“Take native and factitious cinnabar, of each twenty-four grains, musk sixteen grains. Let these be made into a fine powder, and taken in a glass of arrack or brandy.”
This single dose is said to secure the person for thirty days, at the end of which it must be repeated; but if he has any symptoms of the disease, it must be repeated in three hours.
The following is likewise reckoned a good antispasmodic medicine:
“Take of Virginian snake-root in powder, half a drachm, gum asafœtida twelve grains, gum camphire seven grains; make these into a bolus with a little syrup of saffron.”
Camphire may also be given in the following manner:
“Take purified nitre half an ounce, Virginian snake-root in powder two drachms, camphire one drachm; rub them together in a mortar, and divide the whole into ten doses.”
Mercury is likewise recommended as of great efficacy, both in the prevention and cure of this kind of madness. When used as a preventive, it will be sufficient to rub daily a drachm of the ointment into the parts about the wound.
Vinegar is likewise of considerable service, and should be taken freely, either in the patient’s food or drink.
These are the principal medicines recommended for preventing the effects of the bite of a mad dog. We would not however advise people to trust to any one of them; but from a proper combination of their different powers, there is the greatest reason to hope for success.
The great error in the use of these medicines lies in not taking them for a sufficient length of time. They are used more like charms, than medicines intended to produce any change in the body. To this, and not to the insufficiency of the medicines, we must impute their frequent want of success.