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TUB
BRITISH JOURNAL
HOMOEOPATHY
EDITED BY
J. J. DRYSBALE, M.D.,
J. RUTHEEPURB RUSSELL, M I)
R E. DUDGEON, M.B.
in cjm.ts iK oMNiatfr oiua^AS.,
• : lonhon.*
GRO 031 BElDGE & SONS, 5 PATERNOSTER ROW,
EDINBURGH : \Y. H. BILLING IT CASTLE STREET.
Hm YORK W.. RADDli, :i 22 BROADWAY.
Aim ruoiA’i
f w\k*Yi * •; I • * t aaw
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PRINTED BY W. DAVY AND SON, GILBERT STREET, OXFORD STREET.
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
CONTENTS OF No. LI
PAGB
CHOLERA IN BARBADOS, BY DR. CHAPMAN . . 1
ON THE SWEDISH GYMNASTICS, BY DR. ROTH . 25
OBSERVATIONS ON THE CHOLERA EPIDEMIC, BY MR. ANDERSON . 62
HOMCEOPATHY AND THE CONCOURS IN FRANCE . 79
REVIEW.
RECENT WORKS BY DRS. HEMPEL, HIRSCHEL, 8HARP, ETC. 91
CLINICAL RECORD.
INFLAMMATION OF LACHRYMAL 8AC, BY DR. DUDGEON. 135
DISEASE OF 8PERMATIC CHORD AND EPIDYDIMI8, BY DR. DUDGEON ... 137
HEADACHE CURED BY GLONOINE, BY DR. BLACK . 139
DRIVEN OUT OR DRIVEN IN 1 . 140
OBITUARY.
DB.8CHRON .
DR. RUMMEL.!.
MR. 8EARLE .
DR. NU8SER.
HOFRATH WOLFF .
142
145
ib.
146
147
HOMCEOPATHIC INTELLIGENCE.
HAHNEMANN’S CORRESPONDENCE . ib.
HOMCEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF THE INSANE. 153
CORONER’S INQUEST AT BROOKLYN, NEW YORK . 154
MISCELLANEOUS.
FLINT SOUP. 167
DEGENERATED HOMCEOPATHY . 170
DR. BONNINGHAU8EN’S LAST. 171
REPLY TO A CORRESPONDENT.
PERCENTAGE ON PRESCRIPTIONS. 175
BOOKS RECEIVED . 176
CONTENTS OF No. LII.
INTRODUCTORY LECTURE, BY DR. LEADAM. 177
CASE OF PERICARDITIS, BY DR. KIDD . 198
ON THE SWEDISH GYMNASTICS, BY DR. ROTH .203
ON ERYSIPELAS, BY DR. HENRIQUE8. 235
CASE OF CHOREA, BY DR. HAMILTON.254
REVIEWS.
PROPHYLACTIC POWER OF BELLADONNA . 257
THE PATHOLOGY AND TREATMENT OF HYSTERIA, BY MR. CARTER. 286
WAR, CHOLERA, AND THE MINISTRY OF HEALTH, BY DR. J. J. G.
WILKINSON.303
CLINICAL RECORD.
A GROUP OF HEADACHES, BY DR. RUSSELL . 309
CASES OF HEART DISEASE, BY DR. HELBERGER .315
CLINICAL CONTRIBUTIONS, BY DR. TRINKS . 317
ALLEGED SCIRRHU8 OF THE 8TOMACH, BY DR. MEYER . 321
CASE OF SYCOSIS, BY MR. WILSON . 327
CHOLERA AND HOMCEOPATHY, BY DR. GERSTEL . 328
MISCELLANEOUS.
CORONER’S INQUEST AT DARLINGTON .334
WHO KILLED THE CZAR ?.349
HOMCEOPATHIC HOSPITAL FOR OUR SICK TROOPS ENGAGED IN THE WAR 350
HOMCEOPATHIC LIFE ASSURANCE. ib.
CORRESPONDENCE.
LETTER FROM DR. C. DUNHAM . 351
BOOKS RECEIVED . 358
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CONTENTS OF No. LIII
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DR. RUTHERFURD RUSSELL ON DIET.353
DR. HENRIQUE8 ON OPHTHALMIA... 397
DR. ELB ON THE PROPHYLACTIC POWER OF BELLADONNA.414
HOMCEOPATHIC CLINICAL STUDIES—INTERMITTENT FEVER . 419
LAST DESPERATE EFFORTS OF THE ENEMY... 435
REVIEWS.
DR. PERRY’8 LETTER ON THE CHOLERA. 464
DR. PETER8 ON DI8EA8ES OF THE EYES .;. 473
OBITUARY.
DR. CROSERIO .474
REV. T. R. EVEREST.477
CLINICAL RECORD.
CASE8 BY DR. A. POPE . 478
HEMATURIA AND CHRONIC CY8TITI8.484
PNEUMONIA .487
MISCELLANEOUS.
THE PHYSIOLOGICAL ACTION OF THE ESSENTIAL OIL OF BITTER
ORANGE8 . 489
COLD AS A LOCAL AN .ESTHETIC AGENT .497
INFLUENCE OF VACCINATION .500
"WHAT HAS CHEMISTRY DONE FOR DIETETIC8 1 . 503
THE EDINBURGH HOMCEOPATHIC DI8PEN8ARY.504
ACUTE RHEUMATIC INFLAMMATION A8 AFFECTED BY REST .505
FRICTION IN OBSTINATE CHLOROSI8. 506
THE PUFF INDIRECT .507
CALADIUM SEGUINUM IN ITCHING OF THE VULVA. 509
NITRATE OF SILVER IN PARALYSIS.510
HOMCEOPATHY IN AMERICA.. 511
REPORT OF THE LONDON HOMCEOPATHIC HOSPITAL.512
CELEBRATION OF HAHNEMANN’S HUNDREDTH BIRTHDAY . 519
HOSPITAL OF THE SISTERS OF CHARITY AT LINZ .521
THE MINERAL WATERS OF OONTREXEVILLE .523
HAHNEMANN’8 BIRTHDAY.525
DIGJTALINE .ib.
INFUSION OF OATS AS A DIURETIC.526
PROGRESS TOWARDS HOMCEOPATHY .ib.
TARTAR EMETIC IN RHEUMATISM . 527
ALLOPATHY APPLIED TO THEOLOGICAL TENETS AND TENDENCIES.528
BOOKS RECEIVED .ib.
CONTENTS OF No. LIV.
ADDRESS READ BEFORE THE CONGRESS, BY DR. WILKINSON.529
HOMCEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF " BRIGHT’S DISEASE ” BY DR. KIDD ... 560
TIC DOULOUREUX, BY MR. MORGAN .574
CASES OF GLEET AND INFLAMMATION OF KIDNEY AND BLADDER, BY
DR. HASTINGS . 590
EXPOSITION DE PARIS ... 594
ON MINERAL WATER8, BY DR. MADDEN . 613
ON SEPIA, BY DR. MEYER . 634
REVIEWS.
L’ART MEDICAL .
ADDRESS BY DR. PAYNE, AND POEM BY DR. PRESTON
654
656
MISCELLANEOUS.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE CONGRESS OF BRITISH HOMCEOPATHIC PRAC-
DR.^TRINKS^ON THE REFORM OF THE CENTRAL HOMCEOPATHIC ASSO¬
CIATION..
HOMCEOPATHY IN ICELAND ...
ECLECTICISM AMONG HOMCEOPATH1STS .
PARLIAMENTARY RETURN OF THE HOMCEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF
CHOLERA .
HARVEY AND HOMCEOPATHY .
HOMCEOPATHY IN DENMARK .
BOOKS RECEIVED .
658
661
668
670
674
689
694
694
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THE
BRITISH JOURNAL
OF
HOMOEOPATHY.
CHOLEBA IN BARBADOS,
Communicated by Dr. Chapman.
Barbados, though one of the smallest, is probably the most
ancient colony now in the possession of the British crown.
Rebellion, earthquakes, hurricanes, yellow fever, and other
calamities have afflicted this gem of the Caribbean Archipelago,
but none have been so destructive to human life, as the out¬
break there, during the present year (1854), of malignant
cholera.
This plague, for such it proved to be, found the island quite
unprepared to meet its assault. The many who were under
allopathic treatment, and the few who enjoyed the benefit of
homoeopathy, were alike unprovided with the curative means
employed in either system of medicine., The city was in al
state of filthy unpreparedness, though a distinct warning had
been given, that cholera would probably sweep the island;
and there was not only a scarcity of food, but no measures had
been taken to supply the deficiency.
It may be observed, parenthetically, that every country, great
or small, should produce, according to the measure of its capa¬
city, the food necessary for its inhabitants.
In such a' state of things, the cholera pounced on that beau¬
tiful island; and there is no reason to doubt that it was
introduced. A vessel, infected with cholera, arrived in Carlisle
Bay: all communication between the crew of -the vessel and
the inhabitants was prevented; but some of tbe clothes of the
VOL. XIII, NO. LI.—JANUARY 1855. B
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suffering seamen were allowed to be taken ashore to be washed.
The Cholera, in a few hours after, destroyed the laundress and
another dweller in the house. Thence the disease spread like
fire.
In the Island of St. Thomas it was introduced from an
immigrant ship, with which the authorities refused all commu-
cation; hut a black man went off to her, surreptitiously, and
on his return to the shore, was seized with cholera, and died,
and the disease spread over the island.
In Barbados there was evidence that the disease was con¬
veyed from one part of the island to another. Certain it is,
that the moment one case appeared in any district, it spread as
by oontiguity, so as to impress the public mind that the malady
partook of the character of plague. In most cases it could be
shewn, that an infected person conveyed the disease to a place
that had before been free from it.
Similar facts have been recorded during the three visitations
of this epidemic in the British Islands. They are now merely
alluded to, and may be taken for as much as they may be worth.
