286 THE DISEASES AND DISOEDERS OF THE OX. 



madness, lived safe and sound. Also the mariners did relate 

 that the Dutch, by a raw herring salted, applied to the bite of a 

 mad dog for three days' space and renewed, do take away all 

 fear of madness. When this has been neglected, at least by the 

 beheld manner of plunging they are all cured." Helmontii, 

 Ad Not. Oper. Phys., p. 62. 



Pliny, in common with many other writers, has given credence 

 to the absurd and unfounded belief that there is a small worm 

 in a dog's tongue known to the Greeks as Itjtta (rage or 

 madness), and that if this worm be taken away from a pup, the 

 •dog will never become mad or lose its appetite. This worm, 

 after being carried three times round a fire, was given to persons 

 who had been bitten by a mad dog, in order to prevent their 

 becoming mad. Strange to say, this removal of the " worm " 

 from the dog's tongue, or '' worming," as it is called, has been 

 practised from the days of Pliny, and perhaps earlier, even to 

 our own time. The same author also informs us that the flesh 

 of a mad dog was sometimes salted and taken with the food as 

 & remedy for the disease, and that " so virulent is the poison 

 of a mad dog, that its very urine even, if trod upon, is injurious, 

 more particularly if the person has any ulcerous sores about 

 him," and that '* the proper remedy to apply in such a case is 

 horse-dung, sprinkled with vinegar, and warmed in a fig." 

 *' When a person has been bitten by a mad dog, he may be 

 preserved from hydrophobia by applying the ashes of a dog's 

 head to the wound. These ashes are very good, too, taken in 

 drink, and hence some recommend the head itself to be eaten 

 in such cases." *' There is beneath the tongue of a mad dog 

 a certain slimy saliva which, taken in drink, is a preventive of 

 hydrophobia. But much the most useful plan is to take the 

 liver of the dog that has inflicted the injury and eat it raw, if 

 possible. Should that not be done, it must be cooked in 

 some way or other, or else a broth must be taken prepared 

 from the flesh." 



Pliny was, moreover, a staunch supporter of the practice of 

 oauterization, even holding that it was efficacious after the 

 disease had made its appearance. Columella, who lived about 

 the same time as Pliny, refers to " rabies," and says that it 

 was beUeved among the shepherds that if the last bone of the 

 tail was bitten off on the fortieth day after the birth of a 



