Our  Canaries 
121 
CHAPTER  VI. 
DISEASES. 
OUR  LIMITED  KNOWLEDGE  OF  THEM. 
NOTWITHSTANDING  the  vast  popularity  of  the  Fancy  in  late  years  and  its 
spread  among  learned  and  scientific  persons,  many  of  whom  have  brought  to 
bear  their  skill  and  scientific  training  upon  the  study  and  investigation  of  the 
numerous  ailments  which  afflict,  or  are  supposed  to  afflict,  our  feathered  pets,  it 
is  nevertheless  a  fact  that,  as  yet,  our  real  knowledge  upon  the  subject  barely 
suffices  to  convince  us  how  very  little  we  know  of  the  whole  subject  of  bird  diseases. 
So  far  as  our  Canaries  are  concerned  the  number  of  diseases  they  are  heir  to  which 
have  been  scientifically  investigated,  and  have  their  history  understood,  is  ex- 
ceedingly limited,  and  what  has  been  actually  learned  from  these  researches  has 
generally  been  so  largely  at  variance  with  all  preconceived  ideas  of  the  cause  and 
cure  of  avine  ailments  that  it  is  safe  to  say  that  in  a  few  years  hence  when  scientific 
research  has  traversed  a  larger  field  of  bird  ailments  the  vast  majority  of  the 
literary  efi"usion  now  being  devoted  to  the  subject  will  be  relegated  to  the  archives 
of  out-of-date  material,  to  be  thenceforth  only  taken  out  to  amuse,  or  form  a  sub- 
ject for  ridicule.  Therefore  in  the  present  state  of  our  knowledge  the  well-worn 
axiom  to  "  throw  physic  to  the  dogs  "  is  one  of  the  soundest  that  can  be  off"ered 
for  the  fancier's  consideration.  Indeed,  the  trenchant  sentence  said  to  be 
delivered  by  one  of  our  most  prominent  professors  to  a  class  of  medical  students— 
"  Be  sceptical  to  the  pharmacopoeia  as  a  whole— he  is  the  best  doctor  who  knows 
the  worthlessness  of  most  medicine"— exactly  expresses  the  wisest  attitude  the 
fancier  can  adopt  towards  medicines  as  a  whole. 
FOLLY  OF  ANALOGOUS  DEDUCTION. 
It  is  curious  that  of  all  the  mass  of  literature  devoted  to  the  subject,  there 
exists  extremely  little  that,  when  closely  scrutinised,  shows  the  slightest  stroke  of 
actual  research  or  investigation.  There  is  practically  nothing  save  theorismg  and 
reasoning  by  deduction  from  human  ailments,  apparently  in  blissful  ignorance  of 
the  fact  that  all  animated  creatures  do  not  sufi"er  from  the  same  kind  of  ailments ; 
neither  do  drugs  always  produce  a  similar  effect  on  man  and  animal,  nor  even 
upon  different  classes  of  animals.  Many  substances  which  are  deadly  in  their 
effects  upon  mankind  can  be  taken  with  impunity  by  some  animals.  To  give  only 
a  very  few  examples,  horses  can  take  large  doses  of  antimony,  dogs  of  mercury, 
and  rabbits  of  belladonna,  without  injury  ;  whilst  many  birds  in  a  state  of  Nature 
take  as  food  substances  which  are  deadly  to  both  mankind  and  certain  animals. 
It  is  evident,  then,  that  the  known  effect  of  any  particular  drug  upon  the  human 
subject  can  never  be  the  means  of  any  certain  deductions  so  far  as  birds  are  con- 
cerned, even  if  it  were  known  that  both  were  suffering  from  a  similar  complaint. 
