632 
OBSERVATIONS ON RABIES. 
doubt that, in such as cannot gratify the sexual passions, rabies, or 
a disease greatly approaching to it, actually takes place, and more 
or less becomes aggravated: this is stated to have occurred in the 
wolves and other animals on the continent, and in the menageries 
where animals are preserved and exhibited in a state contrary to 
the habits, climate, and freedom they enjoyed in their original 
states ; where, from these circumstances, this passion is unable to 
be gratified as was intended by the great Author of nature, 
pure madness breaks out, and then is only to be restrained in its 
intensity by means of violent purgatives and similar plans of 
treatment. A well-known instance of this occurred in the Elephant 
some time ago at Cross’s menagerie, Exeter Change, where, on 
account of the animal’s unrestrained fury, he was compelled to 
be destroyed; and you must also recollect, that at certain pe¬ 
riods, when the sexual appetite became excited, the vascular 
system was compelled to be lowered by means of strong doses 
of saline medicine: and thus I am borne out in the proposition I 
have advanced; and there is not the least doubt that, had the 
dissection been made with this idea, the whole vascular and 
nervous systems would have been found under great excitement, 
differing exceedingly from what would be perceived under other 
circumstances. As far as my own observations have gone, I have 
seen rabies rarely occurring in the bitch, but almost invariably 
in the dog. If the experience of others support this remark, I 
inquire, is it not highly probable that this may be one of the 
causes of rabies ? 
These are the three points to which I wish to direct your 
particular attention, inasmuch as I conceive a full and delibe¬ 
rate discussion on this important subject may tend, in the end, 
to afford some information as to the proximate cause of the 
pathology of rabies, and thus be the means of ultimately leading 
to some sound plan of treatment to be adopted with both man 
and animals. My object in this paper is not to communicate in¬ 
formation (for that I confess I am unable to do, when compared 
to that which has been communicated by Mr. Youatt), but to 
elicit a discussion from men who have it more in their means than 
myself of instituting inquiries, whether or not the suppositions I 
have advanced in the course of these observations are correct or in¬ 
correct, and which can only be ascertained by the observations of a 
scientific practitioner devoted to his profession, and embracing 
every object that may occur in the practice of himself or his friends : 
and as numerous observations must occur in equine and canine 
pathology, I would take the liberty of suggesting that more 
attention should be paid to an examination of the brain, nervous 
and vascular systems, than is generally done by veterinarians. I 
