Classics of modern science : $b (Copernicus to Pasteur)
History
Classics of modern science : $b (Copernicus to Pasteur)
Science; Science -- History
In this Dairy Country a great number of Cows are kept, and the office
of milking is performed indiscriminately by Men and Maid Servants. One
of the former having been appointed to apply dressings to the heels
of a Horse affected with the Grease, and not paying due attention to
cleanliness, incautiously bears his part in milking the Cows, with some
particles of the infectious matter adhering to his fingers. When this
is the case, it commonly happens that a disease is communicated to
the Cows, and from the Cows to the Dairy-maids, which spreads through
the farm until most of the cattle and domestics feel its unpleasant
consequences. This disease has obtained the name of the Cow-pox. It
appears on the nipples of the Cows in the form of irregular pustules.
At their first appearance they are commonly of a palish blue, or
rather of a colour somewhat approaching to livid, and are surrounded
by an erysipelatous inflammation. These pustules, unless a timely
remedy be applied, frequently degenerate into phagedenic ulcers, which
prove extremely troublesome. The animals become indisposed, and the
secretion of milk is much lessened. Inflamed spots now begin to appear
on different parts of the hands of the domestics employed in milking,
and sometimes on the wrists, which quickly run on to suppuration, first
assuming the appearance of the small vesications produced by a burn.
Most commonly they appear about the joints of the fingers, and at their
extremities; but whatever parts are affected, if the situation will
admit, these superficial suppurations put on a circular form, with
their edges more elevated than their centre, and of a colour distantly
approaching to blue. Absorption takes place, and tumours appear in
each axilla. The system becomes affected--the pulse is quickened; and
shiverings, with general lassitude and pains about the loins and limbs,
with vomiting, come on. The head is painful, and the patient is now
and then even affected with delirium. These symptoms, varying in their
degrees of violence, generally continue from one day to three or four,
leaving ulcerated sores about the hands, which, from the sensibility of
the parts, are very troublesome, and commonly heal slowly, frequently
becoming phagedenic, like those from whence they sprung. The lips,
nostrils, eyelids, and other parts of the body, are sometimes affected
with sores; but these evidently arise from their being needlessly
rubbed or scratched with the patient’s infected fingers. No eruptions
on the skin have followed the decline of the feverish symptoms in any
instance that has come under my inspection, one only excepted, and in
this case a very few appeared on the arms: they were very minute, of a
vivid red colour, and soon died away without advancing to maturation;
so that I cannot determine whether they had any connection with the
preceding symptoms.
Thus the disease makes its progress from the Horse to the nipple of the
Cow, and from the Cow to the Human Subject.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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