Rabies and Hydrophobia. 315 



months (Pasteur), or even six months (Perrin). Rare as these 

 are they must apparently be accepted, and must qualify to some 

 extent the trust reposed in immunization. 



Diagnosis. The early diagnosis of rabies in the dog is of 

 supreme importance as enabling the owner to destroy or seclude 

 the dangerous animal before he has developed the disposition to 

 bite and to propagate the disease. If the dog himself is known to 

 have been bitten, every premonitory symptom should be carefully 

 looked for and critically studied. Any change in the general 

 habit, unusual liveliness or dulness, restlessness, or somnolence, 

 unwonted affection or taciturnity, special watchfulness with 

 vision, or hearing, change in the character or tones of the 

 voice or the disposition to use it, propensity to swallow foreign 

 nonalimentary bodies, retching, vomiting or costiveness, pro- 

 pensity to hide away in a dark corner or to leave home and dis- 

 appear for a day or more, disposition to gnaw and tear up wood 

 or clothing, or hypersesthesia affecting any part of the senses 

 should be carefully noted. Note especially any exaggeration of 

 the generative instinct, any strabismus, or redness of the eyes, 

 any turning of the eyes or head after imaginary objects or snap- 

 ping at them, any disposition to anger or attack when another 

 dog or cat is presented and any disposition to growl at or to bite 

 a stranger. This tendency to anger and resentment though not 

 always present is usually a symptom of the very greatest value. 

 If a dog is known to have bitten or attempted to bite any person 

 or animal he should be tied or shut up in a safe place for four 

 days at least, under veterinary supervision, and set free only on 

 condition that no symptoms have developed at the end of this 

 period. A hasty decision that a suspected dog is not rabid must 

 lay a veterinarian open to the most serious charges, in case rabies 

 occurs in man or beast from the bites. 



Diagnosis is less difficult after the paroxysmal stage has set in. 

 Then there is the extreme irritability and hyperaesthesia, the 

 appearance of reflex spasms of the pharyngeal muscles and chest 

 under the influence of any peripheral excitement, the derange- 

 ment of the senses, the dilated pulpil, the flashing eye, the 

 squinting, the taciturnity and the propensity to bite. I^ater still 

 the lack of coordination of movement or the paralysis, especially 

 of the hind limbs and of the jaws. 



