TREATMENT OF DISEASES. 181 



1. HYDROPHOBIA; or, Mad Dog Bites— Hot Vapor Bathft 

 for. — The following item comes from G. F. J. Colburn, of Wa-ihington, D. C, 

 who says: " For God's sake, give the remedy atrial, should acase present itself/ 

 TJie report was first published in the Salut Public, of Lyons, France, as follows? 



"Dr. Buifson claims to have discovered a remedy for this terrible disease. 

 In attending a female patient in the last stages of canine madness, the doctor 

 imprudently wiped his hand with a handkerchief impregnated with her saliva. 

 There happened to be a slight abrasion on the index finger of the left hand; but, 

 confident of his own curative system, the doctor merely washed the parts with 

 water. He was fully aware of the imprudence he had committed, and says: 

 ' Believing that the malady would not declare itself until the fortieth day, and 

 having various patients to visit, I put off from day to day the application'of my 

 remedy — that is to say, vapor baths. The ninth day, being in my cabinet, I 

 felt all at once a pain m my eyes. My body felt so light that I felt as if I could 

 jump a prodigious height, or, if thrown out of a window, I could sustain myself 

 in the air. My hair was so sensitive that I ap{)eared to be able to count it sep- 

 arately without looking at it. Saliva kept constantly forming in my mouth. 

 Any movement in the air caused great pain to me and. I was obliged to avoid 

 the sight of brilliant objects. I had a continued desire to nm and bite — not 

 human beings, but animals, and all that was near me. I drank with difficulty, 

 and I remarked that the sight of water distressed me more than the pain in my 

 throat. I believe that by shutting the eyes, any one suffering from hydro- 

 phobia can always drink. The fits come on every five minutes, and I then felt 

 the pain start from the index finger and run up the nerves to the shoulder. In 

 this state, thinking that my course was preservative, not curative, I took a vapor 

 bath, not with the intention of cure, but of suffocating myself. When the 

 bath was at 52 centigrade (913 3-5 Fahrenheit), all the symptoms disappeared as 

 if by magic, and since then I have never felt anj-thing more of them. I have 

 attended more than 80 persons bitten by mad animals, and I have not lost a 

 single one. When a person is bitten by a mad dog he mast for 7 successive 

 days take a vapor bath, d la Russe, of 57 to 63 degrees. This is the preventive 

 remedy. A vapor bath may be quickly made by putting 2 or three red-hot 

 bricks in a bucket for 15 or 20 minutes. The person to be covered with a 

 blanket. When the disease is declared, it only requires one vapor bath, rapidly 

 increasing to 37 centigrade, then slowly to 53, and the patient must strictly con- 

 fine himself to his chamber until the cure is complete." 



2. Hydrophobia, Portuguese Physician's Cure. — A Portuguese 

 physician claims to have cured several cases of hydrophobia by simply rubbing 

 garlic into the wound, and giving the patient a decoction of garlic to drink for 

 several days. This is the old Greek treatment, which, it is claimed, was prac- 

 ticed by them with success. — yTedical Brief. 



1. SUN-STROKE AND APOPLEXY, How to Cure.— Sun- 

 stroke and apoplexy, can be cured almost surely if taken in any kind of time. 

 Dr. E. B. Babbitt says: 



I. " Rub powerfully on the back of the head and neck, making horizontal 

 and downward movements. This draws the blood away from the front of the 

 brain and vitalizes the involuntary nerves. 



II. " While rubbing call for cold water immediately, which apply to tlie 

 face and to the hair on the top and the side of the head. 



III. " Call for a bucket of water as hot as can be borne, and pour it by dip 

 perfuls on the back of the head and neck for several minutes. The effect will 

 be wonderful, for vitalizing the medulla oblongata (that part of the spinal column 



