DOG BITES AND SNAKE BITES
Dogs, cats, rats, or mice bite at any time of the year, and provision should always be made for ample protection against such accidents.
Such a wound should always be squeezed or sucked until it has bled freely, and then be cauterized by a red-hot iron or touched with an applicator that has been dipped in sulphuric acid or nitric acid. A subsequent dressing of Balsam Peru is healing. The dog should be watched, and if it shows signs of hydrophobia the bitten child should be promptly taken to the nearest Pasteur Institute for treatment.
In the case of snake bites the same sucking and cauterizing treatment is indicated, with the additional tying of a handkerchief or cord a few inches above the wound to stay the progress of the blood and to keep the poison out of the general circulation. A solution of twenty-per-cent permanganate of potash should be used to wash the wound.
The popular administration of large draughts of whiskey is of no benefit, for the secondary depressant effect of alcohol increases the body's poison burden, and those who survive do so in spite of the whiskey, and not because of it.