inspectors were deprived of the power to slaughter, except in cases where the owner had disobeyed the inspector's order for the separation of sick animals from sound; the local authorities were armed with power to prohibit animals from being brought within their jurisdiction, except under such conditions as they might think fit to impose; and the Secretary of State was empowered to close a fair or market in any district where the local authority had refused to do so, on a complaint from the local authority of a neighbouring district. Finally, for the Justices of Peace in each petty sessional division of a county were substituted the Justices of Peace for the county in General or Quarter Sessions assembled; the area of jurisdiction being enlarged accordingly, and the power of restraining traffic so extended, as to restrain the movement of cattle within each area as well as ingress into it, but not mere transit or egress by railway.

Under the powers thus created, Orders of Quarter Sessions have been made in every county of England and Wales, prohibiting or restricting generally the movement of cattle into and within the several areas of jurisdiction. These Orders, however, exhibit many varieties of detail. By some, all movement is stopped, even from one part of a farm to another, if a public road intervenes. Movement on farms is permitted by others, sometimes with permission granted by a justice or justices, provided the extent of highway traversed do not exceed a space varying from 100 to 440 yards, whilst occasionally the freedom of the farm from disease for a given but not uniform period must be proved before the highway is crossed at all. In most counties, cattle may be moved for slaughter, or for breeding purposes, under licence, which may be granted, in some, by one justice, in others by two; but, in the nature of the declaration on which the licence is founded, the signatures by which that declaration is to be attested, the time for which the licence is to hold good, the facts to be proved, there is remarkable diversity. The animal must have been on the farm, generally speaking, for a period varying from 14 to 30 days; the farm must have been free from disease for a period varying from 14 days to two months; and, in some cases, no disease must have occurred within a certain distance, varying from a quarter of a mile to five miles, of the farm itself, or of the route to be travelled. In one or two instances, it is further required that the beast should not have been brought into contact with newly purchased stock, or exposed in a market, within a given period. In the majority, all removals between

sunset and sunrise are forbidden. Some Orders include cattle, sheep, and swine; some cattle and sheep; some horned cattle only. These examples by no means exhaust all the diversities discoverable in this mass of local regulations-diversities doubtless justified here and there by the varying circumstances of different counties, but evidently arising in a very great measure from mere want of concert, and probably destined, if they are maintained, to beget considerable dissatisfaction and inconvenience.

IV. In our first Report we humbly submitted to your Majesty the conclusions at which we had arrived respecting the general character of the disease, and the measures which should be adopted with a view to arrest its progress. We agreed (Mr. M'Clean dissenting) in the opinion that the only reasonable hope of effecting this object lay in imposing, for a limited period, restrictions of a very stringent kind on the movement of cattle, and that these restrictions should be uniform, and should be carried into effect at a time when the disease had not spread to an unmanageable extent, and when they would be attended with fewer difficulties, and with far less of loss and inconvenience, than must necessarily surround them towards the approach of spring. We differed in some degree as to the amount of stringency which we might reasonably venture to recommend. We think it right to say (Mr. M'Clean still dissenting) that the opinions in which we then concurred not only remain unshaken, but have been materially strengthened and confirmed by the deplorable experience of the last three months.

After laying before Your Majesty our Recommendations on this head, it remained for us to pursue the investigation which we had already begun into the nature of the disease, with a view to ascertain how far it could be combated by curative or preventive treatment. This investigation included a thorough and minute observation of the symptoms and progress of the disorder, and careful inquiries into its general and chemical pathology and morbid anatomy, a microscopical examination of the tissues and fluids of the bodies of diseased animals, a trial of various methods of treatment, experiments on disinfection and ventilation. It was further desirable to ascertain by actual experiments to what other animals it was communicable.

These inquiries were committed, under the general superintendence of the medical and scientific members of the Commission, to the following gentlemen :

1. Nature, Propagation, Progress, and

Symptoms of the Disease; J. B. Sanderson, Esq., M.D.

2. General Pathology of the Disease, and its Relation to Human Diseases; C. Murchison, Esq., M.D.

3. Chemical Pathology of the Disease; W. Marcet, Esq., M.D.

4. Morbid Anatomy of the Disease; J. S. Bristowe, Esq., M.D.

5. Microscopical Researches on the Disease; Lionel S. Beale, Esq., M.D.

6. Treatment of the Disease; George Varnell, Esq., M.R.C.V.S., and William Pritchard, Esq., M.R.C.V.S.

7. Disinfection and Ventilation; R. Angus Smith, Esq., Ph.D.

On several of these heads no definite conclusions could be formed without long and laborious inquiry. On most of them we have already received Reports, and all the Reports will very soon be completed. We shall then lose no time in laying them before Your Majesty, together with a brief general account of the results reached by the different lines of investigation. This will form our Third and last Report.

