and stands over it with an expression of
peevish disgust. A healthy dog is always decided. No animal can be more
so. It will often take that which it cannot eat, but, having done so, it
either throws the needless possession away or lies down, and with a
determined air watches "the property." There is no vexation in its looks,
no captiousness in its manner. It acts with decision, and there is purpose
in what it does. The reverse is the case with dogs suffering from
indigestion. They are peevish and irresolute. They take only because
another shall not have. They will perhaps eat greedily what they do not
want if the cat looks longfully at that which had lain before them for
many minutes, and which no coaxing could induce them to swallow. They are,
in their foibles, very like the higher animal.

The treatment is simple. The dog must be put upon, and strictly kept upon,
an allowance. Some persons, when these animals are sent to them, because
the creatures are fat and sickly, shut the dogs up for two or four days,
and allow them during the period to taste nothing but water. The trick
often succeeds, but it is dangerous in severe cases, and needless in mild
ones. This is a heartless practice, which ignorance only would resort to;
but such conduct is very general, and the people who follow it boast
laughingly of its effect. They do not care for its consequences. A weakly
stomach cannot be benefited by a prolonged abstinence. I have kept a dog
four-and-twenty hours without food, but never longer, and then only when
the animal has been brought to me with a tale about its not eating. The
report, then, is assurance that food has been offered, and the inference
is that the stomach is loaded. A little rest enables it to get rid of its
contents, and in some measure to recover its tone. The dog, as a general
rule, does well on one meal a day; afterward, the food is regularly
weighed, and nothing more than the quantity is permitted. This quantity
may be divided into three or four meals, and given at stated periods, so
that the last is eaten at night. When thus treated, animals, which I am
assured would touch nothing, have soon become possessors of vigorous
appetites. At the same time, exercise and the cold bath every morning is
ordered; and either tonic or gentle sedatives, with alkalies and vegetable
bitters, are administered. The following are the ordinary stomach-pills,
and do very well for the generality of cases:--

Extract of h