Synonyms. Definition: Contagious disease of breeding solipeds, with
special lesions in generative and nervous system, and skin, and caused
by a trypanosoma. Susceptible animals: horse, dog, rabbit, rat, mouse,
ass. History: in Europe and America. Causes: contagion; coition;
microbiology; trypanosoma equiperdum; its successive stages: 1.
granules and refrangent spherules; 2; chromatin bodies with two
prolongations; 3. fusiform body with nucleus and nucleolus and two
flagella; 4. pyriform bodies with flagella; 5. fusiform body with
nucleus, nucleolus and undulating membrane: in blood, sperm, milk,
vaginal mucus, sores; disappears from blood in intermissions and
rapidly after death. Lesions: phlegmons of generative organs, papules,
vesicles, mottling, swollen inguinal glands, penis, testicles,
caseation or atrophy, thickened lymphatics, nervous lesions, friable
bones, arthritis, liver, spleen, kidneys, lungs, lack of red globules,
anæmia, muscular atrophy; in mare, in dog. Symptoms: _Horse_:
incubation 11 days, variable; preputial, scrotal, sub-abdominal
swelling, catarrh of genital mucosa, vesicles, sores, swollen penis,
semierections; paraphymosis, slight fever, tender loins, frequent
micturition, paresis, swollen joints, tendons, emaciation marked
anæmia, apathy, dementia, nasal ulcers, submaxillary swellings.
_Mare_: vulvar swelling, distortion, leucorrhœa, eruption, spots of
depigmentation, erection of clitoris, urine in driblets often,
inguinal swellings, sterility or abortion, lameness, trembling, great
anæmia and emaciation. Diagnosis: from urticaria: from glanders,
generative lesions, no response to mallein, paresis: from chronic
paraplegia, by its coition cause, and in horses only; from vesicular
exanthema by gravity and nervous phenomena. Prognosis: Mortality 70
per cent. and upwards. Symptoms in ass slight: in dog severe and
fatal; in rabbits severe. Treatment: prevent copulation, castration,
local antiseptics early. Prevention: prevent copulation of infected
and suspected animals, castrate, import only on certificate and on
long quarantine.
_Synonyms._ _Venereal Disease of Solipeds_; _Equine Syphilis_; _Maladie
du Coit_; _Chancrous Epizoötic_; _Breeding Paralysis_; _Epizoötic
Paraplegia_.
_Definition._ A contagious affection of solipeds, transmitted by
copulation, and attended by specific lesions in the generative organs
and nervous system, such as local venereal swellings, chancrous ulcers
and cicatrices, dementia and paralysis.
_Susceptibility._ As occurring casually the disease is essentially an
equine one, yet the following species are susceptible to experimental
inoculation in the order named: dogs, rabbits, rats, mice, asses. While
the horse shows the greatest susceptibility, the ass is comparatively
very resistant to the poison.
_History._ The malady has probably long prevailed in the east, yet it
was first clearly distinguished in 1796 when described by Ammon as
prevailing in the royal stud at Trakehnen in Northern Prussia. We have
later descriptions of the disease in the same locality in 1801
(Hertwig), and 1807 (Ammon). It was found in Bromberg in 1817 to 1820
(Waltersdorf), also in Hanover (Haveman), in Austria and Bohemia in
1821–8 (Fischer), in Styria in 1821, in Switzerland in 1830, in France
in 1830–2 (Lautour), in Silesia and Pomerania in 1833–40 (Fischer), in
Italy in 1836, in Russia in 1843, (Fischer), in Silesia and Poland in
1830–40 (Freidberger and Fröhner), in Algiers in 1847–55, and in Syria
and Asia generally and perennially (Daumas and Signol).
It appeared at Bloomington, Ill., in 1882, the first affected animal
being a brown stallion that had been imported from France and which bore
on his neck a brand like the letter D. In this locality it extended to a
considerable number of breeding mares and stallions, and having been
recognized by Dr. W. L. Williams, was largely stamped out by a rigid
quarantine of diseased and exposed animals. Some exposed animals had,
however, left the district, and isolated centres of infection have been
since found in Nebraska and elsewhere in the United States.
