitable, and the breeder may plume himself, on having produced an adipose monstrosity to such a degree as to bury, for instance, a pig's head in the fleshy exuberance of his thorax; but such a derogation from the laws of nature borders closely on disease, and assuredly such an unnatural accumulation, predisposes the glutted animals to epizootic diseases in general.
The water given them to drink must be attended to with particular solicitude. It should never be drawn up from ponds or stagnant rivers. The animals kept in the pasture grounds should always find at their disposal, in receptacles intended for their use, a supply of pure fresh water.
After these precautions with respect to their food and sustenance, attention must next be directed to the hygienic conditions required by the animal. Every morning he should be cleaned, washed, brushed, and dried; what is every day done for the horse must now be done for the ox. These unusual cares will be most salutary to him, and greatly increase his vital resistance.
The animal thus protected in his food and particular necessities, attention must next be directed to the stalls and sheds. Over-crowding must be carefully avoided; the proper cube of air for breathing must be measured out for each head of cattle; every day the latter must be carried out into the open air; the floor of the stall or shed must first be thoroughly cleansed and washed out, after which it must be sprinkled with a solution of chloride of lime. If the stall is not well aired, a little straw should be burned on the ground, to improve the atmosphere, or else branches of resinous trees, or juniper berries may be used. In some cases aromatic fumigations of sage, rosemary, or mint, boiled in water, are employed, the balsamic vapours which arise therefrom being at once tonic and purifying. During the night a tub, containing pitch and tar, should be left in the stall, or a large piece of camphor should be suspended from the ceiling. Vinegar may be spilt on a piece of red-hot iron, or powder of sulphur may be burned into sulphuric gas and diffuse its vapours through the stall or shed. This excellent parasiticide may perhaps be equally endowed with anti-typhic properties.
Finally, when this fatal epizootia is ravaging the country, every farmer and agriculturist must carefully abstain from mixing with his herds any cattle which have been bought either at fairs or markets; he must take care, conformably with the directions issued by the Privy Council, (to which we refer the reader for more ample details,) to avoid all contact both direct and indirect with horned cattle tainted with the typhus, as he might himself become an instrument of the contagion.—Let him never forget that to take as the guide for his actions in these times of calamity his private and personal interest, is the greatest crime a man can commit. Let him strive, therefore, to assist the authorities in the measures which they have taken for the interest of all.
Now that we have examined the measures which prudence directs us to take to defend ourselves against the causes which produce and propagate typhus, let us think of the means of preventing it, when the contagion threatens to diffuse itself over a whole kingdom, as at present it is doing in England.
When, on the 19th of last June, it was believed that the typhus or Cattle Plague, as they continue to call it, had effected its invasion in England, the Government, informed by professional men of the serious danger to which the interests of the country would be exposed, if the disease should spread, might have considered this distemper not as a question of private interest, but as one of public and national concern. It might at the outset have given to this epizootia all the significancy of a public calamity, have looked upon it as the invasion of an enemy threatening to destroy its territory, and have employed every possible means to stifle it at its birth.
We well know that the English Government, derived as it is rather from political than from religious and social changes, is at once monarchical, aristocratic, and partially democratic, and for that reason embarrassed in its working by so many wheels. Its authority is scattered and divided, whilst the respect ascribed to the prerogatives of each distinct public power is the safeguard of the State. In the absence of both Houses during the recess, it could take no resolution as to ways and means; for the difficulties on this unhappy occasion, we cannot too often repeat it, are reduced to a question of money. Deprived of the requisite authority, it was unable to do more than exhume the old laws on the matter and ordain new ones. And yet, the impotence of the Government was not perhaps so great as is imagined; for whilst it suffered the typhus almost unmolested to devastate the country, it very justly, and in the name of the public interest, took vigorous and effectual measures to stamp out another epidemic—the rash and insane conspiracy of the Fenians. It stood still and would not authorize domiciliary visits in stables and stalls, nor the seizure of sick animals, but it did not falter a moment at the domiciliary visits and incarceration of insurgent citizens meditating mischief, so that in this instance, the privilege of immunity has been given to the brute creation. Everybody, both in England and out of England, admires their vigour and despatch in stifling the insurrection in its bud. But why not act with equal promptitude in the case of an epizootia?
Arming itself, in this manner, in the public interest, and with sufficient power, the Government might have appointed an executive commission, with the Lord Mayor as president. Such a commission would have applied itself at once to the consideration and studious examination of the subject in all its bearings, and would have proposed prompt and energetic measures, which the Government, with equal despatch, would have confirmed by giving to them the authority of law, as they have since tardily done. A fund, which, for the wealth of England, would not have been considerable, 250,000l.—the cost of a few Armstrong guns—might have been placed at the disposal of this Board, to enable its directors to meet and provide for, without delay, every just claim and want arising from the scourge.
