"There is danger of blood poisoning as a result of any animal's bite; and there is lock-jaw as the extreme effect of blood poisoning. But the men who have been longest in charge of dogs agree that there is no rabid condition when a bite is more dangerous than at any other time; and that a dog's bite at any time is no more dangerous than the scratch of a cat.

"It does seem that they ought to know. For the sake of humanity's peace of mind the doctors should find out whether the experience of men who have been bitten dozens of times is worth anything."

Harry W. Lacy recently wrote in the American Stockkeeper on this subject: "One would think that a man having intelligence enough to write editorials on a leading daily paper would inform himself sufficiently on the subject not to make such a foolish statement as that muzzling dogs was a sure way to produce hydrophobia, but this is what a Boston Standard editorial said last week. Probably there is no subject about which the average newspaper writer gets off more tommy rot than hydrophobia and mad dog scares.

"These hydrophobia scares are mainly due to the sensational imagination of the reporter who plays upon the nervousness of a public only too ready to shy a stone at dog, and then when the scare has assumed suitable proportions and a muzzling order goes forth, these writers are again the first to question its advisability and play on the feeling of their readers who may own dogs, with the nonsensical statement alluded to above.

"The very rare disease called hydrophobia can only be produced through inoculation with the rabial virus, and a dog might mear a muzzle to the end of his natural life, and unless he was actually bitten by a rabid dog he would be none the worse, though, according to his temperament, the incubus might make him bad tempered, irritable, and so excite his nervous temperament as to send him into a fit wherein he would probably display some of those symptoms of rabies popularly, but erroneously, associated with hydrophobia.

"If such a thing as hydrophobia really exists in a locality there is no surer method to stamp it out than a general muzzling order strictly enforced. The reason is obvious. This may entail hardship on individual dogs, but the good of the others and the community at large demands it.

"Speaking of hydrophobia scares we do not hesitate to say that the Pasteur Institute in New York has done more to keep alive an unhealthy state of public mind in regard to the disease than any other agency. The advent of new patients is heralded throughout the country, and patients from distant states are treated on the supposition that they have been bitten by mad dogs, but rarely is it proved that the dogs were really rabid. Still they undergo the treatment, and Dr. Gibier claims credit for subsequent immunity."

Here are the ideas of Dr. H. Clay Glover, of New York City, one of the highest authorities on canine diseases that we have in America:

Dr. H. Clay Glover, interviewed on the muzzling question by a New York Herald man, was asked why the muzzle was unnecessary. "Because," said Dr. Glover, "it is of no possible benefit either to the dog or public. The mad dog scare, which has been so long agitated, is a myth, and one calculated to do much injury by the introduction of false hydrophobia induced by fear. During my long experience in canine practice I have never seen but one case of authenticated rabies. I have been called to see hundreds of so-called mad dogs, and found they were merely in convulsions, afflicted by epilepsy or suffering from an attack of indigestion or from over excitement, all of which yield to proper treatment."

Another very able authority is next given:

In the Animal World, Mr. Rotherhan, a canine practitioner, describes the differences between rabies, apoplexy and epilepsy. He says: "In rabies a dog never foams at the mouth, its tongue and lips are brown and hard-looking, the discharge from the mouth is small in quantity, brownish in color and hangs about the lips like strings of gum; the eyes have an unnatural glare. In apoplexy there is sudden loss of power, the dog falls down, either partially or wholly insensible, the eyes are fixed and bloodshot, the breathing is heavy; there is no unusual discharge of saliva. In epilepsy the dog is seen to tremble just as the fit is coming on. If the dog tries to move he falls on one side, his jaws begin to champ violently, all voluntary muscles are powerfully convulsed; generally he utters sharp, short cries, but not always; there is a copious discharge of white, frothy saliva, the gums are of a pale leaden hue. When recovering from an epileptic fit the dog has a bewildered look, the eyes having a dull and stupid expression."

So great is the popular dread of hydrophobia that a slight derangement of the dog's nervous system is often mistaken for symptoms of rabies, while a dog in convulsions, in an epileptic fit, or stricken with apoplexy may be shot as mad - particularly if it be hot weather - before there is a chance of determining the nature of his disease. The principal centers of the nervous system are the brain and the spinal cord. These Stonehenge compares to the electric telegraph. The brain he calls the central office. From that station are issued messages to all parts of the body, and the wires which carry those messages are the nerves of motion, the nerves of sensation and the nerves of organic life, all of which have their separate1 ganglia, or the lesser station masters.

The normal, movements of the body are, says a writer in Our Animal Friends, the result of harmonious, co-ordinated functional activity of the neuro-muscular mechanism, i. e., of the nerve centers, nerves and muscles. In convulsions the movements are purposeless and irregular, and are, of course, wasteful of the animal energies. A dog may have a fit from overexertion in the heat of the sun, from neuralgic pains or from toothache, from meningitis, excessive fright, parasites in the nose or brain, acute ear dis-ease, or from the distress of being lost in a large city; or, if a female, of being deprived of her whelps. Recently it has been shown that mental distress has the power to give a dog diabetes. It stands to reason that so sensitive an animal should never be unduly excited.