The distemper is clearly a disease of the mucous membranes, usually
commencing in the membrane of the nose, and resembling nasal catarrh.
the early stage it is
coryza
, or nasal catarrh; but the affection
rapidly extends, and seems to attack the mucous membranes generally,
determined to some particular one, either by atmospheric influence or
accidental causes, or constitutional predisposition. The fits arise from
general disturbance of the system, or from the proximity of the brain to
the early seat of inflammation.
This account of the nature and treatment of distemper will, perhaps, be
unsatisfactory to some readers. One thing, however, is clear, that for a
disease which assumes such a variety of forms, there can be no specific;
yet there is not a keeper who is not in possession of some supposed
infallible nostrum. Nothing can be more absurd. A disease attacking so
many organs, and presenting so many and such different symptoms, must
require a mode of treatment varying with the organ attacked and the
symptom prevailing. The faith in these boasted specifics is principally
founded on two circumstances — atmospheric influence and peculiarity of
breed. There are some seasons when we can scarcely save a dog; there are
others when we must almost wilfully destroy him in order to lose him.
There are some breeds in which, generation after generation, five out of
six die of distemper, while there are others in which not one out of a
dozen dies. When the season is favourable, and the animal, by hereditary
influence, is not disposed to assume the virulent type of the disease,
these two important agents are overlooked, and the immunity from any
fatal result is attributed to medicine. The circumstances most conducive
to success will be the recollection that it is a disease of the mucous
surfaces, and that we must not carry the depleting and lowering system
too far. Keeping this in view, we must accommodate ourselves to the
symptoms as they arise.
natural medicine of the dog seems to be an emetic. The act of
vomiting is very easily excited in him, and, feeling the slightest
ailment, he flies to the dog-grass, unloads his stomach, and is at once
well. In distemper, whatever be the form which it assumes, an emetic is
the first thing to be given. Common salt will do when nothing else is at
hand; but the best emetic, and particularly in distemper, consists of
equal parts of calomel and tartar emetic. From half a grain to a grain
and a half of each will constitute the dose.
This will act first as an emetic, and afterwards as a gentle purgative.
, if the cough is urgent, and there is heaving at the flanks, and
the nose is hot, a moderate quantity of blood may be taken — from three
to twelve ounces — and this, if there has been previous constipation, may
be followed by a dose of sulphate of magnesia, from two to six drachms.
In slight cases this will often be sufficient to effect a cure: but, if
the dog still droops, and particularly if there is much huskiness, the
antimonial or James's powder, nitre and digitalis, in the proportion of
from half a grain to a grain of digitalis, from two to five grains of
the James's powder, and from a scruple to a drachm of nitre, should be
administered twice or thrice in a day. If on the third or fourth day the
huskiness is not quite removed, the emetic should be repeated.
these affections of the mucous membranes, it is absolutely necessary
to avoid or to get rid of every source of irritation, and worms will
generally be found a very considerable one in young dogs. If we can
speedily get rid of them, distemper will often rapidly disappear; but,
if they are suffered to remain, diarrhœa or fits are apt to supervene:
therefore some worm medicine should be administered.
I have said that vomiting is very easily excited in the dog; and that
for this reason we are precluded from the use of a great many medicines
in our treatment of him. Calomel, aloes, jalap, scammony, and gamboge
will generally produce sickness.
are, therefore, driven to some
mechanical vermifuge; and a very effectual one, and that will rarely
fail of expelling even the tape-worm, is tin filings or powdered glass.
From half a drachm to a drachm of either may be advantageously given
twice in the day. There may generally be added to them digitalis,
James's powder, and nitre, made into balls with palm oil and a little
linseed meal. This course should be pursued in usual cases until two or
three emetics have been given, and a ball morning and night on the
intermediate days. Should the huskiness not diminish after the first two
or three days, if the dog has not rapidly lost flesh, I should be
disposed to take a little more blood, and to put a seton in the poll. It
should be inserted between the ears, and reaching from ear to ear.
When there is fever and huskiness, and the dog is not much emaciated, a
seton is an excellent remedy; but, if it is used indiscriminately, and
when the animal is already losing ground, and is violently purging, we
shall only hasten his doom, or rather make it more sure.
It is now, if ever, that pneumonia will be perceived. The symptoms of
inflammation in the lungs of the dog can scarcely be mistaken. The quick
and laborious breathing, the disinclination or inability to lie down,
the elevated position of the head, and the projection of the muzzle,
will clearly mark it. More blood must be subtracted, a seton inserted,
the bowels opened with Epsom salts, and the digitalis, nitre, and
James's powder given more frequently and in larger doses than before.