An experimental investigation of the nature and treatment of the disease was commenced at an early period by several gentlemen of high professional and scientific eminence at Edinburgh, and a valuable Report by them has been already published. These gentlemen are tinuing their researches, and have undertaken to place in our hands a further report upon the subject.

con

A large mass of statistical information respecting the progress of the disease has been collected by the Veterinary Department of the Privy Council Office; and the Department has also obtained, by printed forms very extensively circulated, information respecting the various modes of treatment which have been practised in different parts of the country, and their respective results. A comprehensive digest of the information so procured under both heads is being prepared under the direc tion of the Secretary of the Department, and we hope to be enabled to append this digest, with some illustrative maps, to our Third Report.

the scientific inquiries to which we have referred. There are, however, some points of more or less practical moment, to which, in closing our inquiry, we think it right to advert.

All endeavours to discover a method of treatment on which some reliance could be placed, have entirely failed. Innumerable suggestions of this kind have been made or communicated to us, to none of which any substantial value could be assigned, and the knowledge and ingenuity of prac titioners, in every part of the United Kingdom, have been exerted for this object in vain. The experience of the Dutch physicians and veterinary surgeons during the present outbreak, appears unhappily to coincide on this point with our

own.

Vaccination is not a protection against Cattle Plague. Careful experiments, conducted at our desire by the most experienced operators, have shown that an animal successfully vaccinated, and in which cow-pox has been fully developed, may, within a few days after exposure to the infection of Cattle Plague, contract that disease and die of it. We have, at present, no evidence that vaccination fortifies the system against this new assailant in any degree. The experiment, however, is now being made on so great a scale (upwards of 27,000 having been vaccinated in Cheshire alone), and under such a variety of circumstances, that, should this statement require any material qualification, the public will soon have full information on the subject.

The possibility of mitigating the virulence of the disease by inoculation with the matter of the disease, is a subject of much interest, and has engaged our attention. Such inoculation has been tried repeatedly, and on a considerable scale, by the Russian Government, and the effect of a long series of transmissions has been carefully noted and recorded; but the experiment has not been very successful, and it has for the present been abandoned. The Dutch Government, though much pressed to introduce it in South Holland, has refrained from doing so for fear of the consequences. ("Rapport aan den Koning," 23rd January, 1866.) Whether modes of inoculation may not yet be found which will effect the desired object, is a question which can only be solved by various and repeated trials. Further information on the subject will be given in our Third Report. It is obviously unadvisable that any experiments of this kind should be tried, unless by persons of competent scientific knowledge, and under the strictest precautions to prevent the spread of infection.

Some further evidence, oral and documentary, respecting the progress of the disease, the condition and inspection of cow-sheds and slaughter-houses in the metropolis, the precautions enforced and accommodation provided at the various landing-places for foreign cattle, and the provision made for the proper transport of live stock on the railways of the United Kingdom, is appended to this Report.

V. We shall abstain in our present Report from entering into the results of

The only means of combating the disease which remain, consist in the stoppage of the movement of stock and of things likely to be vehicles of infection, in the isolation and slaughter of infected cattle, and in the use of disinfectants.

The careful and thorough use of disinfectants, which attack and neutralize the poison either when floating in the air or when adhering to solid or liquid substances, cannot be urged too strongly. In every locality, measures should be taken to circulate information as to the best disinfectants, and to insure their

being used. Some ready and effectual compounds for disinfecting the air, for cow-houses, waggons, ships, and moveable articles, especially of metal, and for fresh hides, horns, and hoofs, are described in a note; but we hope to supply more detailed information on this subject in our Third Report.

But it is still necessary, and it will not cease to be necessary, to insist on the measures on which so much stress has already been laid-and of the importance of which the country is now fully awareon the restriction of movement, and on isolation. Recent experience appears to indicate further the expediency of slaugh tering infected cattle, provided this can be done without injustice to the owners. By what means this can be best accomplished,-whether by voluntary associa tions, such as that in Aberdeenshire, or otherwise, what may wisely be done by the Legislature or the Executive to promote and encourage such associations, or to assist in other ways the desired object, are questions on which this Commission possesses no special information, and

The experiments of Dr. Angus Smith show that the best disinfectants are carbolic acid (or M'Dougall's powder) and chloride of lime. Both of these should be freely used in all sheds, and for waggons and trucks, not only in infected districts, but throughout the country; the walls, floors, and roofs being all well washed. Some of the carbolic acid passes into the air, which it purifies. Hides should have common salt spread over them for twelve hours, and afterwards be washed in a solution of carbolic acid and water (two ounces of acid to the gallon), or be laid in a solution of chloride of lime (half a pound to a gallon of water) for ten minutes. Manure should be burnt, or, if this be impracticable, should be disinfected with carbolic acid, and deeply buried. washing purposes, Dr. Angus Smith recommends M'Dougall's disinfecting soap, which contains crude carbolic acid.