It is not known to have invaded Belgium, Scandinavia, England, South
America nor Australasia.
All indications point to Asia or North Africa as the primal home of the
disease, as they still prove its perennial one.
_Causes._ The disease is transmitted by contagion and almost exclusively
in the act of coition. Hayne has seen the affection in geldings, and
Haxthausen in mares that had never been served. Schneider, Buffard,
Nocard, Blaise and others have transmitted it freely by inoculation of
blood and nervous matter, so that the possibility of infection through
other channels than the generative organs must be admitted. But such
irregular means of casual infection are so rare, and the probability of
transmission of the virus from a non-breeding animal is so remote that
in the practical measures of sanitary police, the breeding horses alone
need be taken into account.
The extra vascularity of the male and female generative organs at the
period of coition undoubtedly favors infection, as a latent or
apparently recovered case will relapse under its frequent repetition.
The abrasion of the epithelial surface also forms infection atria and
favors new multiple points of infection.
The disease has occurred congenitally (Rodolff, Jessen). It has been
claimed that the higher bred horses with lighter frames are the more
susceptible (Fischer), but this is probably a delusion, the disease
having been often introduced by the Barb and Arabian and propagated
among their grade descendants. The heavy Percheron shows a very ready
susceptibility and a virulent and fatal form of the affection.
_Microbiology._ That the affection was due to a microbe was clearly
shown by its absence from every part of the world into which infected
horses had not been brought. The secluded countries, Belgium, England,
Scandinavia, that breed their own horses, the distant Australia, New
Zealand and South America remained free in face of the constant presence
of the infection in different parts of Central and Southern Europe, in
Africa and Asia. The horses of America and South Africa showed a ready
susceptibility to the virus brought by infected horses, and rigorous
sanitary police control speedily cleared a district of the trouble.
Thanhoffer found in the blood, vaginal mucous, testicle, semen, spinal
fluid, myelon, and roots of the dorsal and lumbar nerves cocci,
especially streptococci and less constantly bacilli, to which he
attributed the malady. More recently Schneider and Buffard have
apparently demonstrated that an infusorian, the _trypanosoma of
dourine_, is the essential pathogenic agent.
The _Trypanosoma Equiperdum_ varies greatly in form at different stages
of its growth or in different media. In the exudate of the slight early
tumefaction, without as yet other symptoms, it is found as minute
granules in groups, as larger spherical very refrangent bodies like very
large cocci, each having a strongly staining nucleus, and as larger
bodies in which a delicate membranous covering encloses one, two or
three masses of chromatin and extends to form one or more points
(club-shaped or fusiform). Each chromatin mass has a nucleolus on its
outer surface or slightly apart from it. Twenty-four hours later there
may be added: First, short, thick chromatin bodies, with two slightly
undulating, pointed, membranous prolongations. Second, more delicate,
fusiform bodies, each with one chromatin nucleus, a detached nucleolus,
and the membrane prolonged into two actively moving flagella. Third,
larger pyriform bodies with chromatin nuclei and nucleoli and the
membrane prolonged into one or several flagella. Fourth, fusiform
bodies, thick or delicate, each having a chromatin nucleus and
nucleolus, and arranged singly or in groups of two, four, six or more,
united together at one end and diverging at the other to form a stellate
mass. These last, 20 to 30μ long by 1.5 to 2μ broad, may perhaps be the
adult form of the parasite from which the small granular or spore forms
found in the most recent lesions are derived. The fusiform outline, the
deep staining central mass, with its adjacent nucleolus, and the pointed
or flagellate membranous prolongations, more or less motile or
undulating, are characteristic features.
In its morphology and evolutionary forms the trypanosoma of dourine has
not been shown to differ from that of surra, nor the nagana or Tsétsé
disease, the granule form, the spherical, the club-shaped or pyriform,
the fusiform with more or less stellate grouping, are characteristic of
all (Lydia Rabinowitsch, Kemper, Schneider, Buffard). The distinction is
found in the pathogenesis of the two diseases.
