EpJLEPSY. 611 



come on in every limb, the dog foams at the mouth, sometimes the tongue is cut, urine or 

 faeces, or both, pass involuntarily, and a strange vacant look about the eyes, if open, which 

 they usually are. This is one fit, and, after a longer or shorter period, the dog gradually 

 recovers, seems to wonder at first where he is, and what you have been doing to him, but he 

 is soon himself again, and either gets up or falls asleep. It will be well indeed if he does not 

 soon have another, and perhaps many more, until death itself ensues. 



Causes of Fits. Mai-nutrition is certainly the principal cause, although injuries to the spinal 

 cord may produce them. There are, of course, many other lesions of the nervous system, that at all 

 events have been blamed for producing fits. In young dogs, blood-poisoning from distemper often 

 induces them ; worms do so likewise, so does the irritation from teething and constipation. So, 

 too, will any unusual excitement or exercise if the dog is suffering from general debility. You 

 sometimes find them in a bitch that has been badly fed and over-suckled. 



Treatment. The treatment resolves itself into that during the fits, and that during the 

 interval. The first is simple enough. We have only to take care the poor animal does not 

 injure himself. A piece of short stick may be placed between the jaws, and little else can be 

 done, except keeping meddlesome people at bay. You may use cold water to the head, but 

 not to the body ; no bucket douche. We have often seen dogs killed through it. 



The treatment after the fit consists in keeping the poor animal quiet for a short time, and 

 we must then set about at once and in earnest, if we would have the dog's life spared, to improve 

 his general health. Have we been feeding him regularly ? Are his bowels regularly opened ? 

 Has he enough exercise ? Does he suffer from teething or worms ? We must ask ourselves such 

 questions as these, and when we find any seeming cause for the fits, endeavour to remove it. 



Gentle purgatives will do good to begin with, but if carried too far they will do positive 

 injury. The feeding must be generous. The exercise must be gentle. All sorts of excitement 

 must be most carefully avoided. Bleeding, blistering, and setonising, are very useful, if one 

 wishes speedy death to tlie dog. 



Let the dog have plenty of animal food, and milk or butter-milk, and let him sleep out 

 of doors well protected from the cold. The bucket-bath of a morning, which we have found 

 do good in chorea, we here hesitate to use. Cod-liver oil can be highly recommended ; and it 

 the dog is recovering from distemper, quinine may be added. Bromide of potassium, half a grain 

 to five grains, three times a day, conjoined with some bitter tonic, we have also known do good, 

 but it must be given a long time. 



If the dog has quite got over distemper, that is, if the feverish stage has passed, and weakness 

 only remains, a pill like that which follows may be given thrice a day, and continued for some 

 weeks. 



li Ext. belladonn. ... ... gr. ad gr. ij. 



Ext. gent. ... ... ... \ 



-. . a a err. j. ad gr. v. 



Ext. quass. ... ... ... ) J 



M. 



Sulphate of zinc is also a good nervine tonic. From half a grain to five grains made into 

 a pill with extract of quassia, and given three times a day for weeks, administering now and then 

 a mild laxative. 



4. A stlu n a. 



Asthma, which was formerly looked upon as purely a lung disease, is now well known to 

 be of nervous origin. The disorder literally consists in a spasmodic contraction of the muscular 

 fibres of the bronchial walls, and in the dog is nearly always the result of reflex action. 



