602 
motions may not be observed, three times a day. 
If blood should appear in the stools give the 
following: Kino powder, 1 to 10 grains; powder 
ipecac., 4 to 3 grains; powdered opium }% to 
2 grains. This may be made into a bolus with 
any simple extract, and given three times a day. 
The food is of importance. The diet should 
be changed; the food requires to be of a non- 
stimulating kind, no meat being allowed, but 
milk and bread, sago, or arrowroot or rice, etc. 
The drink either pure water, with a pinch or 
two of chlorate and nitrate of potash in it, or 
patent barley-water if he will take it. 
The dog’s bed must be warm and clean, and 
free from draughts, and, in all cases of diarrheea, 
one cannot be too particular with the cleanliness 
and disinfection of the kennels. 
Dislocation of Bones.—Vide BONES. 
The distinguishing signs of fracture and dis- 
location are as follows :— 
FRACTURE. DISLOCATION. 
Deformity and pain. 
No crepitus. 
No mobility. 
Replaced only 
force. 
About same length. 
Seat of injury only at 
a joint. 
Deformity and pain. 
Crepitus or grating 
sound. 
Mobility unnatural. 
Easily replaced. 
Leg is shortened. 
Seat of injury any part 
of bone. 
with 
Distemper.— Although more than one hundred 
years have elapsed since this was first imported 
to this country from France, a great amount of 
misunderstanding still prevails among a large 
section of dog-breeders regarding its true nature 
and origin. The fact is, the disease came to us 
with a bad name, for the French themselves 
deemed it incurable. In this country the old- 
fashioned plan of treatment was wont to be the 
usual rough remedies—emetics, purgatives, the 
seton, and the lancet. Failing in this, specifics 
of all sorts were eagerly sought for and tried, 
and are unfortunately still believed in to a very 
great extent. 
Distemper has a certain course to run, and in 
this disease Nature seems to attempt the elimina- 
tion of the poison through the secretions thrown 
out by the naso-pharyngeal mucous membrane. 
Our chief difficulty in the treatment of dis- 
temper lies in the complications thereof. We 
may, and often do, have the organs of respiration 
attacked; we have sometimes congestion of the 
liver, or mucous inflammation of the bile ducts, 
or some lesion of the brain or nervous structures, 
combined with epilepsy, convulsions, or chorea. 
Distemper is also often complicated with severe 
disease of the bowels, and at times with an 
affection of the eyes. 
Causes.—Whether it be that the distemper virus, 
the poison seedling of the disease, really origin- 
ates in the kennel, or is the result of contact of 
one dog with another, or whether the poison floats 
to the kennel on the wings of the wind, or is 
THE NEW BOOK OF THE DOG. 
carried there on a shoe or the point of a walking- 
stick, the following facts ought to be borne in 
mind: (1) Anything that debilitates the body or 
weakens the nervous system paves the way for 
the distemper poison; (2) the healthier the dog 
the more power does he possess to resist con- 
tagion; (3) when the disease is epizootic, it can 
often be kept at bay by proper attention to diet 
and exercise, frequent change of kennel straw, and 
perfect cleanliness; (4) the predisposing causes 
which have come more immediately under my 
notice are debility, cold, damp, starvation, filthy 
kennels, unwholesome food, impure air, and grief. 
The Age at which Dogs take Distemper.—They 
may take distemper at any age; the most common 
time of life is from the fifth till the eleventh or 
twelfth month. 
Symptoms.—There is, first and foremost, a 
period of latency or of incubation, in which there 
is more or less of dulness and loss of appetite, 
and this glides gradually into a state of feverish- 
ness. The fever may be ushered in with chills 
and shivering. The nose now becomes hot and 
dry, the dog is restless and thirsty, and the con- 
junctivee of the eyes will be found to be consider- 
ably injected. Sometimes the bowels are at first 
constipated, but they are more usually irregular. 
Sneezing will also be frequent, and in some cases 
cough, dry and husky at first. The temperature 
should be taken, and if there is a rise of two or 
three degrees the case should be treated as dis- 
temper, and not as a common cold. 
At the commencement there is but little exuda- 
tion from the eyes and nose, but as the disease 
advances this symptom will become more marked, 
being clear at first. So, too, will another symp- 
tom which is partially diagnostic of the malady, 
namely, increased heat of body, combined with a 
rapid falling off in flesh, sometimes, indeed, pro- 
ceeding quickly on to positive emaciation. 
As the disease creeps downwards and inwards 
along the air-passages, the chest gets more and 
more affected, the discharge of mucus and pus 
from the nostrils more abundant, and the cough 
loses its dry character, becoming moist. The dis- 
charge from the eyes is simply mucus and pus, 
but if not constantly dried away will gum the in- 
flamed lids together; that from the nostrils is not 
only purulent, but often mixed with dark blood. 
The appetite is now clean gone, and there is often 
vomiting and occasional attacks of diarrhea. 
Now in mild cases we may look for some abate- 
ment of the symptoms about the fourteenth day. 
The fever gets less, inflammation decreases in the 
mucous passages, and appetite is restored as one 
of the first signs of returning health. More often, 
however, the disease becomes complicated. 
Diagnosis.—The diagnostic symptoms are the 
severe catarrh, combined not only with fever, but 
speedy emaciation. 
Pneumonia, as we might easily imagine, is a 
very likely complication, and a very dangerous 
one. There is great distress in breathing, the 
animal panting rapidly. The countenance is 