Little aid is to be derived from observation of the pulse of the dog; it
differs materially in the breed, and size, and age of the animal. Many
years' practice have failed in enabling me to draw any certain
conclusion from it. The best place to feel the pulse of the dog is at
the side. We may possibly learn from it whether digitalis is producing
an intermittent pulse, which it frequently will do, and which we wish
that it should do: it should then be given a little more cautiously, and
in smaller quantities.
If the pneumonia is evidently conquered, or we have proceeded thus far
without any considerable inflammatory affection of the chest, we must
begin to change our plan of treatment. If the huskiness continues, and
the discharge from the nose is increased and thicker, and the animal is
losing flesh and becoming weak, we must give only half the quantity of
the sedative and diuretic medicine, and add some mild tonic, as gentian,
chamomile, and ginger, with occasional emetics, taking care to keep the
bowels in a laxative but not purging state. The dog should likewise be
urged to eat; and, if he obstinately refuses ail food, he should be
forced with strong beef jelly, for a very great degree of debility will
now ensue
We have thus far considered the treatment of distemper from its
commencement; but it may have existed several days before we were
consulted, and the dog may be thin and husky, and refusing to eat. In
such case we should give an emetic, and then a dose of salts, and after
that proceed to the tonic and fever balls.
Should the strength of the animal continue to decline, and the discharge
from the nose become purulent and offensive, the fever medicine must be
omitted, and the tonic balls, with carbonate of iron, administered. Some
veterinary surgeons are very fond of gum resins and balsams. Mr.
,
in his excellent treatise on the distemper in his
Canine Pathology
,
recommends myrrh and benjamin, and balsam of Peru and camphor. I much
doubt the efficacy of these drugs. They are beginning to get into
disrepute in the practice of human medicine; and I believe that if they
were all banished from the veterinary
Materia Medica
we should
experience no loss. When the dog begins to recover, although not so
rapidly as we could wish, the tonic balls, without the iron, may be
advantageously given, with now and then an emetic, if huskiness should
threaten to return; but mild and wholesome food, and country or good
air, will be the best tonics.
If the discharge from the nose become very offensive, the lips swelled
and ulcerated, and the breath fetid, half an ounce of yeast may be
administered every noon, and the tonics morning and night; and the mouth
should be frequently washed with a solution of chloride of lime.
At this period of the disease the sub-maxillary glands are sometimes
very much enlarged, and a tumour or abscess is formed, which, if not
timely opened, breaks, and a ragged, ill-conditioned ulcer is formed,
very liable to spread, and very difficult to heal. It is prudent to
puncture this tumour as soon as it begins to point, for it will never
disperse. After the opening, a poultice should be applied to cleanse the
ulcer; after which it should be daily washed with the compound tincture
of benjamin, and dressed with calamine ointment. Some balls should be
given, and the animal liberally fed.
the fits appear in an early stage, give a strong emetic; then
bleed, and open the bowels with five or six grains of calomel and a
quarter grain of opium: after this insert a seton, and then commence the
tonic balls.
The progress of fits in the early stages of the disease may thus be
arrested. The occurrence of two or three should not make us despair;
but, if they occur at a later period, and when the dog is much reduced,
there is little hope. This additional expenditure of animal power will
probably soon carry him off. All that is to be done, is to administer a
strong emetic, obviate costiveness by castor oil, and give the tonic
balls with opium.
the treatment of the yellow disease little can be said; we shall not
succeed in one case in twenty. When good effect has been produced, it
has been by one large bleeding, opening the bowels well with Epsom
salts, and then giving grain doses of calomel twice a day in a tonic
ball.
it is prudent to obviate costiveness, we should recollect that
there is nothing more to be dreaded, in every stage of distemper, than
diarrhœa. The purging of distemper will often bid defiance to the most
powerful astringents. This shows the folly of giving violent cathartics
in distemper; and, when I have heard of the ten, and twenty, and thirty
grains of calomel that are sometimes given, I have thought it fortunate
that the stomach of the dog is so irritable. The greater part of these
kill-or-cure doses is ejected, otherwise the patient would soon be
carried off by super-purgation. There is an irritability about the whole
of the mucous membrane that may be easily excited, but cannot be so
readily allayed; and, therefore, except in the earliest stage of
distemper, or in fits, or limiting ourselves to the small portion of
calomel which enters into our emetic, I would never give a stronger
purgative than castor-oil or Epsom salts. It is of the utmost
consequence that the purging of distemper should be checked as soon as
possible.
