"She could swallow fresh currants with less resistance than anything else, taking care that they were perfectly dry. Her mind had till now been quite calm and composed, and her conversation and behaviour proper during the intervals of the convulsive attacks. Fifteen grains of urgentum nitratum had been given without any sensible effect. The fits and the irritability to external objects increased; the pain shot from the back of the neck round the angles of the jaw, the chin, and throat. At length the paroxysms became more frequent, and, indeed, might be said to come on spontaneously; seven occurred in one hour. She looked pale and exhausted, and a tremor and blueness of the lips and fingers were observable; her pulse became weaker and more rapid, and her scalp so tender that touching it brought on the convulsions. She had latterly eructations of wind and spat up some thick, viscid fluid; her urine now came away involuntarily, and she became more irritable and uncontrollable. Indeed, she passed two hours in almost constant convulsions; became extremely irritable and impatient of everything about her; complained of failure of sight; wished to be bled to death; her words were fewer and interrupted; she struck and threat ened to bite her attendants. She had copious eructations of air; discharged an increased quantity of saliva with much convulsive effort; said the affection of her throat and stomach had quite left her, and continued in a general perspiration with a weak pulse from 140 to 150. She afterwards bit some of the attendants, and was therefore confined in a waistcoat. From this period she lost all control over her mind, and continued for almost four hours in a paroxysm of furious insanity. She now swallowed with an effort near half a pint of water, but this was in a few seconds vomited up, with some mucus and a greenish fluid. In this violent raving state she continued till within two hours of her death, which took place forty-seven hours after the first marked occurrence of hydrophobia. In the course of the case she swallowed once or twice a little porter, and also some cinnamon-water with tincture of opium, but they were always vomited up."

Now it is by no means uncommon for a period to occur when the horror of liquids undergoes a considerable diminution, or even entirely ceases, the patient quenching his thirst, and this sometimes as well as if he were in perfect health, and so as to raise doubts of the existence of rabies. But after a few hours the dread of fluids is renewed again, and with it the convulsive paroxysms, which now become general, violent, and incessant.

Dr. Cayol attended a girl labouring under rabies who was never affected with any very great dread of liquids, nor an absolute inability to swallow them, although she certainly disliked them, and swallowed them with difficulty. In fact, patients are sometimes seen who can swallow wine or broth, although their aversion to water is beyond all control, while other patients can often look at a liquid in a black pot without inconvenience, though any fluid offered to them in a glass will bring on a violent paroxysm of spasm and sense of suffo-cation. The sight of tears has even been enough to excite and bring on the attack.

Another aspect of the question has sometimes been entertained, namely, whether rabies can ever exist quite unattended throughout its course with a dread of liquids? The possibility of such a case was believed by Mead and others, and an instance is recorded by Mignot in which the patient died without having manifested any sign of hydrophobia. However, it is asserted that a careful perusal of this case must produce a conviction that the disorder was not rabies, and it is added that when the histories of this disease on record are critically investigated, none will he found complete which do not make mention of a more or less decided aversion to fluids. It also appears from facts referred to that the dread of liquids does not depend upon the pain which the patient has already suffered from his attempts to drink, as it sometimes occurs before any such attempt has been actually made.

The reader will recollect that an inclination to bite was evinced in the case described by Dr. Powell. Yet this disposition is far from being usual; in fact, it never presented itself among any of the cases that were studied by Drs. Vaughan, Desault, and others. And even when the patient's imagination is so disordered that he cannot help biting, he commonly warns the bystanders to avoid the danger.

Again, the frothy slaver, which is voided with considerable and repeated efforts, is a symptom which is said not to commence before the respiration begins to he convulsive. As the disease advances there is no remission of the sputation necessary to clear the throat of this viscous secretion, and at the approach of death, when it cannot bo expelled, it collects in the mouth and covers the patient's lips.

The symptoms of what is termed cerebral excitement become stronger and more marked in the second stage of the disease. The eyes, the brightness of which is still further increased, appear as it were inflamed; the patient never shuts them again, and as the daylight and brilliant colours are offensive, he prefers darkness.

The hearing becomes very acute, and, as well as the sight, is troubled with hallucinations. The touch is extremely fine, the speech abrupt and rapid, and the conversation energetic, and often expressive of the most touching sentiments.

Dr. Marshall made a very just distinction between the real convulsions which come on towards the termination of the case in death, and the strong, sudden action of the muscles excited in the course of the disorder by light, the sight of liquids, and the feel of the air. Convulsions and hiccough, in fact, are the symptoms of dissolution.

Delirium is far from being a constant symptom, and only happens the last day of the disorder; neither is it always with out remissions, for the patients affected with it sometimes give rational replies. Therefore every case on record where delirium is described as being one of the first symptoms, or as coming on with the dread of liquids, is set down on good authority not as true rabies, but as symptomatic hydrophobia attended with mania.