Barbados is about the size of the Isle of Wight, and con¬
tained, at the time of the outbreak of cholera, 140,000 inhabi¬
tants, of whom 20,000 dwelt in the city, Bridge Town. In
13 weeks, 18,000 died; and during a week or ten days, 200
died daily in the city, which is equal to a rate of mortality of
25,000 a day in London and its environs, if the population of
that brick Babylon be taken at two millions and a half. This
mode of putting the case, will shew the reader how awfully
terrific the cholera was in Barbados. It is due to the clergy,
the medical men, and the gentry of the island, to state, that
they were equal to the emergency, though unprepared and
unprovided with adequate means of resistance, and showed a
constant and heroic front to the grim foe. Many gentlewomen,
gentle, but brave as any heroines on record, were foremost
in their ministrations to the sick and dying.
The address of Dr. Goding, its president, on the first public
meeting of the Barbados Homoeopathic Association, will furnish
all the available statistics that can be produced on the present
occasion.
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“ Gentlemen,—During a period of sickness, unprecedented in
the history of Barbados, your association was formed, having
for its object the promulgation of the doctrine of Hahnemann,
and the encouragement of homoeopathic medicine. The con¬
fidence evinced on that occasion, in appointing me your pre¬
sident, I fully appreciate; and as I have hitherto had no
opportunity of expressing my sense of the honor thus conferred,
you will now receive my thanks, with the assurance of my
readiness to assume the office, and to unite with you in support
of your association.
“ If its institution was thought desirable, prior to the visita¬
tion of the recent epidemic, the events connected with that
dreadful scourge afford additional motives for the furtherance
of the designs of its projectors, and strong incentives for the
promotion of the society, calculated, I believe, from the very
nature of the principles upon which it is founded, to exercise
a beneficial influence on the sanitary condition of the people
of this island.
“As a key to these motives, and conceiving the subject
which has lately engrossed our thoughts not inappropriate or
uninteresting, I have selected as the theme of my inaugural
address,—the cholera and its experiences. In treating the'
subject, it is not my intention to consider it en regie, as a
medical dissertation—the narrow limits of a paper like this not
admitting of it. I purpose, rather, to demonstrate the truth
of the law of similitude, and the power of infinitesimal doses
in curing the rapid and violent disease which has so extensively
prevailed amongst us.
“ To collect the results of the homoeopathic treatment of
cholera, wherever it has been adopted in the island, would
be a task of no ordinary difficulty, and at the present moment
unattainable; if, therefore, in taking a general and retrospec¬
tive glance of this malady, I may seem to bring the results of
my own practice prominently forward, in confirmation of our
belief in the system we profess to hold, and of the impressions
which have been left upon my mind in becoming lately more
familiar with cholera, it is from a sense of what is really due to
- homoeopathy. You must also be fully aware, that to form a
b 2
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On Cholera in Barbados,
just estimate of the value of the homoeopathic method in heal¬
ing so dangerous a disease as cholera, comparative results must
be sought for. In obtaining these in the fairest manner I can
command, I would be distinctly understood, that, in whatever
I may have to offer on this head, no personal application has
been or is intended, and none must be inferred; as it is not my
wish or object to make individual comparisons, but to contrast
the general merits of the two modes of cure.
“A protracted drought of nearly six months' duration, with
its attendant scarcity of native provisions, ushered in the cholera
upon a dense population of 140,000 persons, the poorer classes
of whom, with systems impoverished by a very limited con¬
sumption of food, and frequently by the use of unwholesome
water, were the easy recipients of the miasm, and a ready prey
to this fell disease. Avoiding the question of contagion, it
cannot be denied, that a mysterious influence operated during
the epidemic period, call it by what name you will—that it
chose its victims—exercised its deleterious qualities more in
some localities than in others, although none, not even the
most elevated, isolated, and healthy sites were exempt—often
capriciously, and on a sudden, changed the scene of its ravages
and evinced its effects—independently of the moral emotion of
apprehension, or absolute fear—on almost all persons, by more
or less embarrassing the tone and functions of their digestive
organs. Many instances of death occurred amongst domestic
animals, which were attributed to cholera, or to a disease pre¬
senting many of the features of that malady. The malignancy
of the epidemic, evidenced in the mortality sustained by the
community, nearly twelve per cent of the population, is, there¬
fore, less to be wondered at, when the foregoing considerations
are taken in connexion with other collateral circumstances;
among which may be mentioned, the excessive crowding in the
smaller houses inhabited by the black and laboring class, deser¬
tion of the sick, the want of proper nursing and appropriate
diet during the states of actual illness and convalescence, and
the general ignorance that prevailed of the nature of cholera,
leading to the neglect of the important premonitory symptom,
diarrhoea. For although every described form of cholera was
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met with, daring the reign of the disease, hy far the most
extensively prevalent and fatal variety was the gastro-enteritic
form, or that characterized, independently of cramps, by vo¬
miting and diarrhoea, and almost invariably preceded by more
or less profuse alvine evacuations. This latter concomitant,
although prominently noticed by the warning voice of the
General Board of Health of this island, in its published in¬
structions, was frequently disregarded, until one of the graver
forms of the disease manifested itself, and awakened the sufferer
to a sense of his error. Thus and then it was, that this drain
of the serum of the blood told fearfully upon a people whose
diet is chiefly vegetable, and brought numbers to a rapid and
lamentable state of collapse, ere assistance and medical aid
could he obtained. Indeed, even after the evacuations were
checked, and cramps relieved by remedial measures, few among
these collapsed cases seemed to possess stamina to rally from
the nervous prostration, superinduced by disease insidiously
operating upon frames having a peculiar aptitude to its morbific
influences from previous adverse circumstances, habits, and
mode of living. With such materials to feed upon, the cholera
has not been sparing of its victims ; and the question naturally
arises: What has homceopathy done here in combating so
fearful an enemy ?
“ You who are acquainted with homceopathio literature, and
have taken the pains to investigate the subject, and its principle
of medication, know, that by a natural and essentially practical
law of cure, similia similibus curantur —like are cured by like
—the homoeopathic physician is prepared to encounter the
strangest form of disease. This law is his guiding star—tin
unerring principle, which admits of no vague and uncertain
procedure, no conflicting opinion and praotice. It permits
of no remedy extolled to-day as infallible, and despairingly
abandoned to-morrow as ineffectual—nor of a theory enter¬
tained at one moment, and discarded in the next. By the
aid of this universal principle, the law of similarity, the
momentous question, * What will relieve ? ’ is satisfactorily
solved; not only for an individual case, but for all possible
cases, and in all possible forms: and it is by this principle, now
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On Cholera in Barbados,
become a great fact, regulating the administration of their
attenuated medicines, that the homoeopathic physicians have
been enabled to cope with all acute disorders, and have been
eminently successful in all dangerous epidemic diseases. This
has been strikingly exemplified in the treatment of the yellow
fever in this island, in New Orleans, and the Brazils, and in
the treatment of that destructive form of typhus, which broke
out in the army of Napoleon in his retreat from Russia, and
spread itself through several countries, baffling the skill of all
except the homoeopathic physicians. In that singular epidemy,
to which the name of cerebro-spinal meningitis has been given
—an inflammatory affection of the membranes of the brain and
spinal chord, which raged in Avignon, in France, during the
latter part of 1846, and in the early part 1847, the means
employed by allopathy were vain and ineffectual in arresting
this severe and fatal malady; and it was not until Dr. Bechet
had applied the therapeutic law of Hahnemann to the treat¬
ment of the disease, that success attended the intervention of
human aid. I will here read an extract from a review of
Dr. B6chet’s book in the British Journal of Homoeopathy,
for April, 1853
“‘The epidemy of 1846-7 at first confined its ravages ex¬
clusively to the garrison of the palace barracks; it was the
8rd light infantry that especially suffered from it.
“‘Many consultations of the most distinguished medical men,
both of Avignon and neighbouring towns, were held, with a
view to devise some successful method of combating the plague,
but, as might have been anticipated, no homoeopathist was ever
called in to these consultations, nor was the advice of Dr.
B6chet attended to by the supercilious authorities of the old
system; and yet the success of the homoeopathic treatment
was infinitely greater than that of the allopathic school, which
vainly exhausted all its appliances in the endeavour to stay the
fatal malady, whilst the simple means supplied by the thera-
peutic doctrine of Hahnemann, were crowned by a remarkable
but discredited success. In order to enable his observations to
be authenticated, Dr. B6chet has given the name and address
of every patient treated by him for this affection. This precau-
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lion he adopted because the adversaries of the homoeopathic
system were not slow at insinuating that the boasted successes
of homoeopathy were nothing but fabrications. It should be
remarked, that the symptoms of the disease were so strongly
marked and so severe, that it would have been difficult, even
for a non-medical person, to mistake the malady.
******
- “ * The epidemy, the subject of Dr. Bechet’s remarks, ap¬
peared in Avignon, in November, 1846. It was at first confined
exclusively to the soldiers. From the description of its symp¬
toms Dr. B6chet received, he found that the remedies that
corresponded best to it in a homoeopathic point of view, were
ipec. and hyos. His colleague. Dr. Denis, was of the same
opinion, and they soon, had an opportunity of testing the ac¬
curacy of their views. The wife of the porter of the barracks
was seized with the malady, and was successfully treated with
these two remedies by Dr. Denis. The same gentleman had a
further opportunity of testing the success of this treatment on
two other cases, in the persons of two of the labourers employed
at the barracks. This success of homoeopathy in a disease that
was creating such consternation among the garrison, inspired
the soldiers with confidence in the homoeopathic method, and
at a review of the troops, some of the officers publicly pro¬
claimed their confidence in the system, and the soldiers actually
refused to go into the hospital where they would be under
allopathic treatment. It being contrary to the regulations to
receive any other treatment than that of their medical officers,
the military chiefs were fain to shut their eyes to an infraction
of the rules which was so advantageous to their men. It was
accordingly arranged with the homoeopathic chemist, that he
should deliver gratuitously to those who applied for them, the
remedies prescribed by the homoeopathic physicians ; and in
this way, says Dr. B6chet, more than 160 soldiers were treated
successfully under the rose with ipec. and hyos. No doubt,
says Dr. B6chet, a number of these cases might have been
false alarms, produced by the terror that prevailed, but he
knows from the testimony of many of the officers, men of great
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On Cholera in Barbados,
intelligence, who watched the cases closely, that many of them
were real cases of the disease.
“ ‘ The faot of the efficacy of the homoeopathic treatment in
these cases was so generally known, that it was the common
talk of the town, and it was authenticated by a report of the
Governor of Avignon, made to the Minister of State, who
addressed an enquiry to that functionary on the subject. The
report is given in full in Dr. B6chet’s volume, but we need not
reproduce it here.
