150 Specific and Contagious Diseases. 
Of the few which recovered, one became blind of both 
eyes from infiltration of the layers of the cornea, but 
ultimately sight was restored. Another, affected a fort- 
night later, was seized with clonic spasms of the 
muscles of the face and cervical region, followed in a few 
days by paraplegia. After a tedious convalescence this 
animal recovered his full nervous power. 
Examination of the drains proved them to be full of 
filth, which had percolated through the floor of the 
kennels, and escape of effluvia took place through a 
perforated grating, conditions which fully accounted for 
the fatality. 
Other writers have noticed the occurrence of diphtheria 
in dogs from the consumption of the excreta of human 
patients under the disease. And Professor Law also 
alludes to croup as occurring in the dog, probably 
due to the confinement within buildings to which 
mephitic vapours have gained more or less constant 
access. 
Distemper.—In the list of canine ailments distemper 
probably ranks first in importance, prevalence, severity, 
and fatality. It is a specific disease, and usually believed 
to be closely associated with early life,a peculiarity which 
may, to some extent, be responsible for its fatality. In 
later years the belief in a contagion by which it is carried 
from one animal to another, has included it among the 
highly infectious maladies, yet some who accept the 
theory of its being “self-generated,” also admit that 
many dogs safely pass through the vicissitudes of life 
without contracting the disease. It is also in evidence 
that one attack does not always ensure immunity from a 
second, orevenathird. Various attempts have been made 
to establish identity with various diseases of other animals 
and the human subject, which, it is almost needless to 
state, have failed. In our student days, we assisted in 
the inoculation of numerous dogs as a preventive, the 
belief of our teacher in that day being that the disease 
resembled small pox of the human subject. 
Nature.—The evidences gained by a careful study of 
the disease are decidedly in favour of its being dependent 
