476 
A singular Nervous Affection resembling Rabies, 
While speaking of wounds produced by the bite of a rabid 
animal, Larrey* takes occasion to state his opinion as to the nature 
of hydrophobia . 
“ It is difficult,” he says, “ to explain how the virus of a rabid 
animal can remain latent in the system for a long time, can de- 
velop itself afterwards, and can end by producing the most ter¬ 
rible effects. It would, nevertheless, appear, that this subtle and 
unknown poison has a particular partiality for the nerves, and 
concentrates itself by preference in the nervous system ; in which 
it can remain inactive for a lapse of time more or less consider¬ 
able, on an average, as we have said, of thirty or forty days. Its 
effects, when it is developed, are purely nervous, and it is this 
fact which seems to justify this assertion.” 
It cannot be denied but that the most evident indications of in¬ 
flammatory action attend the symptoms and distinguish the 
pathology of hydrophobia—that we have often inflammation of 
the oesophagus, pharynx and larynx, and occasionally of the brain 
and spinal cord ; yet it is generally admitted, that these appear¬ 
ances are more the consequences than the cause of the disorder, 
and that although frequently present w T ith, they are by no means 
essential to, the existence of hydrophobic action. Rossi of Turin 
has performed experiments which, were they sufficiently con¬ 
firmed, must be regarded as strongly corroborative of Larrey’s 
theory. He dissected out a portion of nerve from the body of a 
rabid animal, during the violence of its paroxysm, and making 
an incision into the flesh of a healthy animal, inserted this ex¬ 
tracted piece of diseased nerve into the incision. After some time, 
the animal thus inoculated became equally mad with the one 
from which the poisoned nerve had been received, and died af¬ 
fected with the same symptoms. The following case will be read 
with interest, and strongly favours the author’s doctrine—that 
hydrophobia is purely a nervous disorder. A soldier, set. 20, 
had his thigh bit by a mad dog, when a youth of between four¬ 
teen or fifteen years of age. From this period, until he came 
under the care of Larrey, he did not cease to experience a 
kind of nervous affection, which was characterized by spasms 
and a slight aberration of the intellectual faculties. He was ir¬ 
ritable, very loquacious, and was frequently agitated by au¬ 
tomatic movements. He was emaciated, his eyes were haggard, 
he was often afflicted with vertigo and dimness of sight, and he 
felt an invincible repugnance against the sight of limpid fluids, 
even in circumstances in which his companions, oppressed by 
* f€ Clinique Chirurgicale,” par le Baron Larrey. 
