The sensation induces him to seek solitude
The sensation induces him to seek solitude
The sensation induces him to seek solitude. But there is another reason which decides his choice of a resting-place. The light inflicts upon him intense agony. The sun is to him an instrument of torture, which he therefore studies to avoid, for his brain aches and feels as it were a trembling jelly. This induces the poor brute to find out the holes and corners where he is least likely to be noticed, and into which the light is unable to enter. In solitude and darkness he passes his day. If his retreat be discovered and the master's voice bids him to come forth, the affectionate creature's countenance brightens; his tail beats the ground, and he leaves his hiding-place, anxious to obey the loved authority; but before he has gone half the distance, a kind of sensation comes over him, which produces an instantaneous change in his whole appearance. He seems to say to himself, "Why cannot you let me alone? Go away. Do go away. You trouble, you pain me." And thereon he suddenly turns tail and darts back into his dark corner. If let alone, there he will remain; perhaps frothing a little at the mouth, and drinking a great deal of water, but not issuing from his hiding-place to seek after food. His appetites are altered, hair, straw, dirt, filth, excrement, rags, tin shavings, stones, the most noisome and unnatural substances are then the delicacies for which the poor dog, changed by disease, longs, and swallows, in hope to ease a burning stomach. So anxious is he for liquids, and so depraved are his appetites, that no sooner has he passed a little urine than he turns round to lick it up. He is now altogether changed. Still he does not desire to bite mankind; he rather endeavors to avoid society; he takes long journeys of thirty or forty miles in extent, and lengthened by all kinds of accidents, to vent his restless desire for motion. When on these journeys he does not walk. This would be too formal and measured a pace for an animal whose whole frame quivers with excitement. He does not run. That would be too great an exertion for an animal whose body is the abode of a deadly sickness. He proceeds in a slouching manner, in a kind of trot; a movement neither run nor walk, and his aspect is dejected. His eyes do not glare and stare, but they are dull and retracted. His appearance is very characteristic, and if once seen, can never afterwards be mistaken. In this state he will travel the most dusty roads, his tongue hanging dry from his open mouth, from which, however, there drops no foam. His course is not straight. How could it be, since it is doubtful whether at this period he sees at all? His desire is to journey unnoticed. If no one notices him, he gladly passes by them. He is very ill. He cannot stay to bite. If, nevertheless, anything oppose his progress, he will, as if by impulse, snap as a man in a similar state might strike, and tell the person "to get out of the way." He may take his road across a field in which there are a flock of sheep. Could these creatures only make room for him, and stand motionless, the dog would pass on and leave them behind uninjured. But they begin, to run, and at the sound, the dog pricks up. His entire aspect changes. Rage takes possession of him. What made that noise? He pursues it with all the energy of madness. He flies at one, then at another. He does not mangle, nor is his bite, simply considered, terrible. He cannot pause to tear the creature he has caught. He snaps and then rushes onward, till, fairly exhausted and unable longer to follow, he sinks down, and the sheep pass forward to be no more molested. He may have bitten twenty or thirty in his mad onslaught; and would have worried more had his strength lasted, for the furor of madness then had possession of him.
A MAD DOG ON THE MARCH.