142 THE DISTEMPER. 



days even previous to its appearance. When, during- great 

 emaciation and loss of appetite, a distempered dog- suddenly 

 appears more cheerful, eats heartily, and shews more bright- 

 ness and briskness of the eyes than before, it may be ex- 

 pected that he is going to be attacked with fits. If the 

 appetite becomes at once not only considerable but greedy, 

 and the eyes look very bright and sparkling, the event may 

 be considered as certain. In some instances, the sudden 

 stopping of the looseness is likewise the forerunner, perhaps 

 the occasion of fits: but it is remarkable, that, when the 

 diarrhoea is overcome by medicine, such an event rarely oc- 

 curs. A cessation of the secretion from the head will some- 

 times likewise occur before the epileptic attack, and it is by 

 no means difficult to conceive how so sudden an alteration in 

 the action of the contiguous surfaces may materially affect 

 the brain. Dissection of subjects who have died from this 

 sympathetic epilepsy does not throw much light on the na- 

 ture of it ; sometimes there is sanguineous effusion over the 

 brain, and an increased vascularity of its membranes ; in 

 other instances, the cerebral substance has appeared to be 

 slightly softened, and now and then an undue secretion has 

 appeared within the ventricles. — See Fjts, 



Instances occur w^here, from the bronchial passages, the 

 affection proceeds to the substance of the lungs, and pro- 

 duces all the appearances of peripneumony (which see). 

 ' Now and then, so much congestion takes place within the 

 chest, as to carry the dog off" in a few days ; but more fre- 

 quently the pneumonic attack is less violent, and continues to 

 harass him with a distressing cough, and every mark of inflam- 

 matory fever. From the lungs, the specific inflammation ex- 

 tends to the liver, oftentimes; in which cases the emaciation 

 and debihty become more peculiarly apparent; a pustular erup- 

 tion often appears ; the inside of the mouth, the whites of the 

 eyes, and every part where the skin is naked, looks yellow; 

 the urine is of a very deep yellow colour from the bile in- 

 fused, and pain is expressed on pressing the belly. On the 

 dissection of cases that have died in this way, 1 have fancied 



