30 
ON RABIES IN THE DOG. 
the Warwickshire dog pack of fox-hounds, to a certain extent, 
became rabid. Not a case occurred in the bitch pack, which, as a 
matter of course, was kept separate from them, but they fed out of 
the same troughs and on the same food. Considering the vast 
number of hounds of all descriptions that are kept in Great Bri- 
tain, it must be admitted very few become rabid, which I, and 
thousands of others, have attributed to the absence of predisposing 
causes, such as eating bones and other foul and indigestible matter ; 
and to being physicked and kept clean. Nevertheless, the fact 
that, when once rabies enter a kennel, it spreads to a certain ex- 
tent, is corroborative of your assertion, that inoculation alone is the 
cause. It of course follows — this being admitted — that the only 
chance of lessening the quantity of the disease is to lessen the 
number of dogs, which alone have the power to create it. 
Allow me to observe on one part of your thirteenth Lecture on 
Rabies in the Dog, wherein you speak of the propensity of the rabid 
dog to eat all kinds of filth, and among them, human excrement, 
and at length his own. That the dog is naturally a filthy feeder is 
quite apparent to any one who watches him narrowly ; and as for 
his propensity to eat excrement of his own species, a short expe- 
rience in a kennel of fox-hounds will render that matter familiar 
to him. It is, indeed, an every-day occurrence, both there and on 
the road to cover, when nothing of that nature comes amiss to the 
hungry but healthy fox-hound. “ The dog returning to his vomit” 
is become a figure of speech, how unpleasing soever the act may 
be to the eye. Depravity of appetite, however, is, I am aware, 
an attendant on the early stages of rabies in the dog, and should 
be carefully watched when exhibited. 
I very much admire your severe strictures on the “ beastly lady’s 
lap-dog,” but I fear they are placed beyond the reach of any pro- 
hibitory tax. How many horrible cases of hydrophobia have been 
recorded as having been caused by fondling and caressing those 
misplaced brutes! That of the Honourable (the beautiful, as she was 
justly called) Mrs. Duff first presents itself to my mind. Guess, 
then, my surprise, when I saw her husband, the Earl of Fife, 
three years back, in Scotland, sitting a whole evening with a king 
Charles’s spaniel on his lap, occasionally licking his hand ! A re- 
markable instance of the danger of these animals occurred only last 
year to an old lady residing not half a mile from where I now sit. 
Her dog shewed some awkward symptoms, and was shut up. She 
insisted upon taking him his supper, because he expressed much 
delight at seeing her. The moment she approached near enough, 
he flew at her and bit her deeply in the heel. The actual cautery 
was applied, and nothing bad has been the result ; but the conduct 
of the police on this occasion was praiseworthy. They not only 