“ ‘ Notwithstanding (perhaps we may say in consequence of)
the success obtained by the occult homoeopathic treatment that
was goin£ on at the barracks, the medical officers of the garrison
contrived to put a stop to it; homoeopathy was blamed for the
mortality that continued to decimate the soldiers brought to the
military hospital, but it was found that when the secret homoeo¬
pathic treatment was put a stop to, the mortality, in place of
decreasing, augmented in a vast degree.
“ ‘ The epidemy, however, soon extended beyond the palace
barracks. Other barracks were attacked, and it appeared also
amongst tbe general population, where Drs. B6chet and Denis
had ample opportunities of treating the disease without any
opposition on the part of hostile medical authorities, until its
final cessation in the middle of April following.'
“ The loss in the military hospitals of Avignon amounted to
72 in 100, while Dr. B6chet’s mortality was 28 per cent. only.
Not to multiply other instances of the superior efficacy of
homoeopathy in acute and dangerous disorders, I ask, could
a law, like all other natural laws, universal in its application,
be less so here than elsewhere ? In our late epidemic it was
tested, and results show that, cateris paribus , success has also
attended the operation of the law in this island, and will add
accumulative evidence to the truth of that fundamental point
in the therapeutic doctrine of tbe Great Master of our Science.
You already know that well authenticated and indubitable evi¬
dence abounds of the success which has attended the homoeo¬
pathic method of treating the cholera in Europe and America;
and in reply to the inquiry now proposed, ‘ What has homoeo-
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pathy done here ? ’ I am prepared to declare my deoided con¬
viction, that, in a large proportion of cases, it has, in this island
also, afforded the most efficacious mode of care.
“ Let ns first regard the light in which the cholera is viewed
by the old school of medicine. With this formidable disease
when fully developed, that school stands confessedly impotent.
Thus, one of the chief organs of allopathic medicine, after
enumerating a list of medicines that had been proposed and
tried during the visitation of the cholera in 1831-2-3, in Great
Britain, pronounces this discouraging remark :—
“ * This long catalogue of suggested remedies is surely suffi¬
cient to show, that we are entirely at a loss for any certain
principle of treatment .’—Medical Gazette , Oct. 15, 1847.
“Subsequently, the same article continues:—‘The metro¬
polis (London) was the seat of an amount of mortality only a
little inferior to that of other localities where the disease ap¬
pears to have run its course unchecked.’ Considering that in
London, which possessed all the advantages of first-rate talent,
of medical skill, well regulated hospitals, and the previous
experience of the continental allopathic school, this was indeed
a very grave admission. The mortality alluded to in London was
at that time nearly fifty per cent. Another mouth-piece of the
same school, the Lancet, has, I believe, endorsed a like opinion,
and inculcates—I speak from memory, and therefore under
correction, that true Asiatic cholera is incurable. Again if we
look to that admirable text book in the schools of medicine,
‘ Dr. Watson’s Lectures on the Principles and Practice of
Physic,’ we there read the painful though honest confession
of the slight reliance to be placed on treatment. ‘ Never, cer¬
tainly,’ says Dr. Watson, ‘was the artillery of medicine more
vigorously plied, never were her troops, regular and volunteer,
more meritoriously active. To many patients, no doubt, this
busy interference made all the difference between life and death.
But if the balance could be fairly struck, and the exact truth
ascertained, I question whether we should find that the aggre¬
gate mortality from cholera in this country was in any way
disturbed by our craft. Excepting always the cases in which
preliminary diarrhoea was checked, just as many, though not
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On Cholera in Barbados,
perhaps the very same individuals, would probably have sur¬
vived, had no medication whatever been practised.’ Dr. Mac¬
intosh, was physician to the Drummond Street Hospital, in
Edinburgh, in the year 1831. In this establishment, which I
visited to become acquainted with cholera, were received 461
patients, of which 291 died (over 63 per cent.), and of the
latter were examined 280 bodies. As an authority then in
cholera, w T e extract the following from his ‘‘Principles of Patho¬
logy,” in which he gives a long chaotic catalogue of medicines
recommended for its cure. * No better evidence can he offered
of the ignorance of the profession generally as to the nature and
seat of any disease, than the number and variety of remedies
that have been confidently recommended for its cure; ’ and the
doctor adds subsequently: ‘The above list would be humili¬
ating to the whole profession, were it not remembered how
much anxiety and exoitement prevailed among medical men
at the time, so much so, that several lost their reason and
many their lives on the occasion. Many of these remedies are
totally opposite in their nature and principles of action, many
of them were proposed upon erroneous principles, and many
more upon no principles at all.’
“ Turning, then, from this disconsolate tone of the old school,
and observing the comparative results of the treatment of
cholera during its invasion of Europe by the allopathic and
homoeopathic methods, we find the statistics of the disease so
strongly in favour of the success of homoeopathy, that we
wonder how, in the mind of any liberal and unprejudiced man,
there can exist a doubt of the value of the latter mode of treat¬
ment, or power to resist the evidence of its superiority. Nor
are these statements equivocal; some are from official sources,
some are accompanied with the sentiments, and are expressive
of the gratitude, of officials in authority, while others are from
medical men possessing undeniable qualifications of the first
status in society, and whose testimony is at least as good as that
of their rivals.
“ In illustration of the position I have assumed, I will men¬
tion that in Vienna in 1831-2, 4,500 patients were treated allo-
pathically, of whom 1,360 died; 581 were treated homceopathi-
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cally, of whom 49 died. This gives 31 per cent, of deaths
under allopathy to 8 per cent, under homoeopathy. You are
aware that in Austria, some years ago, the ordinances against
the practice of homoeopathy were very stringent; hut the
system having been publicly tried in Vienna, under the super¬
vision of an authorized medical censor, its extraordinary success
in the treatment of cholera was such that the government
rescinded the prohibitory statutes.
“ It may be fairly stated, from analysis of the European and
American statistics of cholera, that whilst the mortality under
homoeopathic treatment has varied from 10 to 2d per cent., that
under allopathic has been from 30 to 70 per cent.; thus, then,
the maximum of mortality under homoeopathy is less than the
minimum under the old school.
“ I now proceed to give the results of my own treatment of
the epidemic, premising that the great bulk of the cases
occurred along the sea-coast, including the town of Speights.
My impression is, and I believe I am not singular, that, with
some exceptional localities of the interior, the disease prevailed
along the sea border generally in its more severe and intract¬
able forms, although more concentrated upon some sides than
others.
“ I have recorded 446 cases of cholera, excluding from this
number many cases of diarrhoea, which, although occurring in
the height of the epidemic, I did not deem of such importance
as to designate them cholera cases; but my experience of this
insidious disease has taught me that far slighter instances than
those omitted of diarrhoea, presenting no other marked charac¬
teristic of cholera than this symptom, have rapidly become
severe and even fatal cases of well developed cholera.
“ Of the 446 cases 66 died, or 14’79 per cent.
“Setting aside a serious impediment to successful practice
which every medical man who was overcharged with patients
must have met with, namely, the inability of devoting to the
sick, from their numbers, that attention in frequent visitation
which so rapid a disease demanded, I think it right to call your
attention to the following points of interest connected with
hese cases:—
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On Cholera in Barbados ,
“ 1st. Among the deaths were eight persons from sixty to
seventy years of age; and nine children, some of these of sickly
hahit, their ages varying from two to ten years.
“ 2nd. That death was occasioned in five detected instances
hy improper diet during illness, and in the transition stage of
convalescence, when there was every reason to believe that the
invalids would ultimately do well; in three cases to out-door
exposure during actual convalescence—one woman having been
jolted in a cart to some distance, contrary to every remonstrance
against her removal.
“ 3rd. That sixteen cases were found in a state of total col¬
lapse, and died within periods varying from half an hour to
twelve hours after they were seen. It is worthy of remark
that some of these cases had the pulse restored prior to
dissolution.
“ 4. That among the recorded deaths, were seven females in
various periods of pregnancy. Labour came on in four of the
cases, one out of the four being delivered; in three it became
suppressed from nervous exhaustion, producing a comatose and
torpid state of the brain.
“ That five other cases of pregnancy occurred among the
recoveries, one of which was found collapsed when first seen,
and gave birth to a dead foetus of five months, during her con¬
valescence. Two other females—exceedingly severe cholera
cases—gave birth to their progeny. The remaining two, in
spite of horrible cramps, will probably accomplish their unex¬
pired term.
" 6. Seventy cases found in actual collapse, or in conditions
verging upon it, or becoming cold and pulseless during treat¬
ment, have been saved.
“ I would not be misunderstood in my application of the term
collapse. By it I mean a failure of circulation, marked in many
instances by total extinction of the pulse (collapsed pulse), or
hy a pulse scarcely perceptible even to practised and sensitive
fingers, a shrivelled state of the skin, and a coldness which you
can only associate with iron or marble. Blueness of the skin
may or may not accompany collapse ; in white people there is
no difficulty in discerning the alteration of hue when it does
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occur, but in the blacks there is; and it is best recognized in
the livid lip and the purple colour of the nails, produced by
stagnation of the blood in the capillary vessels of those parts ;
an alteration of the complexion of the skin generally does take
place, cognizable, however, to a practised eye only, but which I
cannot well describe.
“It is, therefore, gentlemen, quite possible to save these
cases, of which there are alive those who, having been in all
these states, can verify this assertion. I have witnessed several
instances of collapsed cholera patients treated successfully by
others than myself; and will narrate one oase, as much to illus¬
trate the power of our infinitesimal doses as to encourage the
homoeopathist, and to caution him against the abandonment of
cases which by the old school are considered as incurable.
“ A visitor applied to me to see with him, to use his own ex¬
pression, ‘a hopeless case,' which he had just discovered. In
a room I found a woman quite alone, and lying on the floor.
She looked exactly like a person who had been drowned and
just dragged out of the water; and excepting a hoarse, low cry
of ‘cramp, cramp,' she was indeed, to all appearance, dead.
