OR CANINE MADNESS. 209 



experience has therefore taught us, that quadrupeds universally 

 seem obnoxious to it ; the feathered tribe appear also not exempt ; 

 but how much lower in the scale the liability extends, we are yet 

 to learn. 



The saliva of a rahid animal contains the rabid virus. — ^Is it 

 the only animal secretion which is thus empowered ? This is a 

 point not yet determined. It has been thought, that the frothy 

 secretion about the mouth was principally bronchial. In the hu- 

 man subject it is possible that it is so ; but it is more than pro- 

 bable that it is not entirely so, but that the saliva is in intimate 

 mixture with it. It has been a question, therefore, whether this 

 bronchial secretion is capable of producing the disease. Mons. 

 Trolliet, a French author of some repute, asserts, that this alone 

 is the vehicle of contagion^^ ; and, to make good his premises, he 

 asserts, that the salivary glands, living or dead, present no marks 

 of affection ; but the mucous bronchial surfaces always do. On 

 this I have to remark, that the statement is totally at variance with 

 ray own observations ; the salivary glands being, as far as I recol- 

 lect, in every instance, involved in one common inflammation with 

 the parts around, themselves being also individually, sometimes 

 very highly, injected, and always enlarged ; while, it must be ob- 

 served, the bronchiae are not always marked with traces of active 

 inflammation. In this respect, Mr. Youatt's experience coincides 

 with my own^^ ; but we both regret that we have not before this, 



'* Propositions Aphoristiques : 1. " La salive n'est point le vehicule du virus 

 de la rage. 2. Les gland salivaires ne presentent ni douleur dans le cours de 

 la maladie, ne traces d' alteration apr^s la mort 3. La bave equemeuse est 

 etrangere k la salive ; elle vient des vois aeriennes. 4. La membrane mu- 

 queuse des bronches est le sifege d'un inflammation specifique ; elle produit 

 le virus de la rage, comme la membrane muqueuse de I'urethre inflammee 

 produit le virus de la blenorrhagie syphilitique." — Nouveau Truiti de la Rage, 

 p. 673. 



•^ His observation on this fact is thus couched: — "The parotid and sub- 

 lingual glands hdve been almost invariably affected (i. e. enlarged and in- 

 flamed), and frequently the sub- maxillary." To those whose faith is strength- 

 ened by the antiquity of an opinion, it may be observed, that the ancients were 



O 