In some diseases a sudden purging, and even one of considerable
violence, constitutes what is called the crisis. It is hailed as a
favourable symptom, and from that moment the animal begins to recover;
but this is never the case in distemper: it is a morbid action which is
then going on, and which produces a dangerous degree of debility.
The proper treatment of purging in cases of distemper, is first to give
a good dose of Epsom salts, in order to carry away anything that may
offend, and then to ply the animal with mingled absorbents and
astringents. A scruple of powdered chalk, ten grains of catechu, and
five of ginger, with a quarter of a grain of opium, made into a ball
with palm oil, may be given to a middle-sized dog twice or thrice every
day. To this may be added injections of gruel, with the compound chalk
mixture and opium.
When the twitchings which I have described begin to appear, a seton is
necessary, whatever may be the degree to which the animal is reduced.
Some stimulating embrocation, such as tincture of cantharides, may be
rubbed along the whole course of the spine; and the medicine which has
oftenest, but not always, succeeded, is castor-oil, syrup of buckthorn,
and syrup of white poppies, given morning and night, and a tonic ball at
noon. If the dog will not now feed, he should be forced with strong
soup. As soon, however, as the spasms spread over him, accompanied by a
moaning that increases to a cry, humanity demands that we put an end to
that which we cannot cure. Until this happens I would not despair; for
many dogs have been saved that have lain several days perfectly
helpless.
to the
chorea
which I have mentioned as an occasional sequel of
distemper, if the dog is in tolerable condition, and especially if he is
gaining flesh, and the spring or summer is approaching, there is a
chance of his doing well. A seton is the first thing; the bowels should
be preserved from constipation; and the nitrate of silver, in doses of
one-eighth of a grain, made into a pill with linseed meal, and increased
to a quarter of a grain, should be given morning and night.
We should never make too sure of the recovery of a distempered dog, nor
commit ourselves by too early a prognosis. It is a treacherous disease;
the medicines should be continued until every symptom has fairly
disappeared; and for a month at least.
may be interesting to add the following account of the distemper in
dogs, by Dr. Jenner. Several of our modern writers have copied very
closely from him.
"That disease among dogs which has familiarly been called the distemper, has not hitherto, I believe, been, much noticed by medical men. My situation in the country favouring my wishes to make some observations on this singular malady, I availed myself of it, during several successive years, among a large number of foxhounds belonging to the Earl of Berkeley; and, from observing how frequently it has been confounded with hydrophobia, I am induced to lay the result of my inquiries before the Medical and Chirurgical Society. It may be difficult, perhaps, precisely to ascertain the period of its first appearance in Britain. In this and the neighbouring counties, I have not been able to trace it back beyond the middle of the last century; but it has since spread universally. I knew a gentleman who, about forty-five years ago, destroyed the greater part of his hounds, from supposing them mad, when the distemper first broke out among them; so little was it then known by those most conversant with dogs. On the continent I find it has been known for a much longer period; it is as contagious among dogs as the small-pox, measles, or scarlet fever among the human species; and the contagious miasmata, like those arising from the diseases just mentioned, retain their infectious properties a long time after separation from the distempered animal. Young hounds, for example, brought in a state of health into a kennel, where others have gone through the distemper, seldom escape it. I have endeavoured to destroy the contagion by ordering every part of a kennel to be carefully washed with water, then whitewashed, and finally to be repeatedly fumigated with the vapour of marine acid, but without any good result.
"The dogs generally sicken early in the second week after exposure to the contagion; it is more commonly a violent disease than otherwise, and cuts off at least one in three that are attacked by it. It commences with inflammation of the substance of the lungs, and generally of the mucous membrane of the bronchi. The inflammation at the same time seizes on the membranes of the nostrils, and those lining the bones of the nose, particularly the nasal portion of the ethmoid bone. These membranes are often inflamed to such a degree as to occasion extravasation of blood, which I have observed coagulated on their surface. The breathing is short and quick, and the breath is often fetid; the teeth are covered with a dark mucus. There is frequently a vomiting of a glairy fluid. The dog commonly refuses food, but his thirst seems insatiable, and nothing cheers him like the sight of water. The bowels, although generally constipated as the disease advances, are frequently affected with diarrhœa at its commencement. The eyes are inflamed, and the sight is often obscured by mucus secreted from the eyelids, or by opacity of the cornea. The brain is often affected as early as the second day after the attack; ihe animal becomes stupid, and his general habits are changed. In this state, if not prevented by loss of strength, he sometimes wanders from his home. He is frequently endeavouring to expel by forcible expirations the mucus from the trachea and fauces, with a peculiar rattling noise. His jaws are generally smeared with it, and it sometimes flows out in a frothy state, from his frequent champing.
