DISEASES OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 173 



When on his feet, if confined in a room, lie circles around it sniffing at 

 the walls, at times stopping and barking for several minutes, his voice 

 altered and the tone pitched high. His legs tremble under him showing 

 increasing -weakness. Liquids he drinks readily and with feverish rapac- 

 ity. Vomiting frequently occurs ; the eyes are bloodshot, the face haggard ; 

 the pulse is quickened, and the temperature of the body notably raised. 

 Restlessness is a marked symptom in this stage. The -writer recalls the 

 case of a young mastiff afflicted with the disease, which he allowed to run 

 at large within his house, that the symptoms might be carefully observed 

 by the inmates. This dog -while he had strength to make the distance had 

 a certain point to -which he invariably journeyed. He would startfrom his 

 bed in the kennel man's room, climb three stairs, enter the kitchen, pass 

 from there into the dining room of his master, and stop at the hall door, 

 then without pausing, take the same direct course back, and on reaching 

 his bed again turn and travel the same distance, always for the same 

 points, never deviating or passing through other doors or going beyond 

 his self imposed limits. Other dogs lay about the rooms undisturbed and 

 unnoticed. At first his journeys were made on an easy walk, head carried 

 low; later on he entered a run which he kept up for an hour at a time 

 until exhaustion overcame him, then for a brief interval he remained 

 quiet, and when his strength returned he would again start on his weari- 

 some run. The inmates of the house would occasionally meet him on his 

 journeys; without any disposition to bite he would deviate only suffi- 

 ciently to pass them and continue on. For two days only had he strength 

 to climb the stairs, but until he died, some three days later, he constantly 

 made feeble efforts to do so. 



The stage of active congestion in dogs suffering from acute meningitis 

 is short, rarely more than two or three days, when the symptoms change 

 as an effusion forms within the cranial cavities and presses upon the 

 brain. Drowsiness succeeds the maniacal excitement ; the sight becomes 

 dim or wholly disappears ; obstructions are no longer avoided but blindly 

 encountered. In his movements the animal seems wholly unconscious, 

 crazed as it were ; his bark is lower and feeble ; he still drinks if his nose 

 is guided to the basin; the intervals of quiet grow much longer; he rises 

 to his feet with difficulty, his legs weak and trembling; the stupor grows 

 more profound; paralysis ends his tiresome walks; convulsions occur 

 often and severe; death finally results. 



The disease under consideration may run a fatal course in two or three 

 days; rarely will it extend beyond six or seven. 



^Diagnosis. —From the foregoing symptoms it will be understood how 

 easy it is for an observer, unfamiliar with the manifestations in both dis- 

 eases to mistake acute meningitis for that dread malady, rabies, and yet 



