544 



In a case recently under the care of the writer a horse, four weeks 

 after being bitten on the forearm by a rabid dog, developed local irri- 

 tation in the healed wound and tore it with its teeth into a large 

 ulcer. This was healed by local treatment in ten days and the horse 

 was kept under surveillance for over a month. On the advice of 

 another practitioner the horse was taken home and put to work, and 

 within three days it developed violent symptoms and had to be 

 destroyed. 



The diagnosis of rabies in the horse is to be made from the various 

 brain troubles to which the animal is subject; first, by the history of 

 a previous bite of a rabid animal or inoculation by other means; sec- 

 ondly, by the evident volition and consciousness on the part of the 

 animal in its attacks, offensive and defensive, on persons, animals, or 

 other disturbing surroundings. The irritation and reopening of the 

 original wound or point of inoculation is a valuable factor in diag- 

 nosis. 



Recovery from rabies may be considered as a question of the cor- 

 rectness of the original diagnosis. 



No remedial treatment has ever been successful. All of the ano- 

 dynes and anaesthetics, opium, belladonna, bromide of potash, ether, 

 chloroform, etc. , have been used without avail. The prophylactic treat- 

 ment of successive inoculations is being used on human beings, and 

 has experimentally proved efficacious in dogs, but would be impracti- 

 cable in the horse, which must invariably be destroyed or be so guarded 

 as to protect the surrounding attendants and other animals in the 

 same stable, when it ^^dll die in a day or two from self-inflicted trau- 

 matism or paralysis. 



