Year: 1876

| A Sad Case of Hydrophobia-Danger RuI

 by All who Own Dogs.

 Once more there is the public alarn about hydrophobia which is sure to re cur with the return of warm weather We admit that the recent instance il Newark, N. J., is painful one. Sev eral members of family were bitten { few weeks ago by a favorite dog. One of them, girl of twelve, died with al the symptoms usually believed to indi cate canine madness. The wounds oi the others have been cauterized, but 0, course their anxiety must be great. The animal being secured in his kennel was found dead. It is with great reluctance that physicians have admitted the ex istence of such disease as hydrophobia at all; but we fear that facts are toe strong to authorize much skeptcism. Too many deaths have occurred exhibit. ing identical symptoms, following the bites ot dogs unequivocally afflicted in the same way. At the same time, our knowledge of the real nature of the dis ease is far from precise or unsatisfac. tory. There seemsto be no fixed period intervening between the bite of the dog and the disorder of the patient. Of two persons bitten by the same dog at the same time, one may die and the other l escape. Sometimes cautery is followed by immunity and sometimes it is not. Sometimes the disease may appear to yield to medical treatment other than mechanical, yet even in such cases there has been no uniformity of practice. All this undoubtedly adds to the terror with which hydrophobia is popularly re- garded. A resort to cautery is shown by experience to be safest. This, how ever, must not be delayed. In all those cases in which it is supposed to have been efectual, it was at once employed after the wound. In Newark it was not tried at all upon the deceased, though the other members of the family bitten have since submitted to it. We think it may be laid down as @ rule, that if there be such disease as hydrophobia, eau tery is the only treatment promising safety; and therefore, since it is impos- sible to determine whether the dog is mad or not, every person bitten by that animal should cause the wound to be cauterized with the least possible delay. So we'll is this understood that those whose business requires them to handle many dogs always carry the caustic with them It ady for any emergency. Veter- mary surgeons claim that they have fre- quently been bitten by dogs unmistaka- ply mad, and have escaped all i'll conse- quences through this precaution.

 The annual massacre of dogs dimin- ishes the number of cases of hydropho- bia by diminishing the number of animals by whom it may be communicated to man. Still, experience shows that it is not alone the vagrant, homeless, ill treated dog that is likely to go mad, for the pets of the parlor and the kennel are equally exposed to the disease. It is not whether it is self-originating or whether it can be communicated only by inoculation, but it is known that the animals most tenderly cared for may at any time be afflicted by it. Those who find Tray, Blanche and Sweetheart necessary to their comfort must run the risk. It must be admitted that this is small. Even among dogs the disease is an extremely rare one; and many a dog goes mad and dies without biting the human subject. The statistics of hydro phobia need occasion no more panic than those of persons killed by light ming. Those who do not keep dogs are almost as likely to be bitten as those who do; and as we shall hardly be rid of tho creatures altogether, we must take our chance of this curious disease, and trust in this case, as in 80 many other matters, to benevolent Provi- dence.-NeW Fork Tribune.