314 HYDROPHOBIA. 





calmly as if they were lacerating the- dead body of another Dog. A similar insensi- 

 bility to pain is' noticeable in human lunatics, who will often inflict the most terrible 

 injuries on their own persons, with the most deliberate and unconcerned air imagina- 

 ble. The nerves seem to be deprived of their powers, and to be insensible even to 

 the contact of burning coals or red-hot metals. In anger, too, which is in truth a short- 

 lived madness, pain is unfelt, and the severest wounds may be received unheeded. 



It is possible that this locomotive instinct of the Dog may give a clue to the cure of 

 this fearful malady, and that if a rabid Dog could be permitted to follow its instinct with- 

 out molestation it might rid itself of its ailment by means of this unwonted exercise. 



By this terrible malady the nerves are excited to the highest degree of tension, and 

 it is not improbable that by violent and continual exercise the system might be en- 

 abled to throw of the " peccant humors " that infect every particle of the blood as it 

 circulates through the veins, and envenom the natural moisture of the Dog's tongue. 



There exists a curious parallel to this propensity for exertion in the celebrated Taran- 

 tula-dancing which was so famous in Naples during the sixteenth century. Those 

 persons who were effected with this curious disease, which was for many years thought 

 to be the effect of the bite of the Tarantula spider, were impelled to leap and dance 

 continually in a kind of frenzy, until they sank from sheer fatigue. In many cases the 

 dancing would continue for three or four days, and seemed to be cured best by the 

 profuse perspirations which poured from the wearied frames of the dancers. In a similar 

 manner the effects of a serpent's tooth may be driven from the system. When a per- 

 son has suffered from the bite of a cobra, or other venomous snake, the most effectual 

 treatment is to prevent him from falling into the lethargy which is produced by the 

 poisonous infusion, and to keep him in constant and violent motion. 



It is a remarkable fact that the Tarantismus, as this disease is termed, used in many 

 cases to recur at regular annual intervals, as has already been related of the wounds 

 caused by the lion's bite, and is the case with the healed wound which has been in- 

 flicted by the teeth of a rabid Dog. So subtle is this influence, and so thoroughly does it 

 pervade the system, that where anger has risen in the mind of a person who has been 

 bitten by a mad Dog, and by taking precaution has felt no evil results, the old sores 

 have become flushed and swollen, and throbbed in unison with the angry feelings that 

 occupied their mind. 



How the nature of the Dog can be so utterly changed as to charge its bite with 

 deadly venom, or how it is that the moist saliva of the rabid animal should communi- 

 cate the disease to other beings, is at present but a mystery. There seems to be an 

 actual infusion of the Dog nature into the animal which is bitten by a rabid Dog, or 

 by one of the creatures which has been inoculated by the bite of one of these ter- 

 rible beings. It is evident that the virus is resident in the saliva, because the malady 

 has been communicated by the mere touch of the Dog's tongue upon a wound without 

 the infliction of a bite from its teeth. Yet it is equally evident that the poisonous prop- 

 erty belongs not to the saliva, but to the influence which is conducted by its means. 

 In some strange fashion the spirit of the angry Dog seems to be infused into the victim 

 of its bite, and it is well known that even where an angry Dog has in the heat of its 

 passion inflicted a wound the result has been very similar to Hydrophobia, though the 

 animal was not affected with that disease. Ordinarily, the bite of a Dog, such as the 

 playful bite of a puppy, though sufficiently painful, carries no danger with it, but if the 

 animal has only been touched with this malady its bite is but too frequently fatal. This 

 death-dealing influence has been proved to remain in the saliva for four-and-twenty 

 hours after the animal's death. Perhaps there may be something of electricity in the 

 fatal influence, which requires a fluid conductor, for if the teeth of the animal have 

 been wiped dry by passing through the clothing of its intended victim no evil results 

 follow. 



Not every one that is bitten by a rabid Dog is a sufferer from Hydrophobia, for it is 

 needful that the constitution should be in a fit state to receive the poison, for its in- 

 fluence to produce any effect. We may notice a similar phenomenon among those who 

 are vaccinated. Some persons appear to be almost proof against the vaccine virus, while 

 others feel its effects so powerfully that they are thrown into a temporary fever, and 



