462 SURGICAL DISEASES. 



irritability wliich renders lier whole system liable to be excited 

 and deranged by causes that would otherwise be harmless : there- 

 fore it happens that, when the petted bitch is permitted to suckle 

 the whole of her litter, her supply of nutriment soon becomes ex- 

 hausted, and the continued drain upon her produces a great degree 

 of irritability. She gets rapidly thin ; she staggers, is half-uncon- 

 scious, neglects her pupj)ies, and suddenly falls into a fit of a very 

 peculiar character. It begins with, and is sometimes confined to, 

 the respiratory apparatus : she lies on her side and pants violently, 

 and the sound of her laboured breathing may be heard at the dis- 

 tance of twenty yards. Sometimes spasms steal over her limbs ; at 

 other times the diaphragm and respiratory muscles alone are con- 

 vulsed. In a few hours she is certainly lost ; or, if there are mo- 

 ments of remission, they are speedily succeeded by increased 

 heavings. 



" The practitioner unaccustomed to this fearful state of excita- 

 tion, and forgetful or unaware of its cause, proceeds to bleed her, 

 and he seals her fate. Although one system is thus convulsively 

 labouring, it is because others are suddenly and perfectly exhausted ; 

 and by abstraction of the vital current he reduces this last hold of 

 life to the helpless condition of the rest. There is not a more 

 common or fatal error than this. 



" The veterinary practitioner is unable to apply the tepid bath 

 to his larger patients, in order to quiet the erethism of certain 

 parts of the system, and produce an eqviable diffusion of nervous 

 influence and action ; and he often forgets it when he has it in his 

 power to save the smaller ones. Let the bitch in a fit be put into 



