Medicinal. 195 



in his fore legs, possesses enormous ears, is likely to 

 grow into a twenty-four pound dog, or has any other 

 failing sufficiently exaggerated as to quite spoil his appear- 

 ance, destroy him at once, as perhaps you have done 

 others earlier on. Inferior dogs are not worth the cost of 

 rearing, and the country already contains plenty of such 

 without more being added to the number. By no means 

 is it a bad plan to give your four or five months old puppies 

 a slight dose of newly-ground areca nut, from 10 to 20 

 grains, according to their age, especially if you have found, 

 or suspect, worms present. When you have decided to do 

 this, be careful to have the stomach empty by keeping the 

 patient without food of any kind for twelve or fourteen hours. 

 Then, following the nut, in two hours administer a dessert- 

 spoonful of castor oil and buckthorn. These are simple 

 remedies, and in fully grown terriers the fasting must be 

 enforced for twenty-four hours, 25 grains of the areca nut 

 and 2 grains of santonine administered in milk, or made up 

 into a bolus, followed by a tablespoonful of the castor oil 

 mixture. A vermifuge may even be given when the pup- 

 pies are on their dam, if worms are suspected. Half a 

 grain of santonine in a teaspoonful of olive oil, administered 

 two or three times at intervals of as many days, will be 

 found free from danger to everything but the worms. 



At from four to six months old, during dentition, or when 

 younger, perhaps when older, distemper may appear, and 

 this often fatal complaint is always to be dreaded. Many 

 complications can ensue, but if the puppy has been reared 

 according to the directions thus shortly given, in ninety 

 cases out of a hundred the attack will be slight. If very 

 severe, the veterinary surgeon should be called in to see 

 the sick animal ; but ordinary cases will be cured by the 



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