With active cutaneous or mucous lesions, the parasite is usually found
abundantly in the blood, sperm, milk, vaginal secretions, and the
erosions of the vaginal mucosa or penis. During intermissions, however,
and in the absence of local lesions, examination of the blood may fail
to detect it, yet its inoculation on a dog will usually produce the
affection. It disappears from the blood and tissues with great rapidity
after death, so that, to prove successful, inoculations should be made
before death or immediately after. They are ineffective after 48 hours.
Schneider and Buffard, Nocard and others found the trypanosoma in the
blood and exudates of horses, asses and dogs, suffering from dourine,
and failed to find it, in the same localities, in animals of the same
species which were free from dourine. The infected blood, preserved for
24 hours in sealed glass tubes, and then inoculated on two dogs produced
characteristic dourine, with the extensive production of trypanosoma in
the blood, the destruction of blood globules, and the pathognomonic
local lesions. Inoculation of two other dogs, with the same material, at
the end of 48 hours produced a slight transient hyperthermia only,
without local lesions or propagation of the parasite in the blood. The
same blood inoculated after 15 days produced neither local lesion nor
fever.
_Lesions._ _Horse._ In the early stages are found a phlegmonous or
œdematous swelling of the _sheath_, _scrotum_, _penis_ and _inguinal
glands_ and a yellowish liquid effusion into the scrotal cavity. The
skin covering these parts may show a papular or vesicular eruption or if
this has passed, a mottling with white spots shows where the lesions
have been. Later still the _inguinal glands_ are shrunken and have
undergone fibroid degeneration and induration and the testicles, swollen
or shrunken, contain centres of caseation. The connective tissue of the
epididymus and cord is the seat of a gelatinoid exudation. The _walls of
the scrotum_ may be greatly thickened and the seat of abscess or of
caseous degenerated hyperplasia. In advanced cases the _testicles_ are
usually abnormally small even if the scrotal mass is enormously
distended. The _sheath_ and _penis_ may be the seat of more or less
numerous ulcers, and swellings, contractions and distortions of the
latter organ are not uncommon. The penis may, however, retain its normal
dimensions. The walls of the _lymphatics_ in the inguinal region may be
the seat of hyperplasia, the thickening causing them to stand out like
cords as in glanders. In the advanced stages the _muscles_, especially
those of the hind limbs, become pale and atrophied.
The _nerve centres_ undergo profound changes which have been studied by
Thanhoffer. The _pia mater_ in the affected parts of the spinal cord is
the seat of active congestion and thickening. The central canal of the
cord is dilated (syringomyelia) more at one point than another, contains
more than the normal amount of liquid, and the neuroglia around it is
thickened and fibrous (sclerosed). The _substance of the cord_, both
white and gray, shows congestion, blood staining, at points foci of
softening, and at others induration (hyperplasia of the neuroglia). The
_nerve cells_ are modified in various ways, some being granular, some
discolored by fine granular pigment, some having enlarged and multiplied
nuclei, and some show vacuoles. The _nerve filaments_ often show a
granular degeneration extending from the nerve cell into the axis
cylinder, and the latter is liable to be varicose or uneven in size. In
the affected portion of the cord leucocytes are numerous and hyperplasia
is often present. The neuroglia especially tends to encrease, and apart
from the foci of softening tends to give a special firmness to the
substance. At intervals, in the perivascular spaces, may often be found
minute (microscopic or macroscopic) blood clots. The subarachnoid and
subdural fluid is encreased and may be pinkish. At the roots of spinal
nerves, especially in the dorsal and lumbar regions, a gelatinoid
exudate may invest the nerve, distending the connective tissue beneath
the neurilemma and even occupying the interval between the nerve
filaments. Sometimes large corpuscular bodies are found between the
nerve fibres.
The _cerebral meninges_, especially the _pia mater_, are congested and
opaque. Foci of softening are by no means uncommon and the cerebral
ventricles contain an abnormal quantity of fluid.
The _bony tissue_ generally has lost its consistency and the medullary
matter may be unduly reddened. The large joints contain an excess of
synovia somewhat pinkish in color, and the ligaments of the hip joints
are often congested, thickened and softened. The articular cartilage may
even show patches of blood staining.
