The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-11-04 00:00:00

DISTRESSING CASE OF
.11YDROPHOBIA

• (Thom the Macclesfield Courier of Saturday.)
It is our duty
.t.) relate,a ninst distressing case of that:most
awful maladysto.which human nature is subject, hydrophobia,
which has occurred in this neighbourhood duringthe present
week.

On Monday last a.son of Mr. Priestnall, a respectable.far-
mer at Butley, near this town, about 13 years of age, a fine
healthy boy, was taken ill at. school with.ageneral fever and
diffiearty of swallowing. On his return home in the evening,
his parents engaged the attendance of Mr. Nightingale, of
Wihnslow, surgeon, being
hat.no apprehensions of hydrophobia
entertained, the case was treated as one of hysterta,..until the
following, morning, when Mr Bland, of Macclesfield, also saw
the boy, and the'symploms were then such as to leave no doubt
op his mind that the patient was ..labonring under a decided
attack of hydrophobia The 1,,:y was able
.to swallow, but not
without gr.eat effort.;
,be compl:,ined of much confusion. in his
head, and after taking any fluid, his eyes became glaring and
very prominent, with an appearance of obliquity c)f vision. A
large number of leeche's were immediately applied at the back.
of the neck, and slight opiates
.administered. Ia the evening
he expressed himself greatly relieved try this treatment, but th.e
.difficulty of swalloWing had.beeome iuereased; and.the slight-
est noise or app arapce:of water, or the approach of a .candle,
near hint, threw him into dreadful convulsions ; he.became
gradually worse during the night, and in his conscious inter-
vals he frequently requested his parents, who attended him with
the utmost anxiety, and whose agonized feelings-cannot be de-
scribed, and the.other persons who came near his •berl, not to
appioach,too pear him, least he might bite them, .almostim-
mediately afterwards attempting to do.so, during the paroxysms.
of his dreadful malady. On the following morning he was.
visited by Mr. Nightingale, Mr. Fleet, Mr. Lallemand, and
Mr. Bland; who, in consultation, deemed the case ntterly
yond-the reach of medidal skill, the poor boy remaining in a
state of almost uninterrupted convillsions accompanied with
violent struggling, requiring the united efforts of several per-
sons to restrain Jiim from doing.injory to himself or those about
him; the'saliva issuing front 'his mouth in considerable quan-
tities. He continued in this deplorable state until the after-
noon of Wednesday, when (lead' terminated the excruciating
agonies which the poor-boy endured, in about 48 hours from his
first attack.

The cause • which led to this melancholy, and to those who
witnessed the case most heartrending event, was-simply, we
are informed, as follows :—About four months ago young
Priestnall, in his rambles in the country, tnet a strange dog'
near a brook, and with boy-like -mischief endeavoured to force.
the dog into the water; it however turned upon him and bit him ;
-very slightly (a mere scratch ) on the back of his left hand, but
the wound was so trifling, that he did nut make the occurrence
known at the time. The dog •was, however, soon afterwards
seen by other persons; and suspicious of its being in a state of,
madness arising, it was pursued and killed near Dean-row. It
would appear that the poor boy had afterwards some apprehen-
sionsof danger, from the circumstance that on seeing a book,
at school that treated on the subject of canine madness, he paid •
much attention to it, and, in the interval of his convulsions. he
inquired from the medical gentlemen whether excision of the
part, or the amputation of his limb, would not be desirable,
adding, that he had read of it in a book at school. The fatal
virus had however been then too deeply imbibed in the system
to allow the possibility-of success from the remedy the poor boy
suggested. Whilst yet the deadly malady was working its fatal
progress, there were intervals of consciousness. On one occa-
sion, when he heard it incidentally mentioned that the eight
was very fine and light, and the moon at the full, he started- up
nmrexclaiMed, "Ah, people go mad at the full of the moon,"
and was instantly seized with violent convulsions,
The melancholy event has occasioned a considerable sensa-
tion in the neighbourhood of its occurrence, as much sympathy
is atauifested•towards the distressed parents.