"During the progress of the disease, especially in its advanced stages, he is disposed to bite and gnaw anything within his reach; he has sometimes epileptic fits, and a quick succession of general though slight convulsive spasms of the muscles. If the dog survive, this affection of the muscles continues through life. He is often attacked with fits of a different description; he first staggers, then tumbles, rolls, cries as if whipped, and tears up the ground with his teeth and fore feet: he then lies down senseless and exhausted. On recovering, he gets up, moves his tail, looks placid, comes to a whistle, and appears in every respect much better than before the attack. The eyes, during this paroxysm, look bright, and, unless previously rendered dim by mucus, or opacity of the cornea, seem as if they were starting from their sockets. He becomes emaciated, and totters from feebleness in attempting to walk, or from a partial paralysis of the hind legs. In this state he sometimes lingers on till the third or fourth week, and then either begins to show signs of returning health (which seldom happens when the symptoms have continued with this degree of violence), or expires. During convalescence, he has sometimes, though rarely, profuse hæmorrhage from the nose.
"When the inflammation of the lungs is very severe, he frequently dies on the third day. I know one instance of a dog dying within twenty-four hours after the seizure; and in that short space of time the greater portion of the lungs was, from exudation, converted into a substance nearly as solid as the liver of a sound animal. In this case the liver itself was considerably inflamed, and the eyes and flesh universally were tinged with yellow, though I did not observe anything obstructing the biliary ducts. In other instances I have also observed the eyes looking yellow.
"The above is a description of the disease in its several forms; but in this, as in the diseases of the human body, there is every gradation in its violence.
"There is also another affinity to some human diseases, viz., that the animal which has once gone through it very rarely meets with a second attack. Fortunately this distemper is not communicable to man. Neither the effluvia from the diseased dog nor the bite have proved in any instance infectious; but, as it has often been confounded with canine madness, as I have before observed, it is to be wished that it were more generally understood; for those who are bitten by a dog in this state are sometimes thrown into such perturbation that hydrophobia symptoms have actually arisen from the workings of the imagination. Mr. John Hunter used to speak of a case somewhat of this description in his lectures.
"A gentleman who received a severe bite from a dog, soon after fancied the animal was mad. He felt a horror at the sight of liquids, and was actually convulsed on attempting to swallow them. So uncontrollable were his prepossessions, that Mr. Hunter conceived he would have died had not the dog which inflicted the wound been found and brought into his room in perfect health. This soon restored his mind to a state of tranquillity. The sight of water no longer afflicted him, and he quickly recovered."2
, more or less complete, is sometimes the termination of the
distemper in dogs.
It is usually accompanied by chorea, and it is then, in the majority of
cases, hopeless. Setons should be inserted in the poll, being then, as
nearly as possible, at the commencement of the spinal cord. They should
be well stimulated and worn a considerable time. If they fail, a plaster
composed of common pitch, with a very small quantity of yellow wax and
some powdered cantharides, spread on sheep's-skin, should be placed over
the whole of the lumbar and sacral regions, extending half-way down the
thigh on either side. The bowels should be kept open by mild aperients,
in order that every source of irritation may be removed from the
intestinal canal. Some mild and general tonic will likewise be useful,
such as gentian and ginger.
The following is a very frequent and unexaggerated history
of distemper, when calomel has been given in too powerful doses:
August 30, 1828
. — A spaniel, six months old, has been ailing a
fortnight, and three doses of calomel have been given by the owner. He
has violent purging, with tenesmus and blood. Half an ounce of
caster-oil administered.
31st.
Astringents, morning, noon, and night.
Sept. 6.
The astringents have little effect, or, if the purging is
restrained one day, it returns with increased violence on the following
day. Getting rapidly thin. Begins to husk. Astringents continued.
10th.
The purging is at last overcome, but the huskiness has rapidly
increased, accompanied by laborious and hurried respiration. — Bleed to
the extent of three ounces.
11th.
The breathing relieved, but he obstinately refuses to eat, and
is forced several times in the day with arrow-root or strong soup.
18th.