The _intestines_ are usually nearly empty, soft, pale and flaccid, and
Ruthe has in one case observed rounded ulcers on the mucosa. Fibroid
thickening on the peritoneal surface may indicate a previous exudate.
The _mesentery_ is thickened, with infiltration and has a yellowish
discoloration and the _mesenteric glands_ are usually enlarged, softened
and friable, though sometimes firm and contracted. The _lymph glands_
adjoining the generative organs are often swollen, pigmented and studded
with foci of caseation, varying in size from a pea upward.
The _liver_ is softened and congested or fatty. The _spleen_ is small.
The _kidneys_ are usually large, but flaccid, pale and bleached.
The _thoracic organs_ may show little change, though hypostatic
inflammation and foci of caseation or suppuration may be present.
The _blood_ is pale and watery and forms a loose, pale, diffluent clot,
while there is an extraordinary diminution of red globules and a
relatively great encrease of leucocytes.
In advanced stages the _muscles_ are pale, anæmic and shrunken
especially those of the hind limbs.
_Mare._ In the mare in addition to the lesions of the internal organs
and blood, the following may be noted in connection with the generative
system. Phlegmonous or œdematous swellings, sores or ulcers on the lips
of the vulva, and on the vulvar and vaginal mucosæ. The parts become
variously distorted, and the vulva, habitually open may expose the
swollen and ulcerated clitoris. A crop of papules or vesicles, running
into sores or ulcers may appear on the urethral orifice, the vulva and
adjacent skin, and even though overlooked, their seats are marked later
by loss of cutaneous pigment and the formation of small white spots. The
mammæ are sometimes inflamed, œdematous and tender, with suppurative or
necrotic foci and the adjacent lymph glands are enlarged by infiltration
or contracted by sclerosis.
_Dog._ These resemble those in horses. In the bitch genito-urinary
congestion, inflammation and catarrh, subcutaneous infiltration under
the belly and inside the thighs, swelling of the inguinal lymph glands,
emaciation, and pallor and atrophy of the voluntary muscles are marked
features.
_Symptoms._ _Horse._ Incubation may last from one to eight weeks
(Maresch), but is usually 11 days from the infecting service. It may be
abridged by a special susceptibility, and by repeated infections and
hence the more acute cases are especially seen in the male in daily
service. In some such subjects local genital infiltrations are speedily
followed by paralysis or vertigo which cuts off the patient in a few
days.
More commonly the malady is _chronic_ though varying in different
countries, epizoötics or even in particular cases.
The first _symptom_ is slight swelling of the anterior border and raphe
of the sheath, which gradually extends backward to the scrotum and
inguinal region and forward on the abdomen it may be as far as the
brisket. This may be hot and painful, but is usually œdematous, cool and
painless. The infiltration affects the end of the penis, the meatus may
be red and angry with a slight muco-purulent discharge, and red spots
vesicles and ulcers may stand out clearly on the pigmented surface.
Williams never saw such eruptions in the American cases and doubts their
existence except as the result of injuries. There are frequent
semierections and service is still possible. Later the engorgement
extends to the specially pendent testicles, inguinal glands and others
adjacent. Paraphymosis is occasionally seen or, more commonly, the penis
hangs out of the sheath soft and flaccid and erection seems impossible.
The local swelling may become excessive, pressing the testicles up
against the inguinal ring, or suppuration and extensive abscess may
follow. Appetite is retained and the temperature remains moderate (100°
to 102° F.).
The local swellings may almost completely subside, except a slight
tumefaction of the end of the penis, hence some (Fischer) have held that
the cutaneous lesions are the primary ones, yet the start of infection
at the generative organs and the fact that a stallion often infects a
number of mares before there is any suspicion of his own infirmity is
evidence enough of the genital seat of the earliest lesions.
