canine madness; and, finally, that violent alternations of heat and cold, and all other causes which induce great debility, and, at the same time, increase the irritability of the system, have, at times, proved adequate to the production of symptoms exactly corresponding with those of rabies canina."-p. 280. It must, however, after all, be confessed, that this subject is still involved in great obscurity, and that it is extremely difficult, from all the vague evidence we possess, to assign limits to the operation of a virus, such as that of the mad dog, which does confessedly lie dormant in the system for a long uncertain period, from a few days to twelve months or more. On the other hand, there is no doubt that symptoms, exactly resembling those of genuine rabies canina, have arisen in the human body from other causes. And surely causes more equal to the production of the disease can scarcely be conceived, than those which operated in the case of Lindsay. "When I reflect," says Dr Bardsley, "that we have no authentic testimony of the canine poison lying dormant more than twenty months. at farthest; that hydrophobia, with all the pathognomonic symptoms of rabies canina, has been produced by other occasional causes than the infection of a rabid animal, and also, that notwithstanding a person should have been really exposed to the canine poison, the chances are greatly in favour of his not being infected, I am compelled to conclude, that this patient fell a victim to other causes than the poison of any rabid animal. Nor do I conceive that the effects detailed in this case are disproportionate to the power of the supposed causes. We ought to consider the melancholic temperament of this patient, so much predisposed to mental and corporeal irritation-the weight of his affliction at the heartrending prospect of his family's distress-his unremitted, but ineffectual efforts to remove these calamities-and the scanty portion of sustenance he allotted to himself during this almost unexampled struggle of strenu. ous exertion against famine, debt, and despair? Add to these circumstances, the effects of imagination in aggravating the violence of the disease. For although the patient's dread of liquids did not arise from this cause, as he felt a difficulty in swallowing them previous to being im pressed with a remembrance of his having been bitten by a supposed mad dog; yet the moment this idea took possession of his mind, he consider. ed his recovery as hopeless. The image of the dog haunted his imagination with perpetual terrors; and the expectation of a violent death, by being smothered (a vulgar and unjust persuasion too often entertained) would not a little tend to increase the nervous irritation already excited.". p. 289-290. The plan, however, for extirpating canine madness from this kingdom, is founded on the opinion, that, in dogs at least, the disease never rises spontaneously. The proofs of this opinion are deduced by Dr Bardsley from a cursory examination of the supposed causes of spontaneous hydrophobia in that animal. The causes causes which have been alleged to favour the spontaneous origin of the disease, are putrid aliment,-climate,-deficiency of water,-want of perspiration; and worm under the tongue. The two last are altogether fanciful. As to putrid aliment, it is remarked, that hounds are fed, for the most part, on horse flesh and other carrion, often putrid, and yet escape the disease; and that, in countries where canine madness is unknown, as at the Cape, and in the interior, amongst the Caffres, the dogs almost entirely feed upon putrid animal flesh. Against the influence of climate, it is argued, that the disease is peculiar to none; that it occurs equally in the coldest and hottest climates and seasons; and that, in some of the hottest regions of the earth, as in South America, Syria, and Egypt, it is totally unknown. Nor does deficiency of water appear more connected with it: in Antigua, from the want of springs, water is less accessible to dogs than in almost any other spot on the globe, yet there canine madness never prevails; and in the parched desarts of southern Africa, dogs often suffer dreadfully from want of water, but rabies is never found to be the result of this privation. These remote causes, then, being insufficient to account for the origin of the disease amongst dogs, it may be inferred, that the disease is propagated, by infection only, from one dog to another. Accordingly, those sportsmen who have been scrupulously attentive to the common rules of medical police, have preserved their dogs from the disease. Mr Meynell preserved, for many years, his kennel from madness, by making every hound perform quaran tine before he was allowed to join the pack. The proposal, then, of Dr Bardsley is: "An universal quarantine for dogs within the kingdom, and a total prohibition of the importation of these animals during the existence of such quarantine. "The efficacy of this preventive scheme rests upon the validity of the following propositions: "1st. That the disease always originates in the canine species. "2d. That it never arises, even in them, spontaneously. "3d. That the contagion, when received by them, never remains latent more than a few months." However probable these propositions may appear, from all that has been urged by our author, they are far from being clearly demonstrated. They are, therefore, with equal modesty and propriety, again stated in the form of queries, addressed to professional men, and he solicits answers from those who have directed their attention to the general subject. In compliance with Dr Bardsley's request, and in return for the information he has given us, we shall here, and we trust not im 4 properly, properly, insert a very concise account of three singular cases which we lately met with in a miscellaneous volume, probably little known to medical readers in this country, "Opere del Consigliere, Gian Lodovico Bianconi. Tomo 11do. 8vo. Milano, 1802." Dr Lupacchini, physician at Aquila, in Abruzzo, was bitten on the ancle by his own dog. He did not believe it to be mad, as it afterwards eat and drank, but it was killed contrary to his will, the same day, by some other persons whom it attacked. A year afterwards, he felt an unusual torpor in the limb, which continued two months, when he perceived a slight difficulty in swallowing fluids. This was on a Sunday; the symptoms gradually increased and he died on the Friday. He was not affected by the sight of fluids, but could never swallow a drop, and suffered extremely from cold air and the sight of splendid bodies. He had a great desire to bite, and the cicatrices of the wounds did not open, or undergo any change, before or during the progress of his disease. A monk, 70 years of age, was bitten by a dog which did not bark. Two years after, he felt a difficulty in swallowing, and died in three days, with symptoms very much