He had become much thinner and weaker, and died in the evening.
No appearance of inflammation on the thoracic viscera, nor in any part
of the alimentary canal. The intestines are contracted through the whole
extent.
Veterinarian
, ii. 290.
Medico-Chirurgical Transitions
, 31st March, 1809.
Contents/Detailed Contents, p. 7/Index
Chapter XV — Other Common Canine Ailments
Small-pox
In 1809, there was observed, at the Royal Veterinary School at Lyons, an
eruptive malady among the dogs, to which they gave the name of
small-pox
. It appeared to be propagated from dog to dog by contagion.
It was not difficult of cure; and it quickly disappeared when no other
remedies were employed than mild aperients and diaphoretics. A sheep was
inoculated from one of these dogs. There was a slight eruption of
pustules formed on the place of inoculation, but nowhere else; nor was
there the least fever.
At another time, also, at the school at Lyons, a sheep died of the
regular sheep-pox. A part of the skin was fastened, during
four-and-twenty hours, on a healthy sheep, and the other part of it on a
dog, both of them being in apparent good health. No effect was produced
on the dog, but the sheep died of confluent sheep-pox.
The
essential symptoms
of small-pox in dogs succeed each other in the
following order: the skin of the belly, the groin, and the inside of the
fore arm, becomes of a redder colour than in its natural state, and
sprinkled with small red spots irregularly rounded. They are sometimes
isolated, sometimes clustered together. The near approach of this
eruption is announced by an increase of fever.
On the second day the spots are larger, and the integument is slightly
tumefied at the centre of each.
On the third day the spots are generally enlarged, and the skin is still
more prominent at the centre.
On the fourth day the summit of the tumour is yet more prominent.
Towards the end of that day, the redness of the centre begins to assume
a somewhat gray colour. On the following days, the pustules take on
their peculiar characteristic appearance, and cannot be confounded with
any other eruption, On the summit is a white circular point,
corresponding with a certain quantity of nearly transparent fluid which
it contains, and covered by a thin and transparent pellicle. This fluid
becomes less and less transparent, until it acquires the colour and
consistence of pus. The pustule, during its serous state, is of a
rounded form. It is flattened when the fluid acquires a purulent
character, and even slightly depressed towards the close of the period
of suppuration, and when that of desiccation is about to commence, which
ordinarily happens towards the ninth or tenth day of the eruption. The
desiccation and the desquamation occupy an exceedingly variable length
of time; and so, indeed, do all the different periods of the disease.
What is the least inconstant, is the duration of the serous eruption,
which is about four days, if it has been distinctly produced and guarded
from all friction. If the general character of the pustules is
considered, it will be observed, that, while some of them are in a state
of serous secretion, others will only have begun to appear.
The eruption terminates when desiccation commences in the first
pustules; and, if some red spots show themselves at that period of the
malady, they disappear without being followed by the development of
pustules. They are a species of abortive pustules. After the
desiccation, the skin remains covered by brown spots, which, by degrees,
die away. There remains no trace of the disease, except a few
superficial cicatrices on which the hair does not grow.
causes which produce the greatest variation in the periods of the
eruption are, the age of the dog, and the temperature of the situation
and of the season. The eruption runs through its different stages with
much more rapidity in dogs from one to five months old than in those of
greater age. I have never seen it in dogs more than eighteen months old.
An elevated temperature singularly favours the eruption, and also
renders it confluent and of a serous character. A cold atmosphere is
unfavourable to the eruption, or even prevents it altogether. Death is
almost constantly the result of the exposure of dogs having small-pox to
any considerable degree of cold. A moderate temperature is most
favourable to the recovery of the animal. A frequent renewal or change
of air, the temperature remaining nearly the same, is highly favourable
to the patient; consequently close boxes or kennels should be altogether
avoided.
have often observed, that the perspiration or breath of dogs labouring
under
variola
emits a very unpleasant odour. This smell is particularly
observed at the commencement of the desiccation of the pustules, and
when the animals are lying upon dry straw; for the friction of the bed
against the pustules destroys their pellicles, and permits the purulent
matter to escape; and the influence of this purulent matter is most
pernicious. The fever is increased, and also the unpleasant smell from
the mouth, and that of the fæces. In this state there is a disposition
which is rapidly developed in the lungs to assume the character of
pneumonia. This last complication is a most serious one, and almost
always terminates fatally. It has a peculiar character. It shows itself
suddenly, and with all its alarming symptoms. It is almost immediately
accompanied by a purulent secretion from the bronchi, and the second day
does not pass without the characters of pneumonia being completely
developed. The respiration is accompanied by a mucous
râle
which often
becomes sibilant. The nasal cavities are filled with a purulent fluid.
