368 THE DOG IN DISEASE. 



strangles in the horse. It is more like typhus than any of 

 them, but the comparison is neither exact nor fruitful. 



The disease is more apt to attack dogs under a year 

 old, and pure-bred dogs, rather than others. 



It is more fatal in the former, and especially in highly 

 inbred animals, which is owing to their less stable nervous 

 system and less resisting constitution generally. 



As no specific is known for the disease, it remains the 

 gravest acute malady that attacks the dog, and between 

 the ravages of distemper and parasites a large proportion 

 of pure-bred puppies are annually carried off ; it therefore 

 becomes important in the highest degree that the true na- 

 ture of the disease and its prevention be well understood. 



Causation. — Recent investigations and experiments, 

 which it is hoped will be continued in different quarters, 

 make it reasonably certain that a germ, possibly several 

 germs, or, more likely, different forms of the one germ, 

 are associated with distemper and constitute the essential 

 cause of the disease. 



Certain it is that there is a virus of some kind, that 

 can be communicated from one animal to another, and 

 which has great vitality — i. e., can long exist outside of 

 the body without destruction, and communicate the disease 

 when brought in contact with susceptible individuals. In 

 this as in all similar diseases there are predisposing causes. 

 Dogs do not equally at all ages and under all circum- 

 stances take distemper. We may say, then, that age, en- 

 vironment, condition of the constitution at the time of 

 exposure, individuality, etc., are all important. 



All dogs do not take distemper when exposed, and, as 

 a rule, the older the dog the greater his chance of escape. 



