XVIII. LIVESTOCK - GOATS, ETC. (cont.)

Treatment of Livestock under Disease [Diseased Livestock]

Time was when every such treatise as the present was expected to contain a description of the diseases to which the domesticated animals are most subject, and instructions for their treatment under them. But now that farriery is discarded and veterinary medicine is taught in colleges, the handling of such a subject is obviously beyond the province of a practical farmer. A few general observations is all, therefore, that we offer regarding it. The province of the stockmaster obviously is to study how to prevent disease, rather than how to cure it. For this end let him exercise the utmost care, first, in selecting sound and vigorous animals of their respective kinds, and then in avoiding those errors in feeding and general treatment which are the most frequent causes of disease. When cases of serious disease occur, let the best professional aid that s available be instantly resorted to; but in all those cases which farmers usually consider themselves competent to treat we advise that they should trust rather to good nursing, and to the healing power of nature, than to that indiscriminate bleeding and purging which is so commonly resorted to, and which in the majority of cases does harm instead of good.






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