On Rabies. 



65 



able time afterwards ; and I should be disposed to conclude that if 

 such an animal developed no symptoms of rabies for some days after 

 having bitten a person or other animal, the latter would be safe from 

 any danger of infection.* 



* The most extensive and important observations and experiments upon this 

 subject ever recorded before M. Pasteur's are those of Hertwig, made in the 

 Veterinary School of Berlin between the years 1823 and 1827. They are published 

 in Hufeland and E. Osann's 'Journal f. prakt. Heilkunde,' Berlin, vol. 67, 1828, 

 (Beit. z. nahern Kentniss d. Wuthkrankheit, oder Tollheit d. Hunde, von Dr. 

 Hertwig). They have been but little noticed by English writers, important as they 

 are. Their chief results are : — 



(1.) Of 16 dogs inoculated with the saliva of others rabid, by puncturing the skin 

 of the head, 6 died infected. 



(2.) Of 7 similarly inoculated with the secretion expressed from the parotid 

 glands, 1 was infected. 



(3.) Of 2 inoculated with the crural and 4 with the sympathetic nerve, no infec- 

 tion resulted. 



(4.) Saliva put in the mouth of more than 20 dogs in no case produced infection. 



(5.) Of 11 dogs inoculated with the blood of others rabid, taken during life and 

 shortly after death, no specific infection occurred. 



(6.) Of 15 caused to be bitten by others rabid, 5 died infected ; but of 137 appa- 

 rently brought to the infirmary bitten by others rabid or (qy.) supposed to be so, 

 only 6 died infected. 



His own pug was inoculated nine times during three years and resisted infection, 

 but succumbed to a subsequent trial. He remarks {op. ext., p. 172) that of the other 

 dogs that died after inoculation, some withstood infection two, three, or four times, 

 and one died at first, clearly showing how variable is the degree of refractoriness 

 possessed by different animals. 



His observations upon the symptoms and appearances in upwards of 200 cases 

 that he examined are carefully recorded, and his statement that he compared the 

 latter with those of healthy animals shows the scrupulous care with which they were 

 made. Their description is fully given in his later work ' Die Krankheiten d. 

 Hunde u. deren Heilung' (Berlin, 1853). 



A series of observations made upon even a larger number — 375 cases of street 

 rabies, in the Veterinary Institute of Vienna, during twenty years — is that of 

 Bruckmuller, recorded in his ' Lehrbuch d. Pathol. Anatomie der Hausthiere ' 

 (Wien 1869). He found a morbid appearance in the stomach in 254 cases, or nearly 

 70 per cent., with the presence of foreign substances in it in 199 cases, or 55 per 

 cent. ; it was " inflamed " in 125, or 33 per cent. 



It appears probable, however, that some at least of these cases may have been 

 destroyed during the progress of the disease, and not improbably some of them may 

 not have been cases of true rabies, which circumstance would materially affect the 

 proportions of pathognomonic appearances observable. 



The best work extant on this subject, of both literary merit and scientific 

 accuracy, is the well-known 1 Kabies and Hydrophobia,' by George Fleming, LL.D., 

 Principal Veterinary Surgeon to the Army (London, 1872), which gives a complete 

 and excellent account of the disease in all its relations, with a notice of the prin- 

 cipal publications up to that time. Of these the best in the English language are 

 those of William Youatt, M ft.C.V.S. (' The Dog,' London, 1845, and 1 On Canine 

 Madness,' London, 1830), in which the account of this disease in the lower animals 

 is given from the numerous cases observed in his own extensive practice. 



VOL. XLIII. F 



