The attempt to stamp out rabies in Great Britain was an experiment undertaken by the government in the public interest. The principal means adopted were the muzzling of dogs in infected areas, and prolonged quarantine for imported animals. The efficacy of dog-muzzling in checking the spread of rabies and diminishing its prevalence has been repeatedly proved in various countries. Liable as other animals may be to the disease, in England at least the dog is pre-eminently the vehicle of contagion and the great source of danger to human beings. There is a difference of opinion on the way in which muzzling acts, though there can be none as to the effect it produces in reducing rabies. Probably it acts rather by securing the destruction of ownerless and stray--which generally includes rabid--dogs than by preventing biting; for though it may prevent snapping, even the wire-cage muzzle does not prevent furious dogs from biting, and it is healthy, not rabid, dogs that wear the muzzle. It has therefore been suggested that a collar would have the same effect, if all collarless dogs were seized; but the evidence goes to show that it has not, perhaps because rabid dogs are more likely to stray from home with their collars, which are constantly worn, than with muzzles which are not, and so escape seizure. Moreover, it is much easier for the police to see whether a dog is wearing a muzzle or not than it is to make sure about the collar. However this may be, the muzzle has proved more efficacious, but it was not applied systematically in England until a late date. Sometimes the regulations were in the hands of the government, and sometimes they were left to local authorities; in either case they were allowed to lapse as soon as rabies had died down. In April 1897 the Board of Agriculture entered on a systematic attempt to exterminate rabies by the means indicated. The plan was to enforce muzzling over large areas in which the disease existed, and to maintain it for six months after the occurrence of the last case. In spite of much opposition and criticism, this was resolutely carried out under Mr Walter Long, the responsible minister, and met with great success. By the spring of 1899--that is, in two years--the disease had disappeared in Great Britain, except for one area in Wales; and, with this exception, muzzling was everywhere relaxed in October 1899. It was taken off in Wales also in the following May, no case having occurred since November 1899. Rabies was then pronounced extinct. During the summer of 1900, however, it reappeared in Wales, and several counties were again placed under the order. The year 1901 was the third in succession in which no death from hydrophobia was registered in the United Kingdom. In the ten years preceding 1899, 104 deaths were registered, the death-rate reaching 30 in 1889 and averaging 29 annually. In 1902 two deaths from hydrophobia were registered. From that date to June 1909 (the latest available for the purpose of this