In offering to the American public a new edition of Dinks and Mayhew on the Dog, which, I am happy to find, is largely called for, I have been induced to make a further addition, which will, I think, render this the most perfect and comprehensive work in existence for the dog fancier and dog lover.
For myself I claim no merit, since, with the exception of one or two trivial changes in unimportant recipes in Dinks, and some abridgment of the last admirable work of Col. Hutchinson on Dog Breaking, which is now included in this volume, I have found occasion to make no alterations whatever, and, save a few notes, no additions.
I will add, in brief, that while I believe the little manual of Dinks to be the best short and brief compendium on the Dog, particularly as regards his breeding, conditioning, kennel and field management, and general specialities, there can be no possible doubt that Mayhew's pages are the ne plus ultra of canine pathology. There is nothing comparable to his treatment of all diseases for gentleness, simplicity, mercy to the animal, and effect. I have no hesitation in saying, that any person with sufficient intelligence to make a diagnosis according to his showing of the symptoms, and patience to exhibit his remedies,[Pg iv] precisely according to his directions, cannot fail of success.
I have this year treated, myself, two very unusually severe cases of distemper, one of acute dysentery, one of chronic diarrhœa, and one of most aggravated mange, implicitly after his instructions, and that with perfect, and, in three instances, most unexpected, success. The cases of distemper were got rid of with less suffering to the animals, and with less—in fact, no—prostration or emaciation than I have ever before witnessed.
I shall never attempt any practice other than that of Mayhew, for distemper; and, as he says, I am satisfied it is true, that no dog, taken in time, and treated by his rules, need die of this disease...