Delirium. 31 



temperature. The derangements of circulation may be in the 

 meninges or in the nervous substance. The intoxications may 

 be with mineral (lead, mercury), vegetable (opium, Indian hemp, 

 belladonna, hyoscyamus, stramonium, strychnia), or other 

 poisons, including the toxic products of microbes (as in pneu- 

 monia, scalma, rabies, influenza. Rinderpest, milk sickness, 

 Texas fever, etc. ) . 



Symptoms. These are usually an extraordinary and disorderly 

 nervous excitement. Horses take expectant or ready positions 

 of the limbs, plunge with feet in rack or manger, rear, turn, kick, 

 bite, spring violently, neigh, and push or knock the head against 

 the wall. Cattle bellow in a loud or frightened manner, attempt 

 to kick and gore, grind the teeth and make movements of the 

 jaws, froth at the mouth, dash themselves in any direction heed- 

 less of obstacles, push the head against the wall breaking teeth or 

 horns, and moving heedlessly against fences, or trees, or into 

 water or pits even to their own destruction. Sheep stamp the 

 feet, butt, bleat, work the jaws, grind the teeth, leap, and move in 

 a given direction regardless of obstacles. Pigs grunt, tremble, 

 champ the jaws, run against obstacles, scratch the ground with 

 their feet or snout and creep under the litter. They may even 

 attempt to bite. Dogs are restless, whine, move in a circle, snap 

 at straw, bars, doors, and other objects, and may show a disposi- 

 tion to bite. In all the domestic animals these delirious symp- 

 toms may closely resemble those of rabies. This has been par- 

 ticularly noticed in certain forms of poisoning. Pascault has 

 found this in cattle that had eaten garlic and Cadeac in dogs that 

 had eaten tansy. 



The animals in such cases become morbid, dull, taciturn, they 

 become usually hypersensitive, sometimes hyposensitive, have a 

 change of voice, and show a readiness to resent and bite if inter- 

 fered with, and even to wander away by themselves as in rabies. 

 On the other hand they may be siezed with lethargy and torpor 

 as in dumb rabies, and with or without access of convulsions may 

 pass away in a condition of paralysis. 



Among other conditions these symptoms have been found to be 

 associated with epilepsy, foreign bodies in the pharynx, gullet, 

 stomach or bowels, with intestinal parasites, or with mycotic 

 poisoning (ergotism, smut, the fungus of coniferous trees, etc.). 



