45f) THE IMPROVED ART OF FARRIERY. 



has a dog entertains a different opinion, and each one 

 has his infallible remedy, despising the prescriptions 

 of another as absurd ; and this in a great measure is 

 the result of the many different symptoms under which 

 the distemper appears, when the treatment must vary 

 accordingly. At one time it is present with excessive 

 laxity of the bowels, another year it may be putrid 

 and malignant, and at times it shows itself with fits. 

 Purgation is the usual attendant of this malady in sum- 

 mer, and fits in the winter ; but few cases are alike, 

 and Air. Blaine observes, that — 



"It is to the immense varieties of the complaint 

 that we must attribute the endless number of reme- 

 dies continually prescribed for it ; every one of which, 

 from being occasionally beneficial, becomes, in the 

 mind of the person using it, infallible. Distemper, 

 therefore, is seldom spoken of among a number of 

 sportsmen, but every one of them knows of a certain 

 cure, one that has never failed with him. The varieties 

 in the complaint are so numerous, that hardly any 

 two cases can be treated alike ; consequently no one 

 remedy can be applicable to every case ; for however 

 efficacious it may prove in a number of instances, a 

 judicious attention must be paid to the varying 

 symptoms." 



In most cases there is generally a greater ob- 

 struction of the bowels than otherwise, and the first 

 effort must be to relieve this by clysters. It attacks 

 indiscriminately every dog, and none have been able 

 yet to account satisfactorily for its appearance : at all 

 times it seems to be a disease very obnoxious to the 

 animal, as he displays many efforts as if attempting to 

 throw it off him. In cases of dissection, the throat 

 has appeared considerably swollen, and the stomach 

 slime and filth ; the mucous or petuitary membrane- 



