.344 THE HOUXD. 



is no doubt that laudanum is the surest method to 

 stop it, but then it is sure to end with fits. Fits 

 at the beginning are no bad sign, and at the end 

 nothing can be worse. I never either approved of 

 bleeding or vomiting in the distemper; the first 

 weakening too much, the latter creating and adding 

 to the irritableness of their stomachs." 



" With the foregoino^ plain, sensible, and simple 

 treatment,'' says the noble lord in his comment on 

 the foregoing observations, " my' junior experience 



perfectly agrees with the opinion of ; 



but I revert to what he justly adds about ' circum- 

 stances,' and differ with him about the bleeding, as 

 I think a good scouring out, and bleeding, before 

 any thing symptomatic of the disease has fairly 

 begun, highly commendable. But, mce tersa^ for 

 instance, if you bleed after the disease has fairly 

 taken root, the lungs, nine cases in ten, being 

 afi'ected, it is ten to one you kill the dog ; but if 

 done early in the day, I cannot but think it is of 

 much service, prevents fever, and in many cases 

 makes the disease less violent. I think perhaps the 

 treatment of whelps, after they come in from their 

 healthy walks to the close confinement of sometimes 

 an ill-kept kennel, is the cause of the distemper 

 taking more violent hold of them than it otherwise 

 would do ; and amongst the hundred pretended 

 receipts of many huntsmen, the remark is a justly 

 correct one, of what ^nay cure one dog will kill 

 another. But here and his ' cir- 

 cumstances ' put you right. What might be 

 advisable would be this : As soon as your puppies 



