these affections of the mucous membranes, it is absolutely necessary to avoid or to get rid of every source of irritation, and worms will generally be found a very considerable one in young dogs. If we can speedily get rid of them, distemper will often rapidly disappear; but, if they are suffered to remain, diarrhœa or fits are apt to supervene: therefore some worm medicine should be administered.
I have said that vomiting is very easily excited in the dog; and that for this reason we are precluded from the use of a great many medicines in our treatment of him. Calomel, aloes, jalap, scammony, and gamboge will generally produce sickness.
are, therefore, driven to some mechanical vermifuge; and a very effectual one, and that will rarely fail of expelling even the tape-worm, is tin filings or powdered glass. From half a drachm to a drachm of either may be advantageously given twice in the day. There may generally be added to them digitalis, James's powder, and nitre, made into balls with palm oil and a little linseed meal. This course should be pursued in usual cases until two or three emetics have been given, and a ball morning and night on the intermediate days. Should the huskiness not diminish after the first two or three days, if the dog has not rapidly lost flesh, I should be disposed to take a little more blood, and to put a seton in the poll. It should be inserted between the ears, and reaching from ear to ear.
When there is fever and huskiness, and the dog is not much emaciated, a seton is an excellent remedy; but, if it is used indiscriminately, and when the animal is already losing ground, and is violently purging, we shall only hasten his doom, or rather make it more sure.
It is now, if ever, that pneumonia will be perceived. The symptoms of inflammation in the lungs of the dog can scarcely be mistaken. The quick and laborious breathing, the disinclination or inability to lie down, the elevated position of the head, and the projection of the muzzle, will clearly mark it. More blood must be subtracted, a seton inserted, the bowels opened with Epsom salts, and the digitalis, nitre, and James's powder given more frequently and in larger doses than before.
Little aid is to be derived from observation of the pulse of the dog; it differs materially in the breed, and size, and age of the animal. Many years' practice have failed in enabling me to draw any certain conclusion from it. The best place to feel the pulse of the dog is at the side. We may possibly learn from it whether digitalis is producing an intermittent pulse, which it frequently will do, and which we wish that it should do: it should then be given a little more cautiously, and in smaller quantities.
If the pneumonia is evidently conquered, or we have proceeded thus far without any considerable inflammatory affection of the chest, we must begin to change our plan of treatment. If the huskiness continues, and the discharge from the nose is increased and thicker, and the animal is losing flesh and becoming weak, we must give only half the quantity of the sedative and diuretic medicine, and add some mild tonic, as gentian, chamomile, and ginger, with occasional emetics, taking care to keep the bowels in a laxative but not purging state. The dog should likewise be urged to eat; and, if he obstinately refuses ail food, he should be forced with strong beef jelly, for a very great degree of debility will now ensue
We have thus far considered the treatment of distemper from its commencement; but it may have existed several days before we were consulted, and the dog may be thin and husky, and refusing to eat. In such case we should give an emetic, and then a dose of salts, and after that proceed to the tonic and fever balls.
Should the strength of the animal continue to decline, and the discharge from the nose become purulent and offensive, the fever medicine must be omitted, and the tonic balls, with carbonate of iron, administered. Some veterinary surgeons are very fond of gum resins and balsams. Mr.