204 
EDITORIAL. 
fully noticing the symptoms, the duration of the disease , etc., and 
if they will conscientiously lay aside their fancy for any bogus 
hydrophobic symptoms which may make their appearance, they 
will certainly abandon the mistaken conclusions, which, were 
they to become established and accepted, would deprive investi¬ 
gators in this field of one of the best means of recognizing rabies 
in the cadaver. 
The Declaration in Cases of Contagious Diseases. —In a 
practical, sanitarian point of view, the first and one of the most 
essential measures touching the prophylaxy of contagious diseases 
is the declaration of the existence of the obnoxious affections. 
Such a declaration, in a report to the proper authorities of the 
presence of the designated disease, recognized and pronounced as 
contagious either to man or to animals, or to both, and by which 
the condition of the disease is authentically established, having 
been obtained as a basis for effective future proceedings it will 
be a comparatively easy task to determine the steps to be subse¬ 
quently taken to insure the result desired, of effectually checking 
the spread of the obnoxious malady, the only method of effecting 
which and of saving the bulk of our domestic animals is the 
prompt destruction of the diseased individuals. As important 
and necessary as this measure is in its results, it is naturally and 
inevitably, of all sanitary regulations, probably the one which is 
the most difficult to carry into effect. It is opposed and evaded 
by the owners of the diseased animals, and it is offensive to the 
sympathies of interested neighbors, fearfully apprehensive, per¬ 
haps, of the time when their turn may come to encounter the 
evil; and moreover, it must be admitted that it is distasteful to 
even the veterinarian himself, who feels his professional conviction 
of the right and necessity of the heroic treatment, and his interest 
as a practitioner drawing in contrary directions—for the prac¬ 
titioner who gives a hopeless diagnosis and a prognosis which is a 
death sentence, will find it hard work to maintain a pre-eminent 
popularity, or to avoid giving offence at times to inconsiderate 
people. 
The delicacy and embarrassment unavoidably involved in the 
issue of the condemnatory declaration seem to have been appre- 
