550 DISEASES OF THE HORSE. 



the attacks of fury the animal may become calm for a variable period. 

 The writer attended a case in which, after a violent attack of an hour, 

 the horse was sufficiently calm to be walked 10 miles and only 

 developed violence again an hour after being placed in the new stable. 

 In the period of fury the horse will bite at the reopened original 

 wound ; it will rear and attempt to break its halter and fastenings ; it 

 will bite at the woodwork and surrounding objects in the stable. If 

 the animal lives long enough it shows paralytic symptoms and falls to 

 the ground, unable to use two or more of its extremities, but in the 

 majority of cases, in its excesses of violence, it does physical injury to 

 itself. It breaks its jaws in biting at the manger or fractures other 

 bones in throwing itself on the ground and dies of hemorrhage or 

 internal injuries. At times throughout the course of the disease there 

 is an excessive sensibility of the skin which, if irritated by the touch, 

 will bring on attacks of violence. The animal may have appetite and 

 desire water throughout the course of the disease, but on attempting 

 to swallow has a spasm of the throat, which renders the act impossible. 

 This latter condition, which is common in all rabid animals, has given 

 the disease the name of hydrophobia (fear of water). 



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

 being bitten on the forearm by a rabid dog, developed local irritation 

 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 prac- 

 titioner the horse was taken home and put to work, and within three 

 days it developed violent symptoms and had to be destroyed. 



Diagnosis. — 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; second, by the evident volition and consciousness on the part 

 of the animal in its attacks, offensive and defensive, on persons, ani- 

 mals, or other disturbing surroundings. The irritation and reopen- 

 ing of the original wound or point of inoculation is a valuable factor 

 in diagnosis. Diagnosis after death may be made by microscopic ex- 

 amination for Negri bodies or by the inoculation of rabbits, as already 

 mentioned. 



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

 rectness of the original diagnosis. Rabies is always fatal. 



Treatment. — No remedial treatment has ever been successful. All 

 of the anodynes and anesthetics, opium, belladonna, bromid of pot- 

 ash, ether, chloroform, etc., have been used without avail. The 

 prophylactic treatment of successive inoculations is being used on 

 human beings, and has experimentally proved efficacious in dogs, but 

 would be impracticable in the horse unless the conditions were quite 

 exceptional. 



