LITMIR.BIZ

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the death of all the inoculated animals. But it was soon perceived that these grievous results, far from prejudicing the theory, really confirmed it; and that the virus, attenuated in its toxical properties, would prove as effectual as was expected. And truly, in 1854 and 1855, at the Dorpat establishment, the inoculations made with a better selected virus afforded results less disastrous. At Kozau they were still more satisfactory. In fine, passing from experiment to experiment, they arrived at the conclusion that it was necessary to inoculate several heads of cattle, the one after the other, without having recourse to any other virus than the first inoculated, so that they might thereby obtain virus of the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, and up to the 10th generation. The virus thus attenuated in its morbid effects answered at length every experiment, and oxen thus inoculated could mingle with impunity with diseased cattle.

      At the veterinary establishment of Chalkoff they inoculated, during eight meetings, 1059 animals with virus of the 3rd generation, and the results were as satisfactory as could be wished for, only 60 animals having sunk under the effects of this preventive operation.

      The inoculations made in 1857 and 1858 on an estate belonging to the Duchess Helena, at Karlowska, in the government of Pultawa, and conducted by the veterinarian Raussels, likewise afforded the most satisfactory results.

      Professor Jessen thinks it certain, that beasts born of cows which have been afflicted with contagious typhus do not contract the disease. He maintains that Europe may be preserved from this frightful scourge, by taking care that no cattle be exported from the steppes of Russia save those which have had the distemper either naturally or by inoculation, and he is striving to propagate this opinion, and to render it practical, by having all the cattle inoculated, without exception.

      It is deeply to be regretted that counsels so prudent have not been heeded in the 47 governments which, out of the 53 possessed by Russia, have generated the contagious typhus; for then it would not so frequently have effected its passage into the neighbouring states, and England most probably, would not now have to take up arms against its fatal extension.

VII

      We here conclude that part of our labour which includes the history of this disease, and what we have been able to glean from those medical writers, and others, who have given us the results of their experience. It may have appeared somewhat protracted, but it has at least laid open to the student the antecedent investigations of our predecessors, under calamities of the same kind, but considerably more fatal than what has yet been witnessed in Western Europe during our time. We have disinterred and brought to light the forgotten works of conscientious and competent men. Like Brunelleschi, the architect, we have sought, not to invent a theory, but to recover a practice; and thus we have received the observations and precious facts, and finally the preventive treatment, of other men and other times, which had coped successfully against the cattle disease when its ravages were infinitely greater.

      To resume, then: these inquiries (which we undertook without anticipating so rich a harvest) have proved, and made evident —

      That the contagious typhus afflicting horned cattle, has spread its destructive principle over our globe ever since there have been animals living on its surface.

      That from century to century, not to say from year to year, it has carried its terrors amidst nations and peoples.

      That the remedial measures which had been taken and applied prior to the middle of the eighteenth century, were utterly powerless either to cure this disease or to prevent it.

      That at that period appeared two English physicians, men of remarkable aptitude and penetration, one of whom, Malcolm Flemming, laid down in theory the bases of a preventive treatment; whilst the other, Peter Layard, applied this theory to practice, by inoculating sound and healthy animals with the morbid virus of the typhus, in order to protect them from the fatal effects of the contagion.

      That this all-important progress in medical experience, has been absolutely forgotten; so much so, indeed, that the experiments of inoculation, tried in Russia only ten or twelve years ago with perfect success, do not seem to be connected by any link with those made in England a century before, and that the invasion of the so-called Cattle Plague in 1865 seemed to some men to have introduced a new scourge, which men were not armed and prepared to meet – which they were powerless to cure, or to stay in its progress.

      These inquiries, then, have proved, we think, that we are not so helpless as we had imagined to resist the evil. But we cannot help feeling, that we have laid bare in this exposition some most distressing inferences concerning the human mind. For, in truth, can anything be more deplorable, than thus to see the civilized nations of Europe endure, from century to century, these reiterated outbreaks of cattle typhus, and to see likewise that no man of sufficient energy and independence has yet arisen to tell the truth fearlessly to the governments and peoples, however painful that truth may be, and to expose the futility of the measures hitherto employed to arrest the scourge?

      And, on the other hand, is it not most afflicting to see discoveries of indisputable value buried out of view, submerged in public libraries, utterly unknown and forgotten, like their authors, to such a degree, that the distemper which they have made known in its entirety, and which is as old as the world itself, seems to us almost new in 1865?

      God send, that these cruel trials and severe lessons which the past has bequeathed to us may teach us something for our benefit! May the irresistible might which is derived from the auspicious union of capital and intelligence supersede the vain and flimsy efforts of isolated energy! May the government, which lavishes hundreds of millions upon the destructive engines of war, devote some portion of its ample means to the study of hereditary infections and contagious diseases! For these fatal epidemics decimate men as well as cattle, and we may at least ward off from our children the desolating disease which at present afflicts ourselves.

      We possess already every requisite means to protect ourselves from the formidable visitation of these diseases: we have science; we have the men who cultivate and teach it; we have the experience of the past added to our own. To-day, we are called upon to resist the baleful effects of cattle typhus; but another epizootia may come to-morrow, and strike our horses and our sheep – those domestic animals which constitute our most precious possession. The cholera hovers about us. If we do nothing, if we talk and debate instead of acting, these scourges will come upon us on a sudden, and find us quite as helpless as ever to resist their sway.

      These palpable truths deserve to be further developed, and will be treated more copiously at the end of this book. They will constitute the complement of our work, necessarily written in haste, since the danger we had to expose was itself so urgent and alarming.

      SECOND PART

      This Part is divided, as already stated, into four chapters.

      CHAPTER I

On Typhous Diseases in general, and the Typhus which affects the Ox in particular

      By following the example of those authors who have described the contagious typhus of the ox, we might proceed at once to explain its symptoms, and go directly to our purpose; but, by taking this hasty course, we should expose ourselves to be imperfectly understood by the majority of our readers, and to leave certain doubts in the minds of physicians as to the nature of the disease and the propriety of its treatment.

      All animals, including man himself, are born with a predisposition and liability to contract a certain number of contagious febrile diseases; they bear in a manner a certain number of physiological elements, which might be called latent germs, and which, under given conditions, become the leaven of these diseases. This must, indeed, be the case, since after these disorders have been once developed those who have been cured of them are not apt to contract them again, the morbid developments having destroyed that natural aptitude which had previously existed to undergo the morbid action of the contagious virus. These diseases are not numerous; they constitute a very distinct class, and the same laws, which regulate the phenomena in one of them are applicable to all the rest.

      These diseases exhibit the following characteristics: 1st, a period of incubation, during which the whole economy, more particularly the blood and humours, experience very important changes and modifications; 2nd, a febrile state, which varies in its continuous or intermittent types, and in its intensity, according to the species

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