The cutaneous lesions, which are essentially secondary, but highly
characteristic, appear from forty to sixty days after the infection
(Schneider and Buffard). They are from a quarter of a dollar and upward
in size (in some old horses much smaller), and rise abruptly from the
healthy skin, becoming the more marked that the hairs upon them stand
erect. These may arise suddenly and subside again in one day, or give
out a serous exudate which mats the hairs into a tuft. They may,
however, last four or five days. These are more patent after a full
drink of water, or after sprinkling or sponging with water. Even when
they have been overlooked these results may often be seen later on
colored skins, in the presence of many circular white spots entirely
devoid of pigment. The most common seat of these cutaneous lesions is
the hind parts (anus, tail, croup, quarters), but they may appear on the
sides, neck, shoulder or thighs.
Tenderness of the loins may now be shown, with frequent, painful
micturition, but the penis becomes more and more paretic, so that
coition becomes encreasingly difficult or impossible. Paresis also shows
in the hind limbs, the animal remains recumbent a great part of the
time, rises with difficulty, starts suddenly forward at the fetlock, and
drags the toe on the ground in walking. Swelling of the joints and
tendinous sheaths, with attendant lameness, is not uncommon. The
appetite remains good, yet emaciation and weakness make marked progress.
The advanced stages are characterised by marked anæmia, paraplegia and
dementia. The visible mucosæ are pale, emaciation advanced, the patient
stubs his toes and sways in walking, and finally drops unable to rise;
or he stands with hind legs straddled and semi-bent, and largely
oblivious of all around him. He may be too stupid to eat unless the food
is placed in his mouth, and yet the neigh of another horse or a mare may
draw forth a feeble retort, as if the deranged generic instincts
remained. Swelling, or even abscess of the lymph glands, axillary,
submaxillary or inguinal, is usually present, and muco-purulent
discharge with ulceration of the nose or eyes is not uncommon. The
joints crack when moved and fractures are common.
The duration of the disease is two or three months, the progress being
more rapid in winter.
_Mare._ Vulvar swelling eight or nine days after service, with ejection
of urine in jets, contraction of the vulva, redness, swelling and
erection of the clitoris, and a muco-purulent discharge are marked
symptoms. European observers note nodules, vesicles and ulcers on the
mucosa and adjacent skin, but these were not observed in the American
cases (Williams). Yet later they showed the characteristic white spots.
Switching of the tail, stamping of the hind feet and painful straining
to urinate are followed in certain cases by ejection of the urine
forcibly in jets or in small dribblets. The catarrhal discharge is at
first watery, but later becomes viscid, sticky and white, yellow or
grayish, or even red. It mats together the hair of the tail and thighs,
and putrefies, exhaling a repulsive odor. The swelling involves the
space between the thighs and often implicates the mammary glands and
even the floor of the abdomen. The inguinal glands are often involved,
and hyperplasias with degenerations and even abscesses may appear in
this region. As in the stallions the local lesions may have periods of
advance and subsidence, and in favorable cases, that are not again
served, there may seem to be a temporary recovery. The mare, however,
remains infecting, and if served the local disease is at once roused
into activity. The button-like skin eruptions appears on the quarter as
already noticed of the horse and in grave cases may caseate or suppurate
and burst, forming an indolent and intractable sore. The dark skin of
the vulva and perineum becomes marked by white spots or by irregular
patches caused by the confluence of several such spots, which for
ordinary breeds of horses are highly characteristic of this disease.
Many Arabian horses naturally acquire such white spots on the dark skin,
and in pure Arabs and grades this appearance need not be held as
evidence of dourine.
Infected mares rarely conceive, and any that do so are likely to abort
before the sixth month.
The systemic symptoms, nervous, paralytic, tremulous, dyspeptic,
atrophic, cerebral and cachectic follow a similar course as in the
stallion.
In grave and progressive cases the lesions of the generative organs
become very marked. The lips of the vulva become rigid and distorted so
that it remains constantly open and the erect clitoris continually
exposed. The skin of the vulva is tense, dry and shining. Lameness is
shown in one or both hind limbs, knuckling over at the fetlock,
shortening of the step, planting the toe first and the heel later with a
jerk, lack of balance, paresis and even inability to rise.
A disposition to trembling is common to both sexes, as is also an
intolerable itching of the skin which may make the animals tear the
lower parts of the limbs with the teeth. In either there may be a local
paralysis of a lip, an ear, an eyelid, or some other part of the body.
