ACCIDENTAL POISONING. 413 
be absorbed or the powder licked off with poisonous results. Where a fairly 
large quantity has entered the system, narcotic effects are produced. There 
is more or less prostration, with symptoms of intoxication, the dog tottering, 
and inclining to one side, with his head hanging low. There is loss of appe- 
tite, but no vomiting. Unless more iodoform was taken, these signs would 
disappear readily, and all be gone in twenty-four hours. A larger and usually 
fatal dose causes great excitation, with irregular breathing, and strong and 
full pulse; there are convulsive movements, during which the head is bent 
backward, as in lock-jaw, with twitchings of the paws, and especially those 
behind. In some instances the signs of poisoning are, dulness, deepening into 
stupor, contracted pupils, abnormal quiet or restlessness, suppression of the 
urine, convulsions and collapse. In mild cases, as for instance where only a 
little too much iodoform has been applied to a wound daily for several days, 
the principal symptoms are general depression and disinclination to move 
about, quickening of the pulse, and loss of appetite. In such, did the poison- 
ing continue, the pulse would likely in time become so rapid — 150 or-180— 
it could only be counted with difficulty, and collapse would speedily follow. 
The treatment usually required is to give hourly the bicarbonate of potas- 
sium in from five to ten grain doses, and stimulate with whiskey or brandy and 
the aromatic spirit or carbonate of ammonia. The smallest dose of the potas- 
sium stated would be right for all dogs under medium size. In extreme and 
desperate cases in which the brain is paralyzed, as it were, atropia might be 
tried, and be administered hypodermically. 
This opportunity is favorable for emphasizing the fact that in dressing cuts 
and other wounds one-sixth of a teaspoonful of iodoform is all that ought to be 
used on one of the largest breeds, and much less on the small breeds, for were 
more applied, there must be danger of poisoning by absorption. 
Being an ingredient of some preparations intended for the destruction of 
certain insects, poisoning by phosphorus is possible. The symptoms pro- 
duced are great restlessness, pain in the throat and stomach, —which may 
account for the howling and whining — abdominal tenderness, intense irrita- 
tion of the mouth and throat, thick and copious saliva, violent vomiting, and 
sometimes purging, coldness, prostration, and either convulsions, paralysis or 
stupor before death. The end may come within a few hours or be delayed 
four or five days. In the lingering cases, after two or three days, the lining 
membrane of the mouth loses its bright red color and becomes dirty-yellowish. 
If the skin and ‘‘ whites” of the eyes also exhibit this jaundice tendency, the 
evidence of phosphorous poisoning is very strong indeed. 
Less than a grain of phosphorus would doubtless kill a dog of large breed. 
Were the fact that phosphorus had been taken into the stomach at once known, 
the poison might be neutralized by the permanganate of potassium, the proper 
dose of which is four grains for largest breeds and one grain for the smallest. 
