102 



DISEASES OF DOGS. 



Fleas QPuleiB serratioeps, Fig. 17) are familiar to most dog- 

 owners, and with their very lively propensities are more mischievous 

 and annoying, if leas disgusting, than the lice which, with them, 

 infest and torment the dog. Numerous are the means suggested 

 for the destruction of fleas, and scores of drugs, simple and compound, 

 are in vogue for this purpose. For pet dogs I do not think there is 

 anything at once so innocent, so clean, and so efiective, as Keating's 

 Persian Insect Powder ; the price alone is against it, that being un- 

 necessarily high. It con- 

 sists, I believe, of the 

 powdered flowers of Pt/- 

 rethrum roseum, and is 

 used in a dry state by 

 simply rubbing it into 

 the roots of the hair or 

 blowing it in with' suit- 

 able miniature bellows, 

 which are sold for that 

 purpose by most chem- 

 ists. The best article 

 of the kind I have seen 

 is one of French manu- 

 facture, worked by a 

 small jjiston, acting on 

 a spring of spiral wire, 

 covered with a piece of 

 glazed calico, the whole 

 neatly encased in tin, 

 with an aperture at the 

 bottom for filling with 

 powder. The powder 

 is blown out of a long 

 spout with such force 

 as to spread it among 

 the roots of the hair. 

 The whole apparatus, when iiUed, costs only Is. 



Within the last few years a large trade has sprung up in " dog 

 soaps, "most of them depending on carbolic acid for their flea-destroy- 

 ing properties, and all of them claiming special virtues in improving 

 the dog's coat, curing mange, getting liim in condition, and all the 

 rest of it. Professor Williams, of Edinburgh, strongly condemns 

 the use of carbolic acid soap on the dog. And I myself have had 

 convincing proofs of the ill effects of carbolic acid and carbolic acid 

 soaps on dogs, and have seen that the acid, even in the mild form of 



Fig. 17. The Dog Flea, with ORniNAEY Flea 

 SHOWH ABOVE. (Both much magnifled.) 



