Never shut her up in a room all night, but let her have free access to kitchen or attic; you will thus have a healthy, cleanly puss, and never be troubled with mice.
The simplest form of medicine for a cat, and one which either in town or country they should never want, is grass. It is an excellent anti-scorbutic, keeps pussy’s blood pure, and acts always as a gentle laxative, and at times as an emetic, according to the quantity taken, and of this pussy herself is the best judge. In the country, a cat can always find grass for herself, but in the town it ought to be given to her. People who are cat-fanciers, should never take a walk into the country, without culling a bunch of nice fresh grass for pussy. When you go home, the best place to keep it will be the cellar, or lumber-room, to which pussy has access, held fast by the ends between two flat stones or bricks, a bit of wetted flannel being placed beneath the upper stone to keep the grass fresh; and the cat will soon know where to go when she finds the need for it.
Although good and regular food, with proper attention, will generally succeed in keeping your cats healthy, still these animals have many troubles which call for medical aid. I give a very few of the commonest, with the treatment appropriate for each.
Diarrhœa. This, for obvious reasons, is a very troublesome complaint in a cat. It is generally induced by irregular feeding, or exposure to wet and cold. Fat meat will also bring it on, or too much liver. It very soon reduces the creature to a mere skeleton, and if not attended to, will end in dysentery and death. Begin the treatment by giving the little patient half a small teaspoonful of castor-oil. Give a still smaller dose about six hours after, to which two drops of laudanum or solution of muriate of morphiæ has been added. Afterwards give, three times a day, either a little chalk mixture, with half a drop of laudanum in each dose, or a teaspoonful of the following mixture:—
| ℞ | Vin. Ipecac. | ℨ j. | |
| Tinct. Kino | ℨ iij. | ||
| Decoct. Hæmatox | ℥ iv. |
Give no flesh diet; you may give the cat fish, however, in small quantities, and arrowroot with bread and milk. A few drops of solution of lime may be added to each diet with advantage.
In diarrhœa, and in all cases of severe illness, the cat should be turned into an empty room, with a little fire, a warm bed and a box of earth or sand.
To give a cat medicine. Roll her all but the head in a sheet, and get some one to hold her. Do not alarm her if possible—mind your fingers—and pour the medicine little by little down her throat. If a pill or bolus, dip it in oil, and put it well down and against the roof of her mouth.
Chronic inflammation of the stomach. This is a frequent disease among cats. It often follows the administration of poison—supposing the cat to have escaped immediate death. She refuses nearly all food, has frequent attacks of vomiting, gets thin and altogether unhealthy-looking, without any apparent cause. In these cases, I generally recommend the trisnitrate of bismuth, about a grain, to be placed on the tongue twice a day. Occasional doses of castor-oil or tincture of rhubarb, with milk diet and fish, and, if there be much wasting, raw beef may be given twice a day.
Bronchitis.—Cats are very subject to this complaint, as they are very liable to catch cold, especially if much exposed. It begins with the symptoms of a common cold, such as staring coat, shivering, and slight cough. Then the cat becomes very ill, for a day or two, with the acute stage of the trouble, which, however, soon passes into the chronic form. There is now apparent difficulty of breathing, the cat is constantly coughing, with the tongue hanging over the lower lip; she has an anxious expression about her face, and the eyes water and are mattery. She gets rapidly thinner, and moons about, refusing all food, or at times eating voraciously, and with depraved appetite.