RABIES IN THE DOG.—SYMPTOMS. 
s 
During an absence from town of some weeks’ continuance, a 
clog was brought to my house late in the evening. Its death was 
evidently not far distant, and no judgment could be formed of 
the nature of the disease either from the inspection of the ani¬ 
mal or the history of the case. It was sent away with some trifling 
medicine, and it died in the course of the night. It belonged 
to a lady, whose son, a surgeon, discovered that it had slightly 
bitten his sister on the day but one before its death. He imme¬ 
diately brought it again to my residence, and a careful examina¬ 
tion of the dog was made by my assistant, the young surgeon 
standing by. There was nothing that excited suspicion in the 
mind of either of them, and no operation was performed, nor 
was any thing said to disturb the mind of the young lady. A 
few weeks after my return I was summoned to attend a medical 
consultation. It had respect to this young lady, who was in a 
state of high nervous excitation—in fact, she was becoming hy- 
drophobous, and she died. I have no right to condemn either ol 
these young men, except that I think I should have applied the 
caustic to the wound, in order to make assurance doubly sure : 
but I introduce this history in order to impress it on your minds, 
that although, in the vast majority of cases, there will be no 
difficulty in coming to a right decision, yet a few may occur that 
present a deceptive character, and that it behoves you at all 
times to conduct these examinations with much caution, and 
with a serious impression of the danger of giving an erroneous 
opinion. 
Method of Examination .—In conducting these examinations I 
have been in the habit of making a free, and continuous incision 
through the integument from the symphisis of the jaw-bones to 
that of the pubis. I then throw the integument back on either 
side, continuing the dissection beneath the scapulae, and thus ex¬ 
posing the parietes of the abdomen, the whole of the thorax, 
and the external part of the muscles of the neck. An incision 
along the linea alba, and a slanting one on each side of the short 
ribs, exposes the contents of the abdomen. With a stronger 
scal|)el I remove the sternum, and three or four inches of the 
ribs on either side, bringing the contents of the thorax into view ; 
and then cutting through the trachea a little above, its bifurca¬ 
tion, and including the oesophagus in the incision, and separat¬ 
ing them from the cellular texture above, and dividing the 
os hyoides with a stout pair of scissors, I continue the incision 
round the inner surface of the inferior maxillary bone, until I 
can introduce my finger, and draw out the tongue between the 
branches of the jaw. The knife is readily passed lound the re¬ 
maining anterior portion of the inner surl’ace of the jaw, and the 
