Page:Willich, A. F. M. - The Domestic Encyclopædia (Vol. 1, 1802).djvu/301

271&#93; BIT a burning heat in the throat and in- jured part, according to the degree of violence with which the malady is accompanied. But the proximate cause of the affection appears to be confined to the nervous system, unconnected with any other disor- der ; so that patients, labouring under the influence of hydropho- bia, have overcome the small pox, and quartan agues, without any aggravation of symptoms. Hence opiates, and other narcotics, as is the case in many nervous diseases, produce no effect. As it is gene- rally allowed, that canine madness, if the dread of water has once taken place, can seldom be cured, the most essential part of the treatment will be the speedy application of preventives. For this reason, we have already stated the immediate necessity of cutting away the parts contiguous to the wound, especially where that operation can be per- formed, without injuring any large blood-vessel. Beside this precau- tion, the wound should be fre- quently washed, by pouring cold water upon it from a considerable height ; and to prevent the canine virus from remaining about the wounded part, it should be kept open, and a discharge of matter promoted for several weeks ; by sti- mulating ointments, mixed with cantharides, or similar applications. Among other means of destroy- ing the contagious matter at the part, both the aclual cautery, and burning with gunpowder, have been occasionally employed ; as fire is one of the most powerful agents. Others have washed the affected place with vinegar, or caustic al- kali properly diluted ; the latter of which has been found more effec- tual. Bathing in sea-water, as well as BI T [271 drinking it, have been prescribed as preventives.. — Dr. Mead, in his treatise on this subject, asserts, that the greatest success has been obtained from diuretics, and conse- quently directs the following pow- der: Take ash-coloured ground- liverwort, half an ounce ; black pepper two drams: reduce them separately to powder, then mix them together, and divide the whole into four doses, one of which must be taken every morn- ing, fasting, for four days succes- sively, in half a pint of warm cows-milk. The famous East India specific is composed of twenty-four grains of native, and an equal proportion of factitious cinnabar pulverized, with sixteen grains of musk, and taken in a glass of arrack, or brandy. It is esteemed a great antispasmodic, and an infallible remedy for preventing the effe&s of the canine virus. Mercury has been recommended as an efficacious preventive, when applied to the wound by friction, and taken inwardly in the form of calomel, to raise, if possible, a slight salivation. At the same time, venesection, opium, the bark, and camphor, have successively been administered in large quan- tities j the warm bath ; and every remedy that human invention could suggest. M. Sab ati er mentions an instance in which, by repeated attacks of a mad dog, the patient had received twenty-five wounds, and above fifty scratches: these were all radically healed, by. the application of the cautery, and of fire, which completely destroyed the poison. As no specific remedy has yet been discovered for the cure of this dreadful disorder, we shall surest