For

which will soon, no doubt, be discussed in Parliament.

We have one thing to add. The subtle poison of this disease has now diffused itself through the country, and our principal danger is at home, and not in importations from abroad. But the question, what permanent regulations must be made to prevent the re-importation of it hereafter from infected countries, is one which must be considered sooner or later.

The importation of foreign cattle is large, and largely increasing. It is found profitable to bring them from countries where this disease is a frequent guest, and in the near neighbourhood of which it commonly dwells. Hungarian bullocks fetch in the English market a price sufficient to repay the importer.

The

time required for transit is not well ascertained, nor is it very important to ascertain it, for it is always liable to be shortened by improved arrangements; and an animal which has travelled in a drove, truck, or ship-load, may well be diseased on its arrival here, without having been so when it started on its journey. As to the countries from which cattle come, there can often be no certain knowledge; they are sent, for the most part, to England by foreign dealers resident in German towns, are consigned to salesmen here, and sold on commission. Hamburg and Rotterdam, from which the chief importations come, are the terminal stations of the great network of German lines, branches of which run into Hungary, Poland, and Galicia, and will soon be pushed up to the Bessarabian frontier. The Dutch ports alone have sent us not less than 150,000 cattle and 250,000 sheep in a year. Cattle which have stood in the markets of Magdeburg or Berlin have undoubtedly undergone inspection, and, if brought from an infected district, quaran tine. But we think it useless to trust to any inspection or other precautionary measures which foreign Governments may be induced to apply to cattle leaving their own ports or frontiers, or in the case of through traffic. Such precautions may be desirable, but no real reliance can be placed on them. We must be prepared to meet the danger when it reaches our own shores. We receive, during several months in the year, from 5,000 to 10,000 animals a week, which are landed at a few ports, and thence dispersed all over the country. More than half of the entire number land at London; upwards of sixsevenths at the three ports of London, Harwich, and Hull. Against the peril which must lurk in these great importa tions mere inspection will always be a very imperfect defence, even if conducted

with greater local facilities, and under more careful supervision, than seems to have been the case hitherto. There is, in fact, but one class of precautions likely to be effectual-viz., to restrict importation absolutely, except in case of stress of weather, to a certain number of ports, where proper accommodation could be provided; to cause all fat cattle to be slaughtered at the ports, and all store cattle to undergo a period of quarantine. Hides and skins from any part of the Continent, not dried as well as salted, ought to be disinfected at the port of importation.

The evidence which we have received on some other points on slaughter-houses and cow-sheds in the Metropolitan District, on the substitution of dead meat markets for live cattle markets, on the inland conveyance of cattle by railway, and on the cleansing and regulation of sea-going cattle boats-we lay before Your Majesty, without founding any recommendation on them. The present calamity has shown

how defective are our general precautions -if any precautions can be said to existfor the detection and prevention of contagious cattle diseases, and we trust that it will give an impulse to improvement in these respects, and that the subject will be reconsidered hereafter. It lies, however, beyond the scope of our commission, and we content ourselves with directing attention to it.

(Signed) SPENCER.
CRANBORNE.
ROBERT Lowe.
LYON PLAYFAIR.

CLARE SEWELL READ.
HENRY BENCE JONES.
RICHARD QUAIN.

E. A. PARKES.
J. R. M'CLEAN 10.
THOS. WORMALD.
ROBERT CEELY.
CHARLES SPOONER.

MOUNTAGUE Bernard.
February 5, 1866.

It is my very painful duty to inform you that a most serious and alarming insurrection of the negro population has taken place in this colony, and been attended with great loss of life and destruction of property. The outbreak commenced at Morant Bay, in St. Thomas in the East, and rapidly spread through the contiguous parishes.

2. A succinct statement of the occurrences will perhaps best enable you to comprehend the very imminent jeopardy in which the colony has been placed, and the nature of the steps taken to put down the rebellion.

3. I may premise that there were three principal objects to be attained :

First. To save the lives of the ladies, children, and other isolated and unprotected persons in the districts where the rebellion existed.

Secondly. To head the insurrectionary movement, and prevent the further spread

of the rebellion in its progress along and around the east end of the island.

Thirdly. To punish the rebels and restore peace to the disturbed districts.

4. On the morning of Wednesday the 11th instant, 8 A.M., I received at Spanish Town a letter from the Baron von Ketelhodt, Custos of St. Thomas in the East, written the previous evening from Morant Bay, to inform me that serious disturbances were apprehended, and to request that troops might be sent.

