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Southland Times, Issue 2019, 18 November 1874, Page 3

Salt foe Shefp. — Inquiries among sheep farmers have led me to the following conclusions : — (a) Salt possesses no property of curing fluke after it has once reached the liver ; the use of it may, indeed, prove beneficial to the sheep's general health and strength, and by that means may prevent the fluke from going ahead ; but if the fluke has once reached the liver the salt never succeeds in reaching it, or, by that means, in killing it. (h) Whenever the sheep has been kept constantly supplied with salt from the day when he first began to eat grass, he has been virtually exempt from fluke. Ido not say that those who have given salt in this way never have a aingle sheep affected with fluke ; but from what I can learn, their losses from fluke have become merely nominal. This is shown to be the case in the salt bush country, where there are often swampy \ places in abundance that would serve as fluke harbors, since the sheep tt>at have been bred there never suffer from fluke. The only reason for this state of things that we can see is, that the presence of salt in the vegetation causes the sheep to have salt enough from the day when he first begins to eat grass. The abundant presence of salt in the intestinal canal is hostile to almost all intestinal parasites, but it is only hostile parasitic : worms which it cannot immediately reach, j because it gives a vigor to the health that is unfavorable to their development and existence withiu the body. If, instead of getting food seasoned with salt as well as having the salt-cellar at the table to take as much salt from as we may wiah for, we had to get all our salt by licking a piece of rock salt ; and if, moreover, there were several others behind us who were impatiently pushing us out of the way, in order to have their turn at the piece of rock-salt, I think it is very likely that we should not get salt enough for our health, and that many more of us would suffer from worms than do now — some of us might perhaps, even suffer from fluke — Mr Earrer's " Grass and Sheep Farming" (Sydney). The last ' Domestic Story.' — A lady was engaging a new cook, and had apparently settled details satisfactorily, when the domestic inquired, ' How many other servants do you keep, ma'am ? ' ' Two,' was tbe reply. ' Oh, then, your place won't suit me, ma'am, as 1 always like a game of whist of an evening, and I don't like playing " dummy." ' Little story about a Chicago church usher : — A man indifferently dressed went to his church. The usher did not notice him, but seated several well-dressed persons who presented themselves, when anally the man addressed the usher, saying, ' Can you tell me whose church this is ? ' ' Yes, this is Christ's Church.* 1 Is He in ?' was the next question, after which a seat was not so hard to find.