Her garments were saturated with perspiration, and this cold,
clammy sweat bathed her face and limbs, both of which were
cold as marble and shrivelled. Her eyes, deeply sunk in their
sockets, were turned up, her tongue cold, and her pulse no
longer perceptible. The alvine discharge was still welling from
her. As the visitor, Mr. Famam, lived very near, he volun¬
teered to give the medicine himself, and to watch the case, if I
thought there was the slightest chance of saving her life.
Veratrum of the 80 dilution was given, as the remedy best indi¬
cated at this moment. The most happy effects followed a repe¬
tition of this medicine, and of others when they were suc¬
cessively called for. By the judicious care of the visitor, and
the assistance of Dr. Charles Corbin, who afterwards assumed
the care of the case, the woman became perfectly restored to
health. Nor is this a solitary instance of the brilliant effects of
our remedies when properly administered. I saw several not
dissimilar cases terminating successfully under the hands of
Mr. Thomas and Mr. Allamby, visitors, and Mr. John Jordan.
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On Cholera in Barbados,
“ What has been the result generally of the treatment of
cholera by Alloeopathic means will, probably, not imme¬
diately transpire, if at all. It was my intention to have
placed in juxta-position what results on either side could be
obtained, in order to exhibit the comparative merits of the
two modes of treatment; but I regret that my efforts, up to the
last moment, in gaining the necessary information are not yet
sufficiently successful to accomplish this object satisfactorily. I
have, therefore, adopted an Appendix to this paper, re mindin g
you that what information has been, or may hereafter be
procured to complete it, has and will come from reliable
sources.
“ You will thus perceive, on an examination of the per-centages
of mortality on both sides, that while Alloeopathy ranges from
70 per cent, its maximum, to 28 per cent, its minimum,
homoeopathy ranges from 23 per cent, its maximum, to 10J its
minimum; thus preserving in this island also its numerical
superiority in statistics.
“ In the commencement of this paper I alluded incidentally to
the salutary influence which your association is calculated to
produce upon our population. In conclusion, I repeat more
fully my conviction that, in many ways, it is capable by strict
adherence to homoeopathic principles, of being instrumental in
doing good; more particularly in one respect—and I venture
to submit it for your 'consideration—should the cholera revisit
our shores. This is an event which the past history of that
disease declares not improbable; while it makes us sensible of a
fact becoming more and more discernible, and that on each
return of the dreaded visitant, it claims other characters than
the humble impoverished inmate of the hovel, and stalking
among the wealthy and more highly favoured in station and
other circumstances of life, not unfrequently numbers the latter
amongst its victims. To send out, should occasion require it
from your association, whence the means of acquiring informa¬
tion will, no doubt, exist, well appointed and organized auxili¬
aries, as house-to-house visitors, would, in my opinion, be pro¬
ductive of good. These, under the supervision of a physician
of the new school of medicine, whose qualification and testimo-
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nials should plaoe him beyond the reach of all cavil, would effect
much in disarming prejudices, in pointing out the necessity of a
careful observance of sanitary precautions, and in arresting
those premonitory symptoms, a disregard of which not only
endangers health, but has too often led to more disastrous
consequences.
“ Appendix A.
“ It will not be devoid of interest to give the results of the
treatment of the cholera in the town of Speights, containing
about 3,000 inhabitants.
“ The total number of cases from 30th May to 31st August,
was 1,119, and the deaths 324, or a little over 10 per cent, of
the population. For this result we have cause for great thank¬
fulness to Divine Providence, when we reflect upon, and con¬
trast it with, the mortality in other places. Thus, at St. Ann’s
Garrison in our island, rank and file, military labourers, women
and children, numbering in all some sixteen hundred, 317 have
died—nearly one in five, or about 19 per cent, upon the whole;
and in St. Michael’s parish, with a population of 38,000, there
were over 6,000 deaths, or about 16 per cent.; while in the
sister islands of Grenada and St. Lucia the mortality has been
still more fearful. In St. Patrick’s, Grenada, out of a population
of 5,160, the deaths were 1,363, or 26£ per cent. In St. Lucia,
in two districts, 25 per cent, of the population died.
“ As regards the treatment of the disease in Speight’s town,
the following statistics, together with the number of cases and
of deaths already given, are taken from the police record, which
was exclusively confined to the cases of the epidemic occurring
in the town.
“ The total number of cases, it has been seen, was 1,119, and
the deaths 324. Of these
“79 appear to have received no medical advice. Of the
remaining cases,
118 were treated alloeopathically, and of these died 33, or
nearly 28 per cent.
922 were treated homoeopathically, and of these
212 died, or nearly 23 per cent.
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On Cholera in Barbados,
“More than half the number of the homoeopathic cases
(namely, 539) were treated by two practitioners of medicine,
Messrs. Lawson and Jordan, who had previously embraced and
practised the homoeoptahic system, and by several amateurs
among the number of bouse-to-house visitors, who were ap¬
pointed by the Sanitary Commission of St. Peter. Great
praise is due to the visitors, from whose unwearied activity
and vigilance the medical men derived muoh valuable assis¬
tance.
“ Dr. Charles Corbin and myself treated the remainder of the
town cases (383), giving our assistance whenever we could be
spared from attendance on our own patients in the town and
rural districts. ,
“ Appendix B.
“ Results of the Homoeopathic Treatment of the Cholera , de¬
rived from various sources.
“ Lambert’s Plantation, St. Lucy.
“ Seventy cases, 12 deaths, of which 2 (children) were taken
ill and died in the night unattended.
“ Patients treated, 68; recovered, 58; died, 10; or 4.17
per cent.
“ Spring Hall, Mount Poyer, and Spring Garden
Plantations, St. Lucy. —Dr. 0. B. Yearwood was the medical
attendant on these estates, upon which were located 700 people*
S. H. 350; Mt. P. 205 ; S. G. 145.
“ At Spring Hall there were 224 cases and 74 deaths, of
which 15 were not seen by Dr. Yearwood.
“ At Mount Payer were 99 cases and 23 deaths, of which 8
were not seen.
“At Spring Garden were 87 cases and 17 deaths, of which 5
were not seen.
“ Patients treated, 382; recoveries, 296 ; deaths, 86 ; or
22.51 per cent.
“Chequer Hall, St. Lucy.
“ Treated by Mr. Perkins . . 61 cases . . 6 deaths
„ Dr. Chas. Corbin 9 „ . . 3 „
“ Making 70 cases and 9 deaths; or 12.85 per cent.
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“Return of Dr. Charles Corbins cases of Cholera, treated
in Speight’s Town, and other parts of the Rural Dis¬
trict.
“ Patients, 265; recoveries, 229; deaths, 36; or 13.58
per cent.
“ Return of Mr. John Jordan.
“Patients, 360; recoveries, 314; deaths, 46; or 12f per
cent.
“ At Hopswell, Vaucluse, and Social Hall Plantations, and
other places in St. Thomas parish, Mr. James W. Paris, the
manager at Hopewell, treated 219 cases, including 88 of
diarrhoea and cholerine, and lost 39, or about 17.8 per
cent.
“ On these cases Mr. Paris writes :—‘ It must be remarked
that Of the 39 cases resulting in death, 19 were seen only when
they were beyond all hope of recovery, and died from one to
four hours after they were seen, and ten had previously taken
allopathic drugs.
“ In the New Barrack Village—so called from its situation
between the new barracks and Hastings, in Christ Church—Dr.
Wilton Turner treated, from 25th June to 31st July, 108 cases
of diarrhoea and 47 of cholera, of which he lost 5, or less than
10.69 per cent.
“In this village, comprising a population of 619 persons, in¬
habiting 148 houses, the epidemic made its appearance on 10th
June, and from that date to 31st July there were 195 cases of
cholera (about 31 \ per cent, of the population), of which 117
died, or an average of 60 per cent.
“ Of the total number of cases—
“ 66 had no medical attendance, and of these 59, or more
than 89£ per cent., died
70 were treated allopathicaliy by medical men, and of
these 49, or 70 per cent., died
59 were treated homoeopaihically, chiefly by Dr. Turner,
and of these 9, or less than 15^ per cent., died.
VOL- XIII, NO. LI.—JANUARY, 1855. C
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Cholera in Barbados,
Appendix C.
“ Results of Allopathic Treatment , derived from various
; sources, wherever they could be obtained.
“Haymonds, St. Peter.
“48 cases and 23 deaths, of which 10 were unattended by the
medical man.
“Patients treated, 38; recoveries, 25; deaths, 13; or
34.2 per cent.
"Ellis Castle, St. Peter.
“ 67 cases, 31 deaths, or 46.26 per cent. No particulars
given.
“ Saint Nicholas, St. Peter.
“58 cases; 46 cholera; 12 diarrhoea; deaths 23; of which
five were not seen by the medical man. Including the cases of
diarrhoea, and deducting the unseen five dases, the total cases
treated will stand thus:
“ Patients, 53; recoveries, 40; deaths, 18; or over 31
per cent.
“Stepney, St. George.
“ 67 cases; 41 deaths; 61.2 per cent, nearly.
“ Of the common gaol in Bridgetown, and the lunatic
asylum, no official return has been obtained; but the mor¬
tality in both these institutions is understood to have been
very high.”
It will be seen that Dr. Goding treated 44 6 cases of malig¬
nant cholera, and that the mortality under his treatment was less
than 15 per cent. This physician is remarkable for an unos¬
tentatious simplicity and integrity of character, and his state¬
ments are to be received with the fullest confidence. It is to he
hoped that he will furnish us with detailed statistics, not only
of cholera, but also of yellow fever which he treated several
years ago with remarkable success.*
I was in constant correspondence with several of my friends
resident in Barhadoes during the prevalence of cholera: and
one of them is now in this country, from whom I have learned
* [We cordially join in the hope expressed by Dr. Chapman, that Dr.
Goding would furnish us with the results of his experience of the powers of
homoeopathy.— Eds.]
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that the comparatively successful homoeopathic treatment of this
disease had produced a marked impression on the public mind
in favour of homoeopathy. Some of the clergy, and not a few
unprofessional laymen, practised this mode of treatment with a
success, in some instances, even more remarkable than that of
Dr. Goding. But they probably included cases of severe
diarrhoea in their lists of cures' '.One lady, the wife of a mili¬
tary gentleman, is said to have treated fifty cases, and not to
have lost a single case. I have seen two gentlemen who treated
a great number of. cases, and each with a per centage of cure
fully as great as that fof Dr. Goding. The remedies chiefly
used were Camphor, Veratrum, Arsenicum, and Cuprum. It
may be permitted me to add a few remarks on several points
connected with this subject..
