292 RHEUMATISM. 



rabid state can produce the disease ; and even should a dog 

 become so bitten unknown to his owner, or when it is 

 known that he has actually been endangered, still there is 

 no real necessity for dread or for any thing more than com- 

 mon caution. So little danger is there from the first stage of 

 the complaint, that I should entertain no fear while living in 

 the same room with half a dozen dogs, all duly inoculated 

 with rabid virus. The slightest degree of attention will al- 

 ways detect some peculiarity in the affected dog's manner — 

 some departure from his usual habits : and this may be ob- 

 served one day at least, cammonly two days, before the more 

 active symptoms commence, or before the most mischievous 

 cases show themselves in a dangerous point of view. But, 

 in a great number of the cases that occur, no mischievous 

 disposition at all appears towards human persons througli the 

 whole complaint, except it is called forth by opposition and 

 violence ; which consideration tends to reduce the danger 

 still more materially. It ought, likewise, in no small degree 

 to lessen the dread and fear of this malady, that, even when 

 the worst has happened, and a human person has been un- 

 fortunately bitten by a rabid animal ; still that a ready, sim- 

 ple, and efficacious remedy is at hand, the application of 

 which is attended with little inconvenience, while the con- 

 sequences are certainly productive of all the safety that can 

 be wished for. 



Rheumatism. 



There is no disease, except distemper and mange, to which 

 dogs are so liable, as to a rheumatic affection of some part or 

 other of the body. 



Rheumatism presents almost as many varieties in dogs as it 

 does in man ; and it has some peculiarities that are observed 

 in the dog only. One very extraordinary one is, that rheu- 

 matism never exists in a dog without its affecting the bowels ; 