The dog that coughs violently at the commencement of the disease,
employs himself, probably, on the following day, in ejecting, by a
forcible expulsion from the nostrils, the purulent secretion which is
soon and plentifully developed. When he is lying quiet, and even when he
seems to be asleep, there is a loud, stertorous, guttural breathing.
Contents/Detailed Contents, p. 7/Index
Mange
The existence of certain insects found burrowing under the skin of the
human being, and of various tribes of animals, has been acknowledged
from the 12th century. In the 17th century, correct engravings of these
insects were produced. On the other hand many doubted their existence,
because it had not been their lot to see them. In 1812, Galés, a pupil
in the hospital of St. Louis, pretended to have found some of them. They
were put into the hands of M. Raspail, of Paris, who proved that they
were nothing more than the common cheese-mites; and substituted by Galés
for those seen by Bonomo.
Professor Hertwig, of Berlin, has given a graphic sketch of these
insects (
Veterinarian
, vol. xi. pp. 373, 489).
Mr. Holthouse states that,
"placed on the skin of a healthy individual, they excite a disease in the part to which they were confined, having all the characters of scabies; that insects taken from mangy sheep, horses, and dogs, and transplanted to healthy individuals of the same species, produce in them a disease analogous to that in the animals from which they were taken; and that there are too many well-attested cases on record to permit us to doubt of scabies having been communicated from animals to man.
may in some degree be considered as an hereditary disease. A mangy
dog is liable to produce mangy puppies, and the progeny of a mangy bitch
will certainly become affected sooner or later. In many cases a
propensity to the disease will be speedily produced. If the puppies are
numerous, and confined in close situations, the effluvia of their
transpiration and fæcal discharges will often be productive of mange
very difficult to be removed. Close confinement, salted food, and little
exercise, are frequent causes of mange.
The Scabby Mange
is a frequent form which this disease assumes. It
assumes a pustular and scabby form in the red mange, particularly in
white-haired dogs, when there is much and painful inflammation. A
peculiar eruption, termed
surfeit
, which resembles mange, is sometimes
the consequence of exposure to cold after a hot sultry day. Large
blotches appear, from which the hair falls and leaves the skin bare and
rough. Acute mange sometimes takes on the character of erysipelas; at
other times there is considerable inflammation. The animal exhibits heat
and restlessness, and ulcerations of different kinds appear in various
parts, superficial but extensive.
, aperient and cooling
medicines are indicated, and also applications of the subacetate of
lead, or spermaceti ointment. A weak infusion of tobacco may be resorted
to when other things fail, but it must be used with much caution. The
same may be said of all mercurial preparations. The tanner's pit has
little efficacy, except in slight cases. Slight bleedings may be
serviceable, and especially in full habits; setons may be resorted to in
obstinate cases. A change in the mode of feeding will often be useful.
Mild purgatives, and especially Epsom salts, are often beneficial, and
also mercurial alternatives, as Æthiop's mineral with cream of tartar
and nitre. The external applications require considerable caution. If
mercury is used, care must be taken that the dog does not lick it. The
diarrhœa produced by mercury often has a fatal effect.
are useful, but considerable care must be taken in their
application. They must be applied to the actual skin, not over the hair.
In old and bad cases much time and patience will be requisite. Mr.
had a favourite setter who had virulent mange five years. He was
ordered to be dressed every day, or every second day, before the disease
was complete conquered.
Cutaneous affections have lately been prevalent to an extent altogether
unprecedented on this and on the other side of the channel. In the
latter part of 1843 the disease assumed a character which had not been
known among us for many years. The common mange, which we used to think
we could easily grapple with, was now little seen: even the usual red
mange with the fox-coloured stain was not of more frequent occurrence
than usual, but an intolerable itchiness with comparatively little
redness of skin, and rarely sufficient to account for the torture which
the animal seemed to endure, and often with not the slightest
discoloration of the integument, came before us almost every day, and
under its influence the dog became ill-tempered, dispirited, and
emaciated, until he sunk under its influence. All unguents were thrown
away here. Lotions of corrosive sublimate, decoction of bark, infusion
of digitalis or tobacco, effected some little good; but the persevering
use of the iodide of potassium, purgatives, and the abstraction of blood
very generally succeeded.