It appears to me that diseases run in cycles of time, disappear
for awhile, sometimes even for centuries, and then return in a
somewhat different form, but still retaining some of their
original characteristics.
Those who are acquainted with the description of the plague
at Athens, and of the epidemios that ravaged Italy during the
time of the Roman Republic—and of the diseases of "the
middle ages,” cannot fail to recognise the truth of this remark.
I may mention as an example “ the sweating sickness” to which
the cholera of to-day seems to me to bear a close affinity. The
serum of the blood was in that case wasted by the skin, instead
of by alvine discharges. The periods of its recurrence were
about the same distance of time as those of our modern cholera.
Again, Sydenham describes a cholera as epidemic several
times, during his medical career, not very dissimilar to the dis¬
ease we have now to deal with.
I have myself seen several remarkable cases of cholera
which assumed the form of " the sweating sickness.”
We are indebted to Sydenham for the remark that during the
prevalence of any epidemic there is a peculiar “ Constitution of
the Air,” which impresses itself on whatever ailments may
occur at that time. This is the experience of all of us now :
and there have been multiplied instances of it during the pre¬
sent summer and autumn.
c 2
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Cholera in Barbados,
We all know the sagacity with which, by anticipation, Hahne¬
mann pointed out the remedies that would probably be found
curative for the treatment of this disease; but there is no evi¬
dence that he ever treated a single case of it himself; and it is
very probable that he never saw the disease. We have not,
therefore, the advantage of knowing what his practice actually
was. To judge from the history of his life, it may be inferred
that he never had very much to do with acute disease, as a
homoeopathic practitioner. In that case, his authority on the
few vexed questions that trouble us still, can scarcely be ap¬
pealed to. Some of his followers, it is known, use large doses
of medicine, some tinctures of low dilutions, and some “the
higher attenuations,” in the treatment of cholera, as well as of
other acute diseases. Sub judice lis est.
It has been asserted that the physician should select carefully
one remedy and stick to it. But considering how the phase of
a disease often changes, this seems to be an impracticable dogma.
The rule may he applicable in some cases, but cannot be rigidly
adhered to in all or even in many cases, in the present state of
our knowledge. All have not the intuitive sagacity, united to
the experience of many centuries, of Bulwer Lytton’s Rosicru-
cian. “Art is long, life short,” said Hippocrates. But still
it is very desirable, if it be possible, to endeavour to come to
some conclusion with respect to the dose, the repetition of it,
and whether or no medicines should ever be given in what is
called “ alternation." This last was certainly not the practice
of Hahnemann, or of the earlier homoeopathists; and their
success was great. The practice has, probably, been adopted
from the inability of the practitioner to remain with a patient
sufficiently long to watch the action of a single medicine.
In a disease that runs its course in a few hours, there is not
much time for deliberation. If the medical man could remain
by the bed-side during the whole time of the danger of the
patient in such a disease as cholera, and if he were calm, self-
possessed, patient and entirely trusted, a great advantage would
be gained. This was the way Hippocrates pursued as often and
whenever he could.
It has been questioned whether Camphor is curative in cho-
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21
lera, and it has been stated that it acts simply as an antipathio.
The multiplied experience of a host of homceopathists, and the
new experience of our antagonists, has at once done justioe to
the sagacity of Hahnemann, and to the immense value of this
drug,
I recommended its use to a manufacturing firm, who employ
hundreds of men, who live with their families in a district in¬
fected with cholera during the present year. Numerous cases
- of diarrhoea and vomitting with cramp occurred in this hamlet;
and in every case Camphor was given with entire success. Not
a single case of malignant oholera occurred, and there was not
a death among them.
It has been asked what are the true characteristics of malig¬
nant cholera. He that has once seen a case of the disease in
collapse can tell it at a glance—the pinched features—the cho¬
leraic expression of the countenance—the cold parched nose
and tongue—the shrunken frame—tell the tale.
Some persons assert that the “ rice-water ” evacuations con¬
stitute the sign—but there is the form of the sweating sick¬
ness—there is the cholera sicca, the worst of all, perhaps,
where there are no such evacuations. My friend Dr. Baikie,
who had large experience of this disease in India, states that
there the suppression of urine was the evidence of real malig¬
nant oholera. This, however, was a sign of the intense malig¬
nity of the disease, as it is in yellow fever. In this latter
malady I have seen persons recover after the coffee-ground
vomiting (black vomit); but I never knew a case recover
in which there was entire suppression of urine. During the
prevalence of the epidemic, the choleraic visage and voice,
and the wretched collapse, are evidences enough of the malig¬
nity of the disease, whether there be or be not rice-water
evacuations, or whether there be or be not entire suppression of
urine.
The subjeot of diet has been also a matter of doubt. It will
be in the memory of all your readers that one of our meritorious
colleagues was not long since imprisoned on the charge of
having starved a cholera patient. He was honourably acquitted;
and it is generally allowed that the greatest possible caution
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Cholera in Barbados,
must be used in administering food to a patient suffering from
this disease. But there is a difference between feeding and
absolute starvation.
The use of ice is an admitted fact. Nothing seems so much
to soothe a patient, and to diminish the preecordial anxiety,
It has not fallen to my lot to see many cases of this terrible
disease ; and during the present year I have only seen a few :
I merely mention several of these, and of cases influenced
by the epidemic.
1. A woman, aged 30, in the sixth or seventh month of preg¬
nancy, was taken ill at 1 p.m. She was not seen by any medical
man till 4 o’clock. One of our colleagues then saw her and
remained with her till her death. I saw her at 7 p.m. She was
evidently sinking—the power of voice was lost. She died soon
after 8 o’clock. It has been said that very few pregnant women
have ever recovered when attacked by cholera. Is this the fact?
2. A woman, upwards of 60. She was in the state of col¬
lapse, was very cold, had dysenteric evacuations, blood and
mucus. She recovered. The medicines given to her were
Veratrum, Merc. corr. and Colocynth. In this case there were
the choleraic face and voice, icy coldness, cramps in the legs, a
pulse almost extinct, but neither rice-water evacuations, nor
suppression of urine.
3. A lady, 50 years of age. Here too was extreme collapse,
choleraic face and voice, but dysenteric evacuations, and great
coldness. This lady had Veratrum and Merc, corr., and re¬
covered.
4. A lady at the critical period, nymphomanic. She had
collapse, great coldness, and cramps in the legs, with great
sexual excitement. She recovered with Veratrum and Platina.
Her evacuations were whitish, and flocculent.
5. A gentleman, who had severe diarrhoea, with whitish
evacuations, and collapse. He was attended by a colleague, and
then had the consecutive fever, of a very low and adynamic
type, with perpetual tremors, stammering voice, pinched features.
I saw him late in his illness. He died about the seventeenth
day.
6. 7, and 8. Three children in one family—all in collapse
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23
followed by fever. Two nurses, in succession, fell ill. The
disease in each of these cases partook of the charabter of what
is called abdominal typhus. These cases all did well. I men¬
tion them because the typhoid character was predominant: and
I have since seen several other similar cases, in which there was
the choleraic influence, though there was not pronounced cholera.
Here arises another question whether cholera is communicable
or not from the patient to those around him. I believe, under
certain circumstances, it is. In short, as Milton said (however
unjustly) of Charles I., that he was Nerone Neronior, I believe
that sometimes cholera is typho typhior. The vext question of
contagion and infection is a very difficult one. What is called
puerperal fever is sometimes an inflammatory disease, and some¬
times typhoid; the same remark applies to yellow fever. In the
one case the disease is not communicated nor communioable; in
the other case, it is.
I have confessed that my own experience of cholora is very
small, but as a bye-stander sees, at times, more into a game of
chess than the players, so one who reads evidence and considers
it, of an epidemic like cholera, may occasionally come to right
conclusions as well as those who are in the thick of the fight,
however deficient he may be in the data derived from actual
experience.
My conclusion is that we must not be too enthusiastic in
treating such terrible diseases. A certain number must die; the
very fountain of life is in many cases poisoned from the begin¬
ning, and man is mortal, and must die when his time is come.
There are, there must be, cases occurring, alas ! too often, when
homoeopathy must fail, as any other method has done and must
do. We can only claim a comparative superiority over other
methods; we cannot claim the power, more than human, of
always subduing disease. It is true wisdom to be modest and
humble.
The islands of Trinidad, Tobago, St. Lucia, and Grenada,
have also suffered, during tbe present year, very severely from
cholera.
There is a curious feature in the history of the epidemic as it
occurred in Trinidad; and the circumstance is well worthy of
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Cholera in Barbados,
our consideration in connexion with the other anomalies of this
mysterious disease. The Coolies (immigrants from India) who
lived in the town, enjoyed an almost total immunity from the
disease, which swept off hundreds of the black ahd coloured
population, both African and Creole. Yet the Coolies are
decidedly the worst class of the whole colony, filthy in their
persons and in their dwellings, and seemingly totally regard¬
less of what they eat, so long as it is food of some kind or
other. Several hunters, who passed through the woods, during
the prevalence of the epidemic, found monkies dead under the
trees in all directions. They appear to have dropped from
the tree overhead, either dead, or in the agonies of death.
During the small-pox visitation in the same island, some time
ago, the same thing was observed. The local writer, from
whence this information is derived, says it is a proof of the
close resemblance between the physical constitution of the
monkey and that of the human being.
In 1849, canaries were said to have died in great numbers in
London, and other places swept by cholera. The potato-blight
occurred also at the same time. During the present year the
potato has been nearly' free from disease, and there have been
no reports of the death of canaries.
It has been asserted by some that cholera is now acclimated
among us, and that henceforth it is always to be expected in
Britain, whether periodically, or as an epidemic. There seems,
however, to be no reason why it should not disappear as well as
the sweating Bickness, the black death, the plague, and other
forms of pestilence.
During the present year the disease has attacked places of a
high elevation, as well as those that are low-lying. Grenada is
a lofty, while Barbados is a low-lying isand.
