234 DISTEMPER. 



However indisposed to eat the dog may have previously been, the 

 appetite returns when the fits are at hand, and the animal becomes abso- 

 lutely voracious. Nature seems to be providing for the great expen- 

 diture of power which epilepsy will soon occasion. The mucus almost 

 entirely disappears from the eyes, although the discharge from the nose may 

 continue unabated ; and for an hour or more before the fit there will be 

 a champing of the lower jaw, frothing at the mouth, and discharge of saliva. 

 The champing of the lower jaw will be seen at least twelve hours before 

 the first fit, and will a little while precede every other. There will also 

 be twitchings of some part of the frame, and usually of the, mouth, cheek, 

 or eyelid. It is of some consequence to attend to these, as enabling us 

 to distinguish between fits of distemper and those of teething, worms, or 

 unusual excitement. The latter come on suddenly. The dog is appa- 

 rently well, and racing about full of spirits, and without a moment's 

 warning he falls into violent convulsions. 



We may here, likewise, be enabled to distinguish between rabies and 

 distemper. When a person, unacquainted with dogs, sees a dog struggling 

 in a fit, or running along unconscious of every surrounding object, or 

 snapping at every thing in his way, whether it be a human being or a 

 stone, he raises the cry of " mad dog,'* and the poor brute is often sacri- 

 ficed. The very existence of a fit is proof positive that the dog is not mad. 

 No epilepsy accompanies rabies in any stage of that disease. 



The inflammation of the membrane of the nose and fauces is sometimes 

 propagated along that of the windpipe, and the dog exhibits unequivocal 

 proofs of chest affection, or decided pneumonia. 



At other times the bowels become affected, and a violent purging comes 

 on. The fasces vary from white with a slight tinge of gray, to a dark 

 slate or olive colour. By degrees mucus begins to mingle with the 

 faecal discharge, and then streaks of blood. The faecal matter rapidly 

 lessens, and the whole seems to consist of mingled mucus and blood ; 

 and, from first to last, the stools are insufferably offensive. When the 

 mingled blood and mucus appear, so much inflammation exists in the 

 intestinal canal that the case is almost hopeless. 



The discharge from the nose becomes decidedly purulent. While it 

 is white and without smell, and the dog is not too much emaciated, the 

 termination may be favourable ; but when it becomes of a darker colour, 

 and mingled with blood, and offensive, the ethmoid or turbinated bones 

 are becoming carious, and death supervenes. This will particularly be 

 the case if the mouth and lips swell, and ulcers begin to appear on them, 

 and the gums ulcerate, and a sanious and highly offensive discharge pro- 

 ceeds from the mouth. A singular, half-fetid smell arising from the dog, 

 is the almost invariable precursor of death. 



When the disease first visited the continent it was regarded as a hu- 

 moral disease. Duhamel, who was one of the earliest to study the cha- 

 racter of the malady, contended that the biliary sac contained the cause 

 of the complaint : the bile assumed a concrete form, and its superabundance 

 was the cause of disease. Barrier, one of the earliest writers on the subject, 

 described it as a violent irregular bilious fever. Others regarded it as a 

 mucous discharge, or a depurative; and others, as a salutary crisis, 

 removing from the constitution that which oppressed the different organs. 

 Others had recourse to inoculation, in order to give it a more benign 

 character; and others, and among them Chabert, considered that it 



