132 RABIES. 



This kind of delirium is of frequent occurrence in the human patient. 

 The account given by Dr. Bardsley of one of his patients is very appro- 

 priate to our present purpose : "I observed that he frequently fixed his 

 eyes with horror and affright on some ideal object, and then, with a 

 sudden and violent emotion, buried his head beneath the bed-clothes. The 

 next time I saw him repeat this action, I was induced to inquire into the 

 cause of his terror. He asked whether I had not heard howlings and 

 scratchings. On being answered in the negative, he suddenly threw him- 

 self on his knees, extending his arms in a defensive posture, and forcibly 

 threw back his head and body. The muscles of the face were agitated by 

 various spasmodic contractions ; his eye-balls glazed, and seemed ready to 

 start from their sockets ; and, at that moment, when crying out in an 

 agonizing tone, * Do you not see that black dog ?' his countenance and 

 attitude exhibited the most dreadful picture of complicated horror, dis- 

 tress, and rage that words can describe or imagination paint." 



I have again and again seen the rabid dog start up after a momentary 

 quietude, with unmingled ferocity depicted on his countenance, and plunge 

 with a savage howl to the end of his chain. At other times he would 

 stop and watch the nails in the partition of the stable in which he was 

 confined, and fancying them to move he would dart at them, and occasion- 

 ally sadly bruise and injure himself from being no longer able to measure 

 the distance of the object. In one of his sudden fits of violence a rabid 

 dog strangled the Cardinal Crescence, the Legate of the Pope, at the 

 Council of Trent in 1532. 



M. Magendie has often injected into the veins of an hydrophobous dog 

 as much as five grains of opium without producing any effect ; while a 

 single grain given to a healthy dog would suffice to send him almost to 

 sleep. 



One of Mr. Babington's patients thought that there was a cloud of flies 

 about him. " Why do you not kill those flies?" he would cry ; and then 

 he would strike at them with his hand, and shrink under the bed-clothes, 

 in the most dreadful fear. 



There is also in the human being a peculiarity in this delirium which 

 seems to distinguish it from every other kind of mental aberration. " The 

 patient," in Mr. Lawrence's language," is pursued by a thousand phantoms 

 that intrude themselves upon his mind; he holds conversation with imaginary 

 persons ; he fancies himself surrounded with difficulties, and in the greatest 

 distress. These thoughts seem to pass through his mind with wonderful 

 rapidity, and to keep him in a state of the greatest distress, unless he is 

 quickly spoken to or addressed by his name, and, then, in a moment the 

 charm is broken ; every phantom of imagination disappears, and at once 

 he begins to talk as calmly and as connectedly as in perfect health." 



So it is with the dog, whether he is watching the motes that are floating 

 in the air, or the insects that are annoying him on the walls, or the foes 

 that he fancies are threatening him on every side one word recalls him 

 in a moment. Dispersed by the magic influence of his master's voice, 

 every object of terror disappears, and he crawls towards him with the same 

 peculiar expression of attachment that used to characterise him. 



Then comes a moment's pause a moment of actual vacuity the eye 

 slowly closes, the head droops, and he seems as if his fore feet were giving 

 way, and he would fall : but he springs up again, every object of terror 

 once more surrounds him he gazes wildly around he snaps he barks, 