It is satisfactory for us to know that homoeopathy has main¬
tained its character for great comparative success in the treat¬
ment of the disease; and it is also satisfactory that at last there
is a chance of our statistics being admitted, by the sanction of a
recognised public authority, in conjunction with those of allo¬
pathy, as medical facts.
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ON THE SWEDISH GYMNASTICS,
By Dr. Roth.
( Continued from Vol. XII, page 659.J
Case. — Complete insensibility of the skin, fits similar to
epileptic, and congestion to the head.
Miss * * * 23 years old,* was always more or less
ailing, and disposed to hysteric laughing, or crying: although
the catamenia appeared at the proper age, they were rather
scanty. About the month of June 1853, she suffered some
slight agitation, and this was believed to have brought on a
course of the most violent fits, with loss of consciousness, con¬
tractions, extensions, and contortions of the arms and legs, as
well as of the trunk, lasting from a few minutes to a quarter of
an hour. After eight months of suffering, this young lady was
sent to my institution and examined the 27th of January 1854,
in the presence of her physician and of her mother. I was
desirous of ascertaining whether there was any particular sen¬
sibility in the spine, or whether there existed any deformity
in the vertebral column; but I found it impossible to examine
the spine, as she was unable to keep upright, when the stays were
taken off, and she was very soon seized with a fit. Great mirth¬
fulness often preceded the fits, which had lately been very fre¬
quent. She complained of giddiness, heaviness, and fulness of the
head : the face was of a greenish-yellow color, very dark circles
round the eyes, a slight sardonic smile on the face; the appetite
was good, the bowels regular; catamenia scanty, little action of
the skin, the forearms, hands, legs and feet cold; the skin of
the whole body almost insensible to the prick of a needle; to
such an extent was this the case, that for the amusement of her
younger sisters, she would take needle and thread, and stitch
away upon the skin of her arm or leg with the most perfect
sang froid. The epigastrium was the seat of almost constant
pain and tenderness, and the abdomen would often suddenly
swell to a most uncomfortable size.
No beneficial effects having resulted from a lengthened thera-
* In the treatment of ladies, beside the medical man, only female gym-
nasts are employed.
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
peutic treatment, Dr. Dudgeon, whose patient she was, placed
her under my care. During the first week of the treatment, she
had a fit more or less violent of from ten to twenty-five minutes
every day in my operating room; in the second week she had
but two fits, and in the third a slight one at home : in the fol¬
lowing three weeks there was no fit, and no had symptoms
appeared even during the catamenia. The 16th of March,
about six weeks after the beginning of the treatment, this young
lady left town in perfect health, and became so much stronger,
that she was enabled to dispense with stays, the absence of
which however it was impossible to detect, and for the abolition
of which injurious article of dress, the lady has become a zea¬
lous advocate. She had no fits till some weeks afterwards,
when the catamenia suddenly ceased, without any known cause,
but since this time, notwithstanding all the excitement inci¬
dental to her position in life, she enjoyed the best health during
the past season.*
The following three prescriptions of movements were used,
ancT with the exception of sponging with cold water, in the
morning, no medicinal or hygienic agent was employed, as Dr.
Dudgeon wished to give a fair trial to the medico-gymnastic
treatment.
The Swedes use symbols, the Germans abbreviations, in
their prescriptions, but as both are unintelligible to the unini¬
tiated, I prefer using the names of positions and movements in
extenso, as I have no wish that the prescriptions should not be
understood.
30th January* 1854.
FIRST PRESCRIPTION.
1. Half lying, double hand-rotation (passive).
2. Half lying, double hand-flexion (P.R.) and extension (G.R.)
3. Half lying, double foot-rotation (passive).
4. Half lying, double foot-extension (G.R.) and flexion G.R )
5. Half lying, double forearm-extension (G.R.) and flexion
(G.R.).
* Since this was written, she has had twice, while the catamenia appeared,
a slight fit, but without any consequent prostration of strength, and although
this case is not a perfect model of a cure, it will serve as an instance of the
utility of medical gymnastics rationally applied in similar nervous derange¬
ments.
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27
6. Half lying, alternate stride* (or hip) rotation (passive).
7. Wing, high stride sitting, trunk-twisting (G.R.) and
(P.R.).
8. Half lying, double leg-flexion (P.R.) and extension (G.R.).
9. Rack-, half lying, arm extension (G.R.) and flexion (P.R).
10. Half lying, leg-abduction or separation (G.R.) and adduc¬
tion or bringing together (P.R.).
11. Half lying, double arm-fulling and stroking.
1 2. Half lying, loin-lift-stroking.
All the movements of the first prescription were made with
the exception of No. 7, in a half lying position, because the
patient was weak, and consequently a support was necessary.
I acted principally on the limbs, to draw off the superabundance
of nervous fluid from the brain, and to increase the capillary
circulation in the forearms, hands, legs and feet, which were
constantly cold ; therefore most of the movements were directed
to the extremities. The passive movements on the hands and
feet, although momentarily retarding the circulation, increase it
in their secondary action, as well as the temperature of these
parts. The half-active movements, by the more copious af¬
flux of nervous fluid and arterial blood, accelerate directly the
capillary circulation in the parts most remote from the internal
organs, and more blood being necessary in the extremities, its
quantity in the central organs is diminished. By the attention
directed in these half active movements to the limbs, and by
the efforts of executing them, more nervous fluid is brought to
the surface, and thus the temperature of these remote parts is
raised. The twisting movement (No. 7) acted on the obliqui
abdominales and abdominal organs very powerfully, and con¬
tributed to the improvement of the abdominal circulation; the
leg-separation was used to throw the blood into the muscles of
the thighs, and to produce a more copious menstruation.
The following engravings and descriptions of the single
movements will show the reader clearly how they were done,
and if he takes the trouble of executing them, as the operating
gymnast, or the patient, he will feel the sensations and effects
produced by the various movements, allowing an interval of
from two to five minutes between them.
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
1. Half lying, passive hand-rotation (fig. 91).
The patient is in half lying posi¬
tion ; two gymnasts stand one on
each side, and make simultaneously
the rotation, or a kind of circular
movement of the hands in the wrist
joints while the patient is passive.
The engraving represents the perfectly passive left forearm of
the patient, which is fixed above the wrist by the right hand of
the gymnast, who stands to the left of the patient, and with his
left hand takes hold of the patient’s passive left hand, in order
to make with it the circular movement, indicated by the dotted
circle : he makes ten or twelve circles in the direction from
right to left, and after an interval of a few seconds to half a
minute, the same number of circular movements in the opposite
direction; and this operation with the necessary intervals is
repeated once or twice more, so that the whole number of rota¬
tions amounts to 36 or 48. These hand-rotations generally
precede and follow the hand-flexion and extension.
2. Half lying, double hand-flexion (P.R ) and extension (G.R.)
(fig. 92).
The patient and two gymnasts are in the same C 9 mmencing
position as in the previous movement, with this difference, that
the hand and fingers of the patient
are perfectly stretohed, and the gym¬
nasts bend them, or vice versa. The
engraving shows two positions of the
patient’s left hand; in the upper the
hand and fingers are stretched, and
form a straight line with the forearm ;
the left hand of the gymnast takes
firm hold of the fingers, and tries, whilst bending the hand
at the wrist joint, to pull it also slightly, so that there is
during the whole flexion, in which the patient resists, a pulling
of the hand combined with the flexion.
The hand bent at the wrist joint (the lower position in the
engraving) is the final position. After an interval of a few
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29
seconds, during -which the hands of the gymnast as well as that
of the patient, remain in the final position, this begpmes the
commencing position of the movement hand extension (G.R.),
in which the patient stretches the hands, while the gymnast re¬
sists. During both the flexion and extension, the gymnast
fixes firmly with his right hand the patient’s forearm. The
hand flexion (P.R.), and extension (G.R.), are done alternately,
with an interval of a few seconds, four to six times.
The word “ double ” before the name of the movement, indi¬
cates that the movement is done simultaneously on both hands
by two gymnasts; but should the patient be very weak, or
unable to act with both hands at the same time, the movement
is done alternately on each hand.
3. Saif lying, double foot-rotation (passive) (fig. 93).
The patient is in half lying position, his legs in stride posi¬
tion, instead of resting with their whole length on the couch
(as in fig. 71), are supported from the knee downwards on the
knees of two gymnasts, who
sit obliquely outwards before
the patient: the one on the
left of the patient with his
right side, the other on the
right of the patient with his
left directed toward the pa¬
tient, and the two nearly
facing each other.
The engraving illustrates the commencing position of the
patient’s left leg, stretched only at the knee joint, but perfectly
passive at the ancle joint, resting with the lower part of the knee
joint on the upper part of the gymnast’s right knee, and with
the lower part of the calf on the left knee of the gymnast, whose
knees are placed apart at a convenient distance, depending upon
the length of the patient’s leg. The gymnast fixes the leg by
grasping it near the ancle joint, so as to allow a free rotatory
movement in the foot joint, analogous to the rotation of the
hand, and which he executes with his left hand placed on the
joint of the foot. The rotations of the foot are rather elliptic
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
than circular. It is understood that the gymnast engaged in
the execution of‘tbe movements on the right foot, makes use of *
his hands in a reversed manner. With regard to the execution
of the foot rotation and the number of rotatory movements, I
refer to the description of the hand rotation .*
4. Half lying, double foot-extension (P.R.) and flexion (G.R.)
(fig. 94 and 95).
The patient and gymnast
are placed as in the preceding
movement, as far as regards
the legs and ' knees. The
diagram shows the commen¬
cing positions of the foot-ex¬
tension (G.R.) and the pa¬
tient’s right foot resting on
the knees of the gymnast,
who sits on the right; the
foot of the patient is bent at the foot joint, and his toes
stretched; the left hand of the gymnast fixes the foot above
the ancle by a firm grasp, his right arm is bent at the elbow
joint, while his right hand grasps the toes and presses firmly
on the joint of the toes and the upper part of the sole; the
upper part of the gymnast’s body is obliquely bent to the left,
in order to resist not only by the power of the arm but also by
the weight of the body during
the action of the extensors of
the patient’s foot; during
the extension of the foot, the
position of the arms and
hands of the gymnast with
respect to his own body
should not change, to which
end he gradually bends in
the lowest part of the spine
* Whole-length engravings of the patient’s and gymnast’s positions in half
lying foot-rotation, in foot-extension (G.R.) and in foot-flexion (G.R), are
published page 178, 179, 180, of my book, “ The Prevention and Cure of
many Chronic Diseases by Movements.”
