HYDROPHOBIA 191 



"In order to determine how great the danger from 'rabies' was in 

 the United States about ten years ago, when Pasteurism was popularized 

 in the country, I carefully followed up all the newspaper and medical jour- 

 nal reports of alleged outbreaks of the malady, and in not a single case 

 was satisfactory evidence of its existence obtained. The reported outbreaks 

 were mostly located in or near two centers, Newark and Chicago. In the 

 epidemic at Niles Centre, seven miles from Chicago, which led to a wild 

 hunt and slaughter of the innocent canines in that village, the human 

 subjects were successfully cured by the 'madstone' — a harmless species of 

 the 'faith cure' in this case. But the subsidence of the panic was mostly 

 due to a sensible physician who declined to .make a premature diagnosis. 



"At Newark, scientific tests were made, which showed that neither 

 the persons dying of alleged 'rabies,' the dogs that had bitten them, nor the 

 children reputed to have been saved by the Pasteur treatment, had been 

 afflicted with any such disease. 



"Prof. Briggs, of the Carnegie Laboratory, and Law, of Cornell, inoc- 

 culated dogs with material from the deceased pound-keeper, Neall, as I 

 did from the deceased Hertlin, and in every case with negative results. 



"The veterinarian, Runge, kept the clogs bitten by the suspected animal 

 in .quarantine for four months and then discharged them as not 'rabid.' 

 Some children bitten by the same dog and not treated by Pasteur are today 

 known to me. They are as free from disease as those who were sub- 

 jected to the treatment. 



"Scores of observations might be added in bringing the review up to 

 date, all of which tend to show that the cases reported, including the eight 

 Baltimore victims, were not sufferers of any trumped-up malady as 'rabies.' 

 From what I have learned of those of the latter who died after receiving 

 the Pasteur treatment, I should say they were poisoned, either by the 

 inoculations or by ptomaines from decayed teeth of the suspicious canine 

 that bit them. Of the others who are believed to' have been saved from 

 the dreadful disease by Gibier's hand, I am satisfied that in biting them 

 the animal didn't happen to get any of the poisonous saliva in the wound 

 or that their systems were not susceptible to the dangers of the Pasteur 

 inoculation. Science has proved that what is harmless to some persons 

 may be deadly to others. The followers of the Pasteur treatment, how- 

 ever, disregard this established fact. 



"In Pennsylvania a number of persons were needlessly rendered un- 

 happy by a sensational report to the effect that 'rabies' had become epi- 

 demic in one of the State's prosperous villages. A large number of school 

 children and several adults had been infected by dog bites. After several 

 of the children and two of the adults had died, the dog — which was a pet — 

 was located. The animal was found to be suffering from epileptic fits, 

 induced by his having swallowed a chicken bone. The deaths caused by 

 the bites were undoubtedly due to the same cause as I have explained in 

 regard to the Baltimore victims. 



"As a whole, in all the cases reported as 'lyssa,' 'rabies' or 'hydropho- 

 bia,' it was either not shown that the subject had been bitten by a dog at 

 all, or that the dog had been mad in the Pasteur sense. Indeed, the 

 errors that have been committed in this direction would be amusing were 

 it not for other and tragical attendant features. 



"Let it be inoculated in the public mind that the sensational symp- 

 toms which tradition assigns to rabies are fictitious, and, like the fear of 

 water which has given a name to the malcondition, never occurs after the 

 bite of a dog; that it is no more possible for a dog to inoculate a man 

 with the tendency to bark and run on all faurs than it is for a man to 

 inoculate a dog with the faculty of speech and an upright gait — then what 

 has been drifting through medical and newspaper literature as rabies would 

 disappear. 



"If once thoroughly understood by the people at large, that supersti- 

 tious fear and expectant attention may not alone develop serious nervous 

 symptoms, but, also actually cause death, many who assume themselves 

 threatened with some rational ill effects, such as ptomaine poisoning after a 



