BY THE BITE OF RABID FOXES. 
75 
hour’s. The girl followed him until she remarked that he seemed 
about to spring on her, and before she could get away he did fly 
upon her and bit her, first on the face and then on the left arm. 
The girl caught him by his ears, and confined his body with her 
feet, and thus, in spite of his struggles, she firmly held him, until 
her cries brought the labourer and a neighbour to her assistance. 
The former quickly seized the animal, and in so doing received a 
bite on his left hand; while the latter killed the fox with a heavy 
stick. Little or no notice was taken of the young girl’s apparently 
slight wounds; they were merely washed with brandy, and bound 
up with dry limen. 
A few days afterwards, when a surgeon was called in, he found 
the wounds in the girl’s face and arm already partially heated; but 
that on the hand of the labourer being much deeper, had not begun 
to close. 
On the post-mortem examination of the fox the teeth were found 
to be very much decayed—the cavity of the skull broken in—the 
gullet dry and pallid: there were no vesicles on the tongue—the 
fauces and the heart in their natural state, as was the pericardium 
and the lungs. The mucous membrane of the trachea a few inches 
above its bronchial division was of a red-cherry colour, as were the 
bronchi; and at the bifurcation of the trachea there was consider¬ 
able inflammation. The larger curvature of the stomach was half- 
filled with food, and the mucous membrane covered with a dark- 
red coloured serosity. It contained part of a young hare, undi¬ 
gested, and several balls of the hair of animals, which he had eaten. 
The mucous membrane of the left half of the stomach was of a 
_ ♦ 
bluish-red colour, and very much inflamed. The spleen was a uni¬ 
form dark-green colour. There were numerous yellowish-red spots 
on the liver. The gall-bladder was about half filled, and its con¬ 
tents resembled Malaga wine. The mucous membrane of the 
whole intestinal canal was almost uniformly inflamed, and of a dark- 
bluish-red colour, deepening at times to black. The mucous mem¬ 
brane contained spots of inflammation. Beside some greenish mu¬ 
cus, several balls of hair were found, and a little half-solid excre¬ 
ment in the lower portion of the intestines. The bladder was empty 
and quite healthy. One testicle was about the size of a hazel nut, 
and the other that of a small apple. On cutting into the latter a 
great number of hydatids escaped. 
Both the bitten persons were now placed under medical treat¬ 
ment. The wounds were deeply scarified, and washed with butyr 
of antimony, and suppuration obtained by the application of a vesi¬ 
catory. 
The girl appeared to be going on well for more than three weeks, 
but on the Gth of September, about two o’clock in the morning. 