Original from
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by Dr. Roth.
31
till he assumes the position shown by the diagram (fig. 05).
Remaining with his body thus bent to the right, he changes
the position of his arms, and places the hand by which he had
fixed the leg near the azide joint on the anterior and upper
surface of the foot and toes, (as in the commencing position of
the next movement (fig. 96), which represents the hands of the
gymnast placed on the left foot of the patient,) and with the
hand which had grasped the toes, he takes hold of the heel in
order to resist the flexion of the patient’s foot, in which he is
again assisted by the weight of the body.
Fig. 96 illustrates the commencing position of foot-flexion
(G.R.) The left foot of the pa¬
tient is stretched at the ancle joint,
the right hand of the gymnast, who
sits to the left, is placed on the
upper and anterior part of the foot
and toes, while his left hand takes
hold of the patient’s heel; the
gymnast resists till he comes int o
the final position represented in
the diagram (fig. 97), where the
patient’s foot is seen at its
greatest flexion. The foot-ex¬
tension (G.R.) waft flexion (G.
R.) are done alternately, pre¬
ceded and followed by the foot-
rotation , in the same manner, and to the same extent with re¬
gard to their repetition, as the hand-flexion and extension.
5. Half-lying, double forearm-extension (G.R.) and
flexion (P.R.).
The patient is in half lying position, both forearms bent, and
with the stretched hands directed towards the chest. Two gym¬
nasts stand near the patient, one on each side; with the arm
next to the patient, they take hold of his upper arm, which
they fix, while they grasp with the hands of the other arm the
forearms above the wrist joint, and resist the patient extending
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
the forearms. The commencing position is similar to the en¬
graving (fig. 6) with this difference, that the gymnast’s left
hand must be placed on .the outside of the 'patient’s forearm ;
then follows the forearm-flexion (G.R.), which is described as
active-passive forearm flexion (see figs. 5 and 6). The flexion
and extension are done alternately three to four times.
6. Half lying, passive alternate stride {or hip) rotation.
The patient is in half lying position : a gymnast standing
sideways takes hold, while one leg is bent in the knee and
placed with the foot on the floor, of the other perfectly passive
leg, which he bends in the knee and hip joints, and moves it so
that the knee describes a circle. The
engraving (fig. 98) represents the
passive left leg of the patient bent at
the knee joint, the right hand of the
gymnast who stands at the left, ma¬
king the rotatory movement of the
hip-joint, while his left hand is sup¬
porting and carrying the foot by a grasp at and round the
heel. The dotted circle is that which the knee describes, and
which by degrees is made to sweep a larger and larger circle.
After the rotation of one hip joint, which comprises thirty to
forty circular movements, done with the necessary intervals,
partly to the right and partly to the left, the same operation is
performed on the other leg. It is desirable that a second gymnast,
standing in a bent position before the patient, should fix the
patient’s hips, and the leg which is on the floor; the first he
does by his hands, while he fixes with both his knees and legs
the patient’s knee and leg placed between them as seen in the
dotted lines of the gymnast in fig. 116, with this difference, that
the gymnast places his hands on the patient's hips, while the
arms of the patient are passive, instead of being in wing-posi¬
tion, as shewn in that diagram.
7. Wing, high-stride sitting, trunk-twisting (G.R.) and \P.R).
The patient with the hands on the hips {wing) is sitting with
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33
m
the feet apart {stride) on a high operating chair provided with
two narrow boards on each side, on which the feet rest, and are
prevented from slipping by a half circular strap fixed on the
boards. In this position the patient twists his body first to one
side, while the gymnast resists by placing his hands on the
patient’s shoulders, so that while he pushes against the shoulder
which is moving backwards, he always pulls slightly with his
other hand the shoulder which is moving forwards.
The engravings 99 and
100 show more distinctly
how the movement is
done. The first repre- m
sents the patient in
high-stride-sitting posi- 'y
tion, with the upper part —,
of the body twisted to the | ^ /
jeft; the right hand of the j
gymnast, who is supposed ~_Jy TT
( 99 ) to stand behind him, is "fioo)
placed on the upper and posterior part of the patient’s right
shoulder, against which it pushes, while the left hand of the
gymnast is placed on the upper and anterior part of the pati¬
ent's left shoulder, which it pulls or rather holds back, when the
patient twists ‘from the left to the right. In fig. 100 the right
shoulder, which was previously directed forwards, is now directed
backwards, because the body is twisted to the right. The twist¬
ing is done three times alternately to the right and left while the
gymnast resists, and as often by the gymnast while the patient
resists. The resistance either on the part of the gymnast or the
patient, must in no case be too strong, but always in propor¬
tion to the strength of the patient, whom I advise to breathe
deep after each half-active movement, that he may not be
fatigued.
8. Half-lying , leg-flexion (P.R.) and extension (G.R.).
The patient in half lying position rests on the couch, only to
the knees. While his legs are stretched, two gymnasts stand
VOL. XIII, NO. LI.—JANUARY, 1855. D
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34
On the Swedish Gymnastics,
in walk position, one on each side of the patient’s legs protrud¬
ing beyond the couch, and fix the lower part of the thighs
above the knee-joint by the hand nearest to the patient, while
they bend his knees, with the other hands grasping the patient's
legs above the foot-joint, which they press gradually down
while the patient resists: the gymnasts are consequently stoop¬
ing when the final position of leg-Jiexion (P.R.) is attained;
( 102 )
they then resist without
any change of their hands
while the patient again
stretohes his legs, and thus
the leg-extension (G.R.)
is executed. The engra¬
ving (fig. 101) illustrates
the commencing position
of right leg-flexion (P.
R.), and fig. 102 the final
position, which is also the
commencing position of
right leg-extension (G.R.)
while fig. 101 is its final
position. The movements
are done alternately three
times.
9. Raek-half-lying, arm-extension (G.R.) and flexion (P.R.)
The commencing position of the patient with his arms
stretched forwards (rack) as clearly shown in the engraving
fig. 103. The gymnast standing in walk position, (in order
to be more firm), takes hold of the patient’s stretched arms
near the hand joints, and resists while the patient moves
the stretched arms in a horizontal line backwards, and in the
shoulder joints only till the position of fig. 104 is attained.
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by Dr. Roth.
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where the gymnast, whose feet
must not move, is seen very
much bent forwards. From
this position the gymnast pulls
the stretched arms of the pa¬
tient, who resists again into the
first position, the bending taking
place only in the shoulder joints,
which movement constitutes
arm flexion (P.R.). The two
movements are alternately re¬
peated three to four times, and
if done with the help of
two gymnasts, one stands
on each side of the pa¬
tient, and takes hold with
one hand of the patient’s
arm near the hand joint,
while he fixes the shoulder
- on his side with the other
hand.
( 105 )
The engraving, fig 105, represents also
the two positions of arm-flexion and ex¬
tension in right walk-standing position of
the patient, and.as the drawing was taken
in front, the forward stretched arm of the
patient is seen fore-shortened, but the
two positions of the gymnast’s left arm in
the two. actions are distinctly seen, while
his right hand fixes the patient’s hip. Two
gymnasts are wanted in the standing posi¬
tion, in which the movement is considerably
more difficult for the patient than in the sitting position.
d 2
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
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10. Half-lying, double leg-separation or abduction (G.R.) and
adduction or bringing together (P.R.).
The patient is in half lying position, his stretched legs touch¬
ing each other in their whole length, while the knees and toes
are turned outwards, and are kept by a gymnast, who stands
before him in walk position, as shown in fig. 86. The patient
separates the stretched legs while the gymnast resists, as far
outwards and horizontally as possible, in which positions, after
a few seconds employed in breathing, the opposite movement
leg-adduction (P.R.) is done by the gymnast, while the patient
resists. The two movements are done alternately three or four
times. The patient may have the arms in wing position.
When two gymnasts execute the movement, as the patient
gains strength, one stands on each side, takes hold of one leg
with one hand at the foot joint, and assists with the other
placed above the knee-joint to stretch the leg of the patient,
who during the movement is frequently disposed to relax the
knee. The abduction and adduction alternately done are also
called division, and executed three or four times.
11. Half-lying, fulling of the arms.
This passive movement is done by two gymnasts standing
one on each side of the patient, and is performed simultaneously
on the patient perfectly passive, arms hanging down at the side,
the patient being in half lying'position. The gymnasts place
the palms of both
hands on the opposite
sides of the arm,which
they slightly press, as
seen in fig. 106, repre¬
senting the right arm
of the patient; he then
slides one hand for¬
wards and the other
backwards, and so on
( 106 ) as seen in fig. 107, ( i OT)
representing the patient’s left arm. The dotted lines indicate
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37
the to and fro direction, as the hands progress slowly from the
upper part of the arms to the hands and fingers, which are thus
put into a quick vibration, if the patient's arms are perfectly
passive. The number of to and fro movements varies from 20
to 30, from the upper arms to the fingers. The fulling is
repeated three or four times, so that the gymnast moves his
hands in the course described from 60 to 80 or 90 to 120
times. This movement is generally finished with a longitudinal
stroking from the shoulder to the hand, for which purpose the '
gymnast takes hold with both hands, his fingers being stretched
at the highest parts of the patient’s arm, and while pressing
gently makes a stroking movement similar to mesmeric passes,
but differing from them, inasmuch as the slightly pressing hand
is in contact with the arm. The arm-stroking is done three or
four times, and it each time begins at the highest point of the
arm.
Note — Stroking is the moving of a gymnast’s hand or hands
near to or in oontact with the surface of different parts of the
patient, so that larger or smaller surfaces are fanned by the
hand of the gymnast, or are in mediate or immediate contact
with it, according as the parts are or are not covered with clo¬
thing. The first kind of stroking is called near-stroking ; the
second, contact-stroking: of the latter there are two kinds, the
slighter and the stronger , according to the degree of pressure
made during the movement.