resembling hydrophobia. The third case is remarkable, as it shews the effect of the imagination in exciting the disease. A dog bit five persons, one of these a lady, who was persuaded the dog was not mad, experienced no bad consequences, until two months afterwards, when a gossiping visitor congratulated her on her escape, as the others had all died eight or ten days after they were bitten. She was immediately depressed, complained of severe pain in her wounded arm, and in two days died rabid. For the doubts and reflections of the intelligent and sceptical author, to which these cases have given rise, we must refer to the work itself. VII. A Treatise on the Diseases which are incident to Sheep in Scotland; drawn up from Original Communications presented to the Highland Society. By ANDREW DUNCAN, Jun. M. D. F. R. S. Ed. &c. From the Transactions of the Highland Society. Edinburgh, 1807. OUR UR readersmay perhaps remember, that we gave them a short account of an essay on the disease called the rot in sheep, in one of our early numbers; and we concluded our remarks with expressing expressing a hope, that some agricultural society would take up this subject. At that time we did not know that the Highland Society, in the year of 1803, with the laudable view of collecting information relative to a most important national object, offered a gold medal, or piece of plate of forty guineas value, to the author of the best essay on the accidents and disorders to which sheep are liable. As a proof how widely extended is the spirit of enlightened observation among farmers and breeders in the northern part of our island, no less than ten essays of considerable length, besides shorter communications, were transmitted to the Society; and although no one was deemed so complete or superior to the rest as to be worthy of the prize, yet each of them received some mark of approbation; and they were all put into Dr Duncan's hands, to select and arrange the most original and valuable information into one general treatise, to be printed in the Society's transactions. Thus is the condensed body of sheep-farming knowledge now sent into the world, with the corrections of an intelligent and candid editor. He tells us, he has not inserted a single fact or observation which does not rest on the authority of one or more of the essays submitted to his revision, and he has endeavoured to omit none of their statements by which the knowledge of the diseases of sheep might be increased, and the means of preventing them rendered more perfect. We wish, indeed, that, among other corrections, the editor had made some attempt to reconcile the apparent contradictions in some of the accounts of the diseases, that the remarks of one writer might not have been invalidated by the opposite assertions of another; but to mean well is a degree of merit which overbalance much greater errors than inconsistency in a work composed of such different materials; and, in the present imperfect state of our knowledge, a diversity of opinion. may lead to the discovery of truth. In our review of Dr Harrison's essay, we have already given some hints respecting the causes of the rot, and we pointed out several disorders which go under that name. Those opinions have received additional confirmation, though no new light, from reading the different descriptions here detailed. We shall now endeavour to follow the writers through all their observations on this interesting quesion. The editor begins by stating to the farmer the importance of being able to distinguish sheep tainted with the rot, however slightly, as soon as they are affected, because they never recover perfectly, and, in the early stages of the disease, they fatten as quickly as healthy sheep. Rules for determining the soundness of sheep, when the stock is drawn at Martinmas, are then given, from the words of experienced shepherds. shepherds. The symptoms of the disease are next described and then the appearances on dissection. "If opened soon after it is dead, a sheep which dies of the rot emits very little smell. Upon taking off the skin, which is unusually tender, the fell, as it is called, is entirely white, and the whole carcase has a dull white or leaden colour. In the belly, water is sometimes found. The liver, and especially its concave side, is always enlarged, sometimes to a very extraordinary size, and, instead of its healthy red colour, is of a livid dun, variegated with many white spots. These correspond with indurated portions of its substance, which are the more easily felt, as the other parts are soft and spongy; or it appears as if interlarded with layers of sand. Both upon the outside of the liver, and in its ducts, are generally found great numbers of an ugly flat insect, having some resemblance, in their shape, to flounders or flukes, (faciolae hepatice). These are not, however, peculiar to this disease, as they are found, though very few and very small, in most aged sheep, and as in some rotten sheep they do not exist. When the liver is very rotten, it is also studded with hydatids or globules of water, which are likewise found adhering to the lungs, and among the tallow. Besides, the liver does not stiffen when boiled, and is said, by Mr W. Hog, to become very quickly putrid. The small intestines are blackish and tender, as if they were rotten, and will scarcely bear handling, and the lacteal glands, or clyars, as they are called, are always swelled and hard. "The lungs are likewise swelled to a greater size, and assume a whiter colour, and are often streaked on the outside with white, and under these streaks are to be found hard substances like cartilage or even bones. "Mr Stevenson is more particular in his description. In the rot, the lungs are the principal seat of the affection; and, on opening the body, they are found sometimes almost destroyed. In the whole of their cellular substance, there are a number of white round knobs, of a larger or lesser size, which, in the parts most affected, are found swelled into a bag, which is filled with white and pure matter. Some of them are very large, and the side of the lungs in which they exist is quite destroyed, and a membranous bag left in their place, full of matter, of a thinnish appear. ance, which is at times coughed up. Hence arises the difficulty of breathing. "When these swelled parts, or tubercles, as they have been cal led, are in the lungs, the latter generally adhere to the side of the ribs, which they do not do in a natural state. These tubercles I have seen in lambs, scattered through the substance of the lungs like so many pin-heads. In general, the left side of the lungs, or that in which the heart lies, is most affected in rot. The lungs are found at times considerably swelled, and a collection of water around them. This is only, however, towards the beginning of the dis ease.' "The mutton of rotten sheep does not stiffen when cold, but re |