An auxiliary commission, exclusively medical, and consisting of medical and veterinary doctors, might have been formed conjointly with the former, and every preventive measure, considered by them as necessary to stamp out the complaint at the outbreak, after it had been proposed by the medical board, and submitted to the executive commission, and by them to the Home Secretary, might have been acted upon by law within twenty-four hours.
Taken unawares, and the mode of treating the sick animals not being known at first, they would have been reduced to the cruel necessity of exterminating at once all tainted cattle, as well as those belonging to tainted herds, but not without compensating the owners of those cattle.[S]
They would have sent two physicians to Russia and Hungary, to observe and study the preventive and curative medication, especially their mode of inoculation, and thanks to the rapid locomotion of these times, twenty days would have been sufficient for this foreign exploration. The physicians constituting the medical board should have been authorized to seize any beast tainted with the typhus; a company should have been charged to collect and keep ready for the public service, at the four quarters of London, an ample retinue of horses, closed carriages, and working men, to convey at all hours of the day and night the carcases of the slaughtered animals to the respective spots, where long and deep trenches had been dug to receive them. Each carcase before burial to have been well sprinkled with chloride of lime.
By taking this course, every one's interest would have been respected, as much as can be desired when a great calamity threatens a country; besides, in doing so, the present ministers would but have followed the example of the Government (with regard to compensation), during the epizootia of the eighteenth century. The proprietors who had thus received, not the full and absolute price, but a sum sufficiently remunerative for their sacrificed cattle, would have assisted the authorities, and thereby would have served the common interest, because their sick cattle, perishing every hour within their stalls and sheds, were no longer a real source of embarrassment and ruin. They would not have been obliged to drive them to market to get what they could out of them and disencumber themselves. The most active cause of the contagion would by this means have been prevented.
This allowance having been made for the most pressing dangers, attention should next have been directed to a matter no less important—we mean the treatment and cure of this distemper; for we will never admit that England can have fallen back a century, and that whilst those enlightened men—Malcolm Flemming and Layard—proposed and tried to cure and prevent ox-typhus in 1757, we, in 1865, shall have been reduced to the horrible alternative, the repugnant barbarity, of the general and indiscriminate extermination of the tainted cattle.
Whilst, therefore, the treatment of the typhus would have been studied on the spot, and the most urgent measures would have been taken to withstand the propagation of the evil, they would have established, a few miles from London and on the northern side, in the direction of the great cattle market, a number of hospitals or sanitariums, and, as far as possible, within a park. These hospitals, constructed of wood, containing, besides stables and sheds, a slaughter-house, a dwelling-house for the staff of employés, a laboratory stocked with all the physical and chemical instruments required, &c., would in two or three weeks have been sufficiently prepared to receive a certain number of cattle.
Provided with these advantages and opportunities, a permanent stage of operation would have been raised on which trials and experiments might have been made with every chance of fruitful results. In these sanitariums, for instance, the most practical physicians and veterinarians might have entered upon a systematic course of treatment, dividing the bovine patients into classes, according to their periods of disease, their age, &c.; and trying some particular mode of treatment, some remedy considered as effectual, alternately, upon each of these classes of tainted cattle. These experiments, having been made under circumstances so favourable, would have enabled the faculty to establish a medical basis, which, if not infallible, would have been relatively efficacious, and might have saved a large number of the infected animals.
Whilst thus fixing their attention on the cure of the sick animals, these experimentalists would have carefully studied and practised the preventive treatment by inoculation, availing themselves both of Layard's hints and recommendations and of the practical knowledge acquired by the medical expedition to the steppes, which would by that time have returned from their mission. They would have selected animals smitten with the genuine typhus, of the typhoid and intestinal form, in the third period, whilst the depurative and critical secretions are running from the mucous membranes; they would have gathered the virus from its springs of infection or from its purulent subcutaneous deposits or from the serum of the blood.
On the other hand, they might have chosen four heifers, of good constitutions and healthy, and these they might have prepared, according to Layard's advice, for inoculation, by a special treatment, and by hygienic and medical cares. On some of these the inoculation would have been made near the tail, according to the subcutaneous process, with a lancet charged with typhic virus; on others, a crucial incision, or cross-cut, would have been made on the crupper. But, to speak truth, we cannot do better than Layard, whose ingenious treatment, with all due deference to a certain veterinarian of our day, deserves a very different epithet than that of being amusing.[T] Layard says:—