In both sexes the disease tends to extreme anæmia, debility and
emaciation, and to infective internal inflammations (lungs, bronchia) or
septic or purulent infections.
_Diagnosis._ From _urticaria_ this disease is to be distinguished by the
absence of lesions of the generative organs in the former, by its
association with change of food and digestive disorder and by the
absence of all evidence of contagion.
From _glanders_ it is to be distinguished in the same way by its casual
transmission by sexual connection only, by its restriction to breeding
animals, and by the irresponsiveness of the victim to the mallein test.
The progressive paresis and hebetude are valuable diagnostic phenomena.
From _chronic paraplegia_ it is distinguished by the same prevalence in
breeding solipeds only, and by its mode of transmission.
The greatest difficulty is experienced with the slight and comparatively
occult cases, and in some of these the history of the infection of a
number of breeding animals, which have been served by the same horse may
be the one guiding point for a number of the cases. For sanitary
purposes it is well to treat as suspicious animals all mares that have
been served by a stallion which is in the line of infection. This
suspicion would attach also to any stallion that had served a mare which
had been to a diseased or suspected stallion, and to all mares that have
been served by the suspected stallion after he had been to the suspected
mare.
From _simple vesicular exanthema_ dourine is to be distinguished by its
comparatively slow progress, and by the uniformity of the lesions of the
generative organs and nervous system, which are lacking in the vesicular
affection.
_Prognosis._ A certain number of animals recover from the milder attacks
which have not become complicated by the grave trophic and nervous
lesions, but as in glanders, recovery from severe attacks and in the
advanced stages is practically unknown. The mortality is set at 70 per
cent. and upward.
_Symptoms in the Ass and Mule._ The disease usually remains discrete,
the lesions in the generative organs or other seat of infection being
the marked symptoms, and recovery the rule. Œdema of the end of the
penis, obliteration of the folds around the orifice of the urethra and
eversion of the urethral mucosa are the most constant features, distinct
even in semi-erection. Œdema of the sheath and skin eruption may follow.
Exceptionally a mule proves as susceptible as the horse, and shows the
disease with the same fatal severity.
_Symptoms in Dog._ A bitch, 15 days after vaginal injection of the
infected equine blood, showed severe vaginitis and hyperthermia (100°).
On the 23d day she aborted, followed by muco-purulent discharge, vulvar
œdema, pallor of the mucosæ, anæmia, rapid emaciation, paresis and
occasional convulsions. Blood drawn from the vulva contained the
trypanosoma. She died on the 66th day. The temperature rose to 103°.
Two male dogs that lined the above infected bitch showed after 12 days,
engorgement of the sheath and scrotum, muco-purulent discharge, and
abundance of the trypanosoma in the blood of the affected parts.
Cutaneous lesions on the loins, thighs, sides or forehead, showed
erection of the hair, with infiltration, or shrivelling and
bloodlessness.
Other dogs showed arthritis, corneal opacities and ulcers, hypopion,
cataract, nasal discharges, facial periostitis, dyspnœa and syncope.
_Symptoms in Rabbits._ Rouget found in inoculated rabbits, extensive
gangrene of the skin, involving even the cranial bones, ulcerative
keratitis, hypopion, panophthalmia, following on the earlier genital
troubles of vaginitis, swelling and discharge.
_Treatment._ Some cases recover spontaneously a few may be aborted in
the earliest stage of the disease, but cases that have advanced to any
extent and assumed a grave character are practically hopeless.
An important element in treatment is to do away as far as possible with
the cause of generative excitement since the disease is aggravated and
more rapidly advanced by frequent copulation. Rodloff from a very wide
experience speaks highly of castration of the stallion. Castration of
the mare has not been specially advocated and the absence of marked
lesions in the ovaries, may deter the veterinarian, yet whatever
promises to lessen in any degree the genesic excitement is not to be
despised, and the measure has besides a sanitary value for other
animals.
