In 1661, after a hot, dry summer, a kind of phrcnzy spread among animals, especially horses, cattle, and sheep ; but we do not know if it was contagious. It was principally confined to the northern climates, and, on opening the head, one or more worms were found in the substance of the brain. Numbers of fasciolx or intesti nal worms, were also discovered in many animals pe rishing by an epizooty in 1663 and the two succeeding years, and were then considered the sole cause of the distemper. Analogous symptoms, though it does not appear whether the malady was equally fatal, attacked almost the whole cattle in the Danish territory in 1674.
France was visited by an epizooty among the black cattle in 1682. The animal functions were uninterrupted until the attack, when sudden death ensued. This was accompanied by gangrene of the tongue and intestines, and the former sometimes came away in pieces. Those who tended the cattle, and neglected proper precautions, are said to have been infected by the disease, and to have died. Its progress was regular, and marked by astonish ing rapidity ; and it was observed to be at the rate of 12 English miles in 24 hours. Thus it spread from the frontiers of Italy to Poland.
The knowledge of the various distempers to which animals are subject, had wonderfully increased in the commencement of the eighteenth century ; and oppor tunities for observation seemed to keep pace with a gene ral anxiety to investigate their cause. Between the years 1705 and 1711, a distemper called the flying chancre of bubo, which the latest authors denominate a real plague or murrain, was found to be making terrible ravages in Europe. It had been imported by a single infected ox broug it into the Venetian states from Hungary and Dal matia ; and it was thence disseminated throughout the Roman territory and the kingdom of Naples, sweeping away almost the whole cattle in its progress. It did not reach France until the year 1714 ; and, in the same year, having been some time prevalent in Britain, the most vigorous means for repressing it were adopted by go vernment. All the animals attacked were ordered to he destroyed, and buried deep in the earth, and a compen sation allowed to those who thus lost their property. The violence of the disease did not subsist above three months, during which time the counties of Essex, Mid dlesex, and Surrey, lost 5857 cattle, old and young. At this time it was observed, that on cows being brought to a pond to drink, many became giddy, fell clown in con vulsions, bled copiously at the mouth and nose, and died. Other nations suffered more severely ; Piedmont lost 70,000 cattle ; Holland, not fewer than 200,000 ; and the full extent of the epizooty throughout Europe, was cal culated to have destroyed 1,500,000 animals. All these perished of the infection disseminated by the single dis eased ox from Hungary. But the disease was marked by considerable distinctions in different countries ; and it seems that some of its symptoms bore little resemblance in one place to what were seen in another.
An intelligent German physician, Andrew Gcelicke, had an opportunity of making many interesting observa tions on an epizooty among black cattle in 1730, which spread by contagion ; and the attention of DI. De Sauva ges of Montpellier was soon afterwards directed to a distemper among cattle, horses, mules and asses. This was a blain of the tongue, degenerating into a cancerous ulcer, whereby that organ was almost totally destroyed. The commencement and termination of the disease were sometimes witnessed within 24 hours. The people of the city of Nismes did not escape ; and on looking into historical record, several Parisians had apparently been affected by a similar complaint, in the year 1571. The tongue of the diseased animals now fell to pieces, while they fed and performed their ordinary functions.
One of the most destructive epizooties known to have appeared, again ravaged Europe for at least ten con secutive years from about 1740. Its virulence, however, was greatest in 1745 and 1746. It was generally thought to have originated at the siege of Prague, and to have been disseminated from Bohemia by means of distem pered cattle. This disease was exhibited by the same general symptoms of shivering, palpitations of the heart, difficult respiration, a frequent cough, coldness of the hoofs and horns, cessation of the natural evacuations, and sometimes the animal fell down as if Struck by apoplexy. Eruptions covered those which survived the violence of the attack. But it was evidently contagious, and the strongest precautions were adopted to repress the infec tion. Former experience had proved, in the history of au Lancisi, that they could not be too strictly adopted ; for certain drivers having brought their cattle to a fair in Italy, in the year 1713, a prohibition was is sued against holding it, in order to prevent the dispersion of the cattle. However, the drivers, rather than be dis appointed of a market, conducted them by private roads to Rome, and sold their cattle at a low price. Immedi ately afterwards, a contagious distemper spread through the whole Roman territory, and destroyed 300,000 ani mals. Notwithstanding similar precautions now enforced, and burying the diseased cattle, as well as interdicting the sale of their flesh, untoward accidents happened ; and if we are to credit the accounts of the times, contagion was disseminated by the skin. But at different places in France, guards were posted to prevent any cattle from approaching them, whereby the stock was preserved in health, though the malady was making rapid advances in the surrounding country. The Marquis do Courtiv von, instituted numerous experiments regarding this dis temper, from which he concluded that it exhibited itself on the fourth day from infection, that the ninth was its crisis, and that the contagion could spread only by direct communication between two animals.