5. The circumstances stated in the Baron's letter were to the effect that on Saturday the 7th October, whilst a black man was being brought up for trial before the justices, a large number of the peasantry, armed with bludgeons and preceded by a band of music, came into the town, and, leaving the music at a little distance, surrounded the Courthouse, openly expressing their determination to rescue the man about to be tried, if convicted. One of their party having created a considerable disturbance in the Court-house, was ordered into custody, whereupon the mob rushed in, rescued the prisoner, and maltreated the policemen in attendance.

10 Subject to views appended to First Report.

No further injury appears to have been done at this time, and the magistrates seem to have thought so little of the occurrence that no steps were taken to communicate with the Executive.

6. On Monday the 9th October, the justices issued a warrant for the apprehension of twenty-eight of the principal persons concerned in the disturbance of Saturday, and confided it to six policemen for execution.

Upon the arrival of the police at the settlement where the parties lived (called "Stoney Gut," and about three or four miles from Morant Bay) a shell was blown, and the negroes collected in large numbers, armed with guns, cutlasses, pikes, and bayonets.

They caught and ill-treated three of the policemen, putting them in handcuffs and administering to them an oath upon a Bible, which they had ready, binding them to desert the whites and join their (that is, the black) party.

7. Up to this period (Monday night) the Custos had not been in the parish. He arrived on Tuesday the 10th October, about noon, but did not seem, as I am informed by Mr. Stephen Cooke, Clerk of the Peace and Magistrates, even now to think much of what had taken place, and it was only at the urgent entreaty of Mr. Cooke that he was induced to write the letter to which I have already adverted.

8. Upon receiving this communication at 8 A.M. I immediately sent for the Executive Committee, and after a hurried consultation with them and with the Attorney-General, an express was sent over to Kingston, requesting the General commanding Her Majesty's troops to get ready 100 men for immediate embarkation, and an express was also sent off to Captain De Horsey, of Her Majesty's ship"Wolverine," and senior naval officer at Port Royal, to request that if possible a man-of-war might at once be sent up to Kingston to receive the troops and take them to their destination.

9. Unfortunately, the only man-of-war besides the "Wolverine" had left Port Royal for Vera Cruz on this very morning.

Captain De Horsey, however, at once got ready his own ship, the "Wolverine," took her up to Kingston by 5 o'clock, and by 6 P.M. the troops were embarked and away to Port Royal, where the ship was at anchor till daylight and then run down to Morant Bay.

A letter was sent by this opportunity to Baron Ketelhodt, conveying general instructions for his guidance.

10. Having thus done all in my power at the time and without the least delay,

I returned to my temporary residence at Flamstead, in the mountains, to be present at a dinner party which was to meet there the next day.

11. On that day (Thursday, the 12th), about half-past 4 P.M., I received a private letter from a Mr. Davidson, a magistrate of St. David's, which had been sent across the country, stating that it was reported the blacks had risen and murdered the Baron, two sons of the rector of the parish (Mr. Cooke), and several other persons; and stating that it was expected the rebels were coming along the line of the Blue Mountain Valley to destroy the properties contiguous thereto, and to murder the white and coloured inhabitants.

12. Upon receiving this communication I wrote a hasty application to the General for 200 more troops, and then at once got upon my horse and set off for Kingston. When about half-way down the mountain I met a messenger from the Custos of Kingston corroborating the intelligence I had already received. Upon arriving at the residence of General O'Connor, about 7 P.M., I found the news of the massacre had reached Kingston about 2 P.M. The General at the time was absent at Port Royal reviewing the troops, but an express was sent to him by the Custos of Kingston. This express met him about 3 P.M. as he was returning in a small gunboat from Port Royal. He at once put back to Port Royal, and directed the embarkation from thence of another 100 men on board the gun-boat “Onyx" to proceed to the scene of the disturbance. By 6 P.M. they were on board, and all ready to sail at daylight next morning.

13. Finding that the General had thus promptly and judiciously anticipated to a considerable extent the requisition I had written, it appeared to me that the only additional step to be taken immediately was to detach a company of white troops from Newcastle, to proceed along the line of the Blue Mountain Valley, and try to intercept the rebels who were said to be coming up in that direction, whilst a party could be detached from Morant Bay to meet and co-operate with them. This was accordingly done. By midnight the order was sent off to Newcastle, and soon after 3 A.M. the company was under arms marching to execute the service; a letter having been written by me to General Jackson, an old Indian officer, of ability and experience, requesting him to attach himself to the party in his capacity as a Justice of the Peace, and to afford the benefit of his local information and general experience.

14. The Executive Committee met me in consultation at the residence of General