138 The Canary Book. 



vin. ipecac, (ipecacuanha wine) to each ounce of the former. Any 

 sudden change from heat to cold, or from a cold room to a 

 hot one, or placing before a fire, is to be avoided, as it would 

 only tend to increase the symptoms and feed the complaint; 

 a moderate and uniform temperature is the best. A light diet 

 must always be given in cases of internal inflammation; a 

 little arrowroot biscuit, steeped in warm new milk, and given 

 fresh twice a day, or a little oatmeal, which has been lightly 

 browned in the oven and made into a paste with a little honey 

 and gum-water, may be alternated with the former. 



If you succeed in restoring the bird to health, it will require 

 a little tonic medicine for a few weeks after its restoration, 

 such as iron and gentian; a rusty nail should be placed in 

 the water-trough, with a few drops of either the infusion or 

 tincture of gentian added. If, however, the disease will not 

 yield to these remedies, as occasionally happens, and suppu- 

 ration intervenes, with frequent involuntary shivering, and 

 the bird discharges fo3tid stools of a reddish, watery appear- 

 ance, and the poor little patient seeks to bury its head deeper 

 and deeper beneath its wing, and persistently hustles itself 

 into a solitary corner of its cage, there is but small hope of 

 its recovery, for gangrene most probably has set in, and will 

 soon terminate the life of the little sufferer. 



EPILEPSY. There are three different species of this dis- 

 ease the cerebral, the sympathetic, and the occasional. The 

 one from which birds most frequently suffer is the last-named. 

 The predisposing cause seems to be a nervous tendency, allied 

 with a delicate constitution, and is probably the result of 

 continual confinement. The fits are generally brought on 

 whenever a bird, subject to this ailment, is surprised or 

 frightened; anything likely to create terror must be carefully 

 guarded against. I have known birds subject to these fits go 

 off in one every time they were brought into the open air, 

 or every time a hand was put in the cage to take hold of 

 them. Whenever a bird is seized with one of these occasional 

 fits, sprinkle it freely all over with cold water, but more par- 

 ticularly about the head ; dip your fingers into a basin of 



