TAPE WORM. 485 



sensations in the lower part of the abdomen, which take on all the 

 appearance of colic ; these sensations are most marked when the 

 animal has for some time been deprived of food, or after the use 

 of particular articles of diet, while, on the other hand, they are miti- 

 gated by eating, and especially by the use of certain articles of 

 food, as mush and milk, oatmeal, etc. Ravenous hunger is of 

 frequent occurrence, and when we see a well fed dog eating vora- 

 ciously throughout his meal, and simulating a half starved animal, 

 it behooves us to suspect, and to be on the look out for, these in- 

 testinal parasites, particularly if he suffers from distension of the 

 abdomen, disturbance of the digestive canal, especially diarrhoea 

 alternating with constipation. Cramps, blindness, deafness, chorea, 

 salivation without appreciable cause, vomiting, and marked unre- 

 liability of the olfactory organs are likewise symptomatic. 



Unless the diagnosis is certain, it is scarcely allowable to make 

 such an attack on the economy of the intestinal canal as a tape- 

 worm cure always must be. And the diagnosis can only be cer- 

 tain when it is known that segments of a worm have been expelled. 



The cure can only be said to be complete if the head is found, or 

 if several worms are present, a head for each. There is no such 

 thing as a partial cure. It is judicious, before commencing the 

 actual cure, to give the dog some preparatory treatment, by which 

 we empty the intestinal tract, so that the worm when detached 

 may pass more quickly, and the cure therefore be sooner ended. 

 With this object, however, only the very mildest purgatives should 

 be given. For strong purgatives readily cause parts of the worm 

 to be torn off and expelled, and as a consequence our efforts to 

 dislodge the part that remains may fail. Of the many medicines 

 that are more or less effectual, koosso and male fern are most 

 to be recommended. Where the former is used, two hours after 

 it is swallowed, the animal should be given a dose of castor oil. 

 See prescriptions 5, 6, 7, and 8. The last may be used as prepar- 

 atory. 



Once the cure is over, we must take compassion on the diges- 

 tive tract that has suffered such rough usage, and the animal should 

 therefore get some mucilaginous soup, or an emulsion with, in some 

 cases, a few drops of laudanum. (No. 9.) Bark of pomegranate 

 root has been recommended, but it is too powerful for canine con- 



