HYDROPHOBIA FROM SKUNK-BITE. 233 



the lobe of tlie ear, the thumb, or one of the fingers, and passes on. Here 

 is probably the reason these bites are more fatal than those of other ani- 

 mals — always in a vascular part not protected by clothing, which i)revent8 

 by wiping away the poisonous saliva in the fierce attacks of the mad dog 

 or wolf, and thus saves the life of the one bitten. At a frontier post* this 

 was well illustrated. A mad wolf suddenly sprang upon the officer of the 

 day, who was making his round, and bit him on the arm, through his cloth- 

 ing ; passing on, he bit a sentinel on post in the wrist, between the sleeve 

 of his coat and glove, and then sprang upon a woman who was nursing a 

 child near by, and bit her on the shoulder through a thick woollen shavsl. 

 All the cases were treated the same. The officer and the woman escaped 

 the dread disease, but the^soldier died of hydrophobia. A recent writer t 

 says in reference to bites of rabid dogs : ' The documents of investigation 

 furnish indications full of interest in regard to the more or less innocuous- 

 ness of bites, according to the different parts of the body upon which they 

 were inflicted. If we compare the fatal with the harmless bites made upon 

 the same region, we find that out of thirty- two cases where the face was 

 bitten, twenty-nine proved fatal, which gives these wounds a mortality of 

 ninety per cent. Out of seventy-three cases, in which the wounds were 

 upon the hands, they have been fatal in only forty-six cases, harmless in 

 twenty-seven, giving an average mortality of sixty-three per cent. In 

 comparing wounds of the arms and legs with those of the face and hands, 

 the ratio is inverted ; twenty-eight wounds upon the arms were followed by 

 only eight fatal terminations, and twenty-four bites upon the lower limbs 

 gave only seven fatal cases ; seventeen remained harmless, showing a mor- 

 tality of twenty eight to twenty-nine per cent., and an innocuousness of 

 seventy to twenty-one per cent., and, lastly, the ratio mortality for wounds 

 upon the body is shown as follows: Out of nineteen bitten, twelve cases 

 were fatal and seven bites proved harmless.' 



"These facts are confirmatory of those afibrded by other statistics, demon- 

 strating also that rabid wounds upon uncovered or unprotected parts, such 

 as the face and hands, are much more readily contagious than those of the 

 arms and legs, which the teeth of the animal cannot reach without passing 

 through a portion of the clothing, which wipes off the virulent moisture 

 from the teeth. It is true the consequences of bites upon the body seem to 

 conflict with this statement : but we must remember that generally these 

 wounds are more severe, and among them some are uncovered parts, such 

 as the neck and chest, and that, when a man is attacked by a rabid animal 

 and bitten upon the body, he is also bitten upon his hands, which are his 

 material means of defence. Another reason for the apparent large propor- 

 tion of fatal cases from skunk bite is, that it is only since 1871 that these 

 cases have been collected, or that the fact of hydrophobia existing in and 

 following the bites of these animals has been generally known, and only 

 those cases proving fatal have been reported, the non-fatal cases, from the 

 trivial character of the wound, not being considered of sufficient importance 

 to report. 



"a case of skunk bite not fatal. 



**W., a young man, twenty-two years old, born in Missouri, commonly known 



* '• Foit Larned, Kansas." 



t " H. Bouley, Gen. Inspector Vet. Schools of France, etc., etc." 



