242 RABIES CANINA, 



the complaint *. As these animals, already particularised, 

 are those only in which the inherent aptitude to a spontane- 

 ous origin of rabies is appropriate, so it appears, from the 

 concurrent testimony of experiment and observation, that 

 they only are capable of comnmnicating the disease. In all 

 others, the inherent aptitude for spontaneous g:eneration of 

 it, as well as the power of reproducing" it, are wanting-, and 

 confined to a capability of receiving it by inoculation t. Our 



* A 'priori, the rabid malady would appear most likely to be gene- 

 rated within the carnivorous constitution, and, also, that its specific 

 character of communicable quality should be confined there. The mor- 

 bid compound is there chemically elaborated, and readily finds a nidxis 

 for its germination. A septic tendency in animals who live on flesh, 

 we are fully aware, gives rise to peculiar diseased combinations at first 

 highly inflammatory, and, next, assuming a putrid and infectious cha- 

 racter. 



■f Opinions, however, vary on this point, and discordant facts are 

 quoted that tend to increase the difficulty of arriving at the truth; and, 

 although my own opinion decidedly leans to an incapability of commu- 

 nicating rabies by any animals except the members of the canine and 

 feline genera, yet candour requires that every thing should be stated 

 that has weight on either side of the question. It was long a popular 

 bugbear, that the bite of a human person, or the application of the 

 saliva of one labouring under rabid hydrophobia, to an abraded sur- 

 face, was capable of producing the disease in another**. Analogy and 

 more extended experience gradually taught us to think otherwise. The 

 Drs. Vaughan and Babington submitted the matter to a course of rigid 

 experiment; but, although they inoculated dogs and other animals, I 

 believe, with every caution to render the expei-iments complete, yet 

 they both wholly failed in producing it. A similar result has followed 

 similar experiments by Dr. Zinke, and others, who extended the trial 

 to horses, asses, kine, sheep, and pigs, but which all escaped unhurt. 

 However, if we are to credit the testimony of Messrs. Magendie and 

 Brasslet, as detailed in the London Med. Rejws., vol. iv, p. 35, there is 

 a possibility of reproducing this disease in the qviadruped by inocula- 

 tion with virus secreted in the human system. The following account of 



** It is I'utetl, by more ihar. one aiiilior, UuiL a inollic)- lias coiiliiiueil to Jiis5 

 a hydrophobic child iiicessantly, without hurt ; and as we know that the saliva, 

 in such oases, is ejected with lorce, surely she could not c,-capc uithor.l bein^ 

 subjected to some danger, weie the human saliva iiii'tclious. 



