114 
A CASE OF HYDROPHOBIA. 
swallows wine in considerable quantity, and with it liq. opii sed. 
in twenty-minim doses occasionally. 
Half-past 8, p.m. — Continues quiet; has eaten some bread; 
there is some incoherence of speech ; pulse 140. From this 
time till a quarter to eleven he continued remarkably free from 
spasm, with easy deglutition, taking occasionally a little wine 
and ice ; he also called for some coffee. The tendency to deli- 
rium increased, however, and at eleven o’clock Dr. Guy, who 
was now with him, tried the cold douche. Almost immediately 
after the douche the pupils, which had been previously much 
dilated, became extremely contracted, and the boy died in the 
course of a few minutes. Various efforts were made for his re- 
suscitation, but in vain. 
The rigor mortis came on very quickly, before the means used 
for his resuscitation were suspended. 
After-death Appearances . — The body was examined fifteen 
hours after death. The brain and its membranes were much 
congested, and the cerebral substance was rather softer than 
natural. The spinal veins and meninges were also much con- 
gested, but the cord was natural. The lungs and bronchial 
tubes much congested. Abdomen natural. Stomach empty and 
contracted. Pharynx injected, and its follicles seemed large. 
The following clinical remarks were made by Dr. Todd, pre- 
vious to the inspection of the body : — 
That assemblage of symptoms known under the name of hy- 
drophobia, or, more correctly, rabies , is the result of the intro- 
duction into the system of an animal poison, the operation of 
which presents several remarkable peculiarities. This poison is 
generated spontaneously by animals of the dog or cat kind, or 
by the genera felidae and canidae, of the class carnivora ; and it 
is communicable from these animals not only to individuals of 
their own kind, but also to those of other genera, or at least the 
mammiferous class. For example, a dog becomes spontaneously 
hydrophobic — he can communicate the disease to a sheep or to 
man ; but there is no evidence to prove that the fluids of a sheep 
or of the human subject, affected with this disease, can inoculate 
another animal with it. The experiments of Magendie and Bres- 
chet, performed with the object of trying to inoculate dogs with 
the fluids from a patient in the Hotel Dieu, certainly failed to 
prove that the disease was communicable by the human subject. 
It must be confessed, that it is difficult to experiment with 
this poison, especially on dogs, prone as they are to its sponta- 
neous generation ; for another remarkable feature of the poison 
is, that it remains latent in the system for a considerable period, 
varying from some days to several months ; ordinarily, however, 
from ten days to six weeks, or two months. This was exemplified 