Early local treatment is the most promising, and especially if it can be
applied to exposed animals during apparent incubation. Injection of the
urethra, sheath, vulva, vagina and uterus with antiseptic lotions, and
apply them to the external sores. Mercuric chloride 1:2000, carbolic
acid 2:100, silver nitrate 1:250, calcium chloride 1:100, or chlorine
water may be taken as examples. When local swellings have supervened it
would be entirely appropriate to incise them freely or even to excise
them and cauterize thoroughly with stronger agents.
Internal treatment by mercuric chloride 1½ to 3 grains, potassium iodide
2 to 5 drs., arsenic 7 to 14 grains, has been widely used but to little
purpose. The same may be said of Rodloff’s treatment by tonics and
carminatives (sal ammoniac, camphor, iron, angelica, gentian, ginger and
valerian.)
_Prevention._ The one thing to be secured is the prevention of
copulation with any animal that has been affected, or exposed to this
disease in the past three years.
1st. Any stallion or mare once affected must be excluded from breeding
for at least three years after apparent recovery.
2d. Every such animal that has been exposed by copulation with a
suspected animal must be excluded from breeding for the same period even
if no active symptoms have been shown.
3d. Every affected or exposed animal, should be quarantined in the hands
of his or her owner and placed on an official register and the sale,
gift or loan of such an animal, or its movement to a new place where it
might propagate the disease should be made a misdemeanor.
4th. In any county or district in which the disease exists all stallions
and mares should be registered and none should be allowed to be used for
breeding purposes without an official certificate showing that each of
the animals mated is free from all suspicion of having been exposed to
this infection.
5th. If any stallion or mare is imported from a country in which dourine
exists it should be accompanied by an official certificate showing that
it has not in the past three years been exposed to the possibility of
infection with dourine.
6th. In the absence of such certificate the imported animal (capable of
breeding) should be kept in strict quarantine for the period of three
years.
7th. A much more radical measure, which may be made to supersede all of
the above, would be to castrate every soliped (stallion or mare) which
has suffered from the disease in the past three years, and every such
animal that has by coition been exposed during that length of time to
even a remote opportunity for contagion. This would embrace all
apparently sound mares that had been served by a stallion which had
shown slight symptoms of the disease, or by a stallion which had not
himself shown such symptoms, but which had served a mare that had shown
such symptoms; or one that had served a mare that had not shown such
symptoms, but that had been previously served by a stallion which had
shown such symptoms, or that previously covered a mare that had shown
such symptoms. In such cases the State might well afford to indemnify
the owner for any reduction in value of the castrated stallion from that
borne by the animal as a prospective breeder, the breeding for which
indemnity is sought being understood to count only from a date of three
years after the sanitary castration. A mare once attacked should be
remorselessly castrated or killed. A perfect recovery in a horse can be
better attested; that of a mare is always uncertain, and most secondary
outbreaks after the apparent extinction of the poison have come from
breeding mares that have apparently recovered, or that after exposure
have shown no appreciable symptoms.
When a State is so lost to all sanitary considerations as to abandon an
affection of this kind to take its course, the owners of stallions and
mares cannot be too careful to avoid the exposure of their valuable
breeders to the risk of infection. Each mare brought for service should
be admitted only when accompanied by a certificate showing all previous
services in the last three years, with the identification of the
stallion, and this irrespective of whether the service has been fruitful
or not. In such certificate the owner of the mare should bind himself to
make good all damage or loss that may accrue from his failure to set
forth in the certificate every such service and every symptom of illness
affecting the generative organs from which the mare has suffered in the
three years antecedent.
The owner of the stallion should give a similar guarantee that the horse
has in the past three years served no mare that was in any way open to
suspicion, and that the animal has not suffered from any affection of
the generative organs which had any of the characteristics of dourine.
No mare should be served which shows swelling, nodules, distortion, or
gaping vulva, a muco-purulent discharge, or too frequent or too
prolonged _heats_.
No stallion in such locality should be allowed to serve which shows
pasty swelling of the sheath, swelling, shrinking or distortion of the
penis, red, angry, tender meatus urinarius, or a muco-purulent
discharge.
Unless in case of Arabian horses the appearance of white spots on the
dark ground of the sheath, penis, vulva, or perineum, should be ground
for debarring from service until an absolutely stainless record covering
a number of years has been shown.