12. Half-lyin'g, loin-lift-stroking.
The patient is in half lying position with the feet placed apart
on the floor. The gymnast standing before him in a walk posi¬
tion, places the hands in such a manner that they touch each
other with the tips of the fingers, or cover each other in the
region of the loins of the patient. The gymnast then lifts the
middle part of the trunk a little upwards, so that the pit of the
stomach projects, the shoulder blades and the posterior surface
of the thighs with the seat still remaining on the chair. As
soon as the patient is a little raised, the gymnast pulls him
still more forwards, while his arms are placed round the body of
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
the patient; he then brings his hands in front by a stroking
movement till his wrists almost touch each other on the an¬
terior side of the patient’s abdomen, on which the patient
falls softly back and down on the chair. Such stroking is done
five or six times, and after a little pause is sometimes repeated.
In the present case the patient’s abdomen was so tender, that
the hands were brought down sideways to the thighs.
The movements were well home by the patient, with the
exception of the half-lying leg-abduction (G.R.) and adduc¬
tion (P.R.), whioh produced such a disagreeable and uncom¬
fortable sensation, that I substituted for it the movement
Trunk lying, pelvis-rotation,
whioh is a passive movement analogous to the above described
rotations, and which is done while the patient is in trunk-lying
position (fig. 64, representing the patient and one gymnast
fixing the body); a second gymnast takes hold of the patient’s
stretched legs, puts the pelvis and legs into a circular motion
describing a cone, the point of which is at the lowest part of
the spine, while the basis is formed by the patient’s feet. After
eight to ten rotations or rollings to the right, the same number
is done to the left, and the whole operation repeated after a
short interval. This last movement was done principally to
accelerate the abdominal circulation, and to increase the men¬
strual secretion, on which I could not act by the prescribed
half active leg-division, in consequence of the uncomfortable
feeling which it produced.
The movements of the first prescription were continued to the
19th of February, amounting to fourteen times only, the patient
having been absent from the institution for three days, in conse¬
quence of some slight indisposition. The improvement attained
in this short period induced me to change the prescription
to another, which contained the following movements.
19th Feb. 1854. second prescription.
1. Half lying, longitudinal arm-and-leg-down-stroking.
2. Rectangular high-standing, foot-flexion (G.R) and exten¬
sion (P.R.).
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89
3. Lean,-stride-standing,-double forearm*flexion, and exten¬
sion (P.R.) and (G.R.).
4. High-stride-wing-sitting, trunk-twisting (G.R.) and (P.R.).
5. Wing-arch-(supported) squat-standing, leg extension (G.R.)
and flexion (P.R.).
6. Stretch-grasp-inclined-reclined-squat-lean-standing, knee-
down-pressure (P.R. and knee-raising (G.R.)
7. Wing-stride-toe-curtsey standing, knee-extension (G.R.)
and flexion (P.R.).
8. Yard-ledge-standing, trunk-twisting (G.R.) and (P.R.).
9. Half-lying,-double-leg-separation (P.R.) and (G.R.)
10. Wing-stride-toe-standing,-trunk-twisting (G.R.)
11. Half-lying,-loin lift-stroking.
This prescription contains several movements in standing
position, which the patient was now capable of, in consequence
of increased strength.
1. Half-lying, longitudinal-arm and leg-down-stroking.
The arm-stroking was done as described after the arm
fulling, about eight or twelve times, and as often on the legs.
The gymnast standing before the patient, places the hands on
the hips, and makes the stroking movement on both legs simul¬
taneously, by moving the hands which are in contact with the
patient, down the thighs, the bent knees, legs, and feet.
2. High rectangular, standing, foot-flexion (G.R.) and
(P.R.).
The patient stands on a chair, or some elevated level place,
in front of a vertical plank from 12 to 15 inches wide, his feet
at a right angle with each other, and the heels a few inches
apart. The heel of the foot which performs the movement is
about two inches within the edge of the ohair, so that the foot
projects and is then free to move. The patient bends his arms
at the elbow, and fixes himself by grasping the plank on each
side with one hand at the height of his elbow. The gymnast
standing at the side of the patient, fixes with the hand which
is nearest the patient, the heel, and resists with the other hand
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
placed on the upper part of the foot and toes, while the patient
bends the foot upwards. This is foot-flexion (G.E.), and when
the foot is bent to the utmost, the gymnast after a pause of a
few seconds without changing the position of his hands, presses
down, that is extends the foot, while the patient resists, and
this is foot-extension (P.R.). When the foot is to be bent by
the gymnast from the last position (extension), then he must
place his hand under the foot and toes, and pull these parts
up while the patient resists : this is foot-flexion (P.R.) From
this position, without any change, the foot-extension (G.R.)
is made by the patient stretching the foot while the gymnast
resists: these four different foot movements may be executed
also in the following way:
1. Foot-flexion (P.R.) 3. Foot-extension (P.R.)
2. Foot-flexion (G.R.) 4. Foot-extension (G.R.)
In this case the gymnast must change his operating hand after
each movement, which is repeated at least three times, so that
the number of actions in these movements amounts at least to
twelve to each foot. Both the flexors and extensors of the foot
are acted upon in a high degree in this position, in which a
great part of the muscles of the trunk and of the other leg are
brought into activity, in order to keep up the position during
the movement.
3. Lean-stride-standing, double forearm-flexion and extension.
(P.R.) and (G.R.)
The patient is in stride-standing position, and leans with the
back against a vertical plank or post, 12 or 15 inches wide.
Two gymnasts in walk position stand one on each side of the
patient, and take hold of his forearms which are bent forwards,
while the upper arms in yard-position are fixed. The gymnast
on the right fixes the patient’s right upper arm with his left
hand, while the gymnast on the left fixes the patient’s left upper
arm with his right hand; while they both resist or pull with
the other hands, grasping the patient’s forearm. Having given
the details of the forearm-flexion (P.R.) and forearm-flexion
(G.R.), with the illustration belonging to them, I will only
mention, that in the forearm-extension (P.R.), the gymnast
pulls the patient’s forearm from the bent position, till it is
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41
stretched, and in the same horizontal line as the upper arm,
while the patient resists. The forearm-extension (G.R.) is
also in the same direction done by the patient, while the gym¬
nast resists. The four different movements are done twice or
thrice each; and with regard to the order in which they follow
each other, I refer to the preceding movement.
4, High-stride-wing-sitting, trunk-twisting (G.R.) and (P.R.).
This movement is described in the first prescription.
5. Wing-arch-squat-standing leg-extension (G.R.) and
leg-flexion (P.R.)
The patient is standing with the hands on the hips {wing)
and the chest well vaulted {arch), with his knee bent, (see the
position of the left leg, fig 30); but instead of keeping it freely
up, the thigh is supported by a horizontal padded bar, while a
gymnast standing behind the patient fixes him by holding the
hips. The operating gymnast stands on the other side of the
bar, and executes the movement exactly as described in the first
prescription, with-this difference, that the leg-extension (G.R,)
precedes the leg-flexion (P.R.)*
6. Stretch-grasp-inclined-reclined-squat-lean-standing- knee-
down pressure (P.R.) and knee-raising (G.R.). figs. 108, 109.
The patient stands
in inclined - reclined
position : his arms are
extended upward, and
the hands grasp a high
peg protruding on each
side of the vertical
plank, against which
one leg presses (leans)
with the heel, while
the other leg is in
squat position. Two
gymnasts standing one
on each side of the patient, place each one
* At page 181 of my book, the Cure of Diseases by Movements , is a larger
engraving of this position of the patient and operating gymnast in this move¬
ment
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
hand on the sides of the lowest part of the patient’s spine (the
loins) and pull the body so forwards that the stomach is the
most protruding part. The gymnast on the right, as seen in
the engraving (fig. 108), standing in right-walk position, places
his right hand on the patient’s right raised knee, and presses it
down while the patient resists. Of the gymnast on the left
only the right hand on the patient’s loin is seen: this gymnast
places his left hand covering the right hand of the other gym¬
nast also on the patient’s knee, and assists in the operation,
which is done three times alternately with the raising of the
knee (G.R.) on one leg, and then as often on the other. The
other engraving (fig. 109), illustrates the final position in
which the leg of the patient is stretched and the gymnast is
bent, and from which attitude the knee-raising (G.R.) begins,
which is done by the patient while the gymnast resists.
7. Wing-stride-curtsey-toe-standing-knee-extension (G.R.)
and flexion (P.R.).
The commencing position of the patient in this movement is
indicated by the dotted lines of fig. 50, which show the hands
on the hips (wing), the knees bent very much outward (curtsey),
the feet placed apart (stride), and the whole body on the toes
(toe-standing). Two gymnasts stand, the one before, the other
behind the patient, and place their hands upon the patient’s
hands on the hips, in such a way that the right hand of one
gymnast covers the left of his colleague. The patient then still
on his toes, gradually stretches his legs, while the gymnast
resists till the wing-stride-toe-standing position is attained.
The gymnasts afterwards press, or rather pull down the hips
to make the patient’s legs bend, although he resists, and this is
called wing-stride,-toe-standing, knee-flexion (P.R.).
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8. Yard-ledge-standing-trunk-twisting (G.R.) and (P.R).
Figs 110 and 111.
C^\ The diagrams represent the twist-
yW Ny ing of the standing patient, whose
arms are stretc ^ e ^ out (y ar d)> while
^rr7T )>) the ^ eet pl ftce< ^ two or tbree inches
\4 / \k^// apart, are prevented from slipping
(\\) by two small ledges at the edge of a
\ 1) 1 V fixed board, sufficiently wide to re-
\ / A I ceive the two feet of the patient
mv/IyV an ^ third one of a gymnast
I JjfJ U placed partly between the two for-
^ J i W- i _. ) 1 mer. The gymnast standing behind
--the patient in walk-position, places
(110) the anterior part of one foot be¬
tween those of the patient, and thus presses them slightly
against both ledges: he takes hold of the patient’s upper arm
by a grasp near the elbow joints, and pushes with one hand
t against one arm, while with the
other he slightly pulls the other
arm of the patient, who during the
movement holds his arms perfectly
horizontal in the height of the
shoulders, and so inflexible at the
shoulders that as the arm moves
the trunk moves. The twisting is
done as described in the first pre
scription, but differs in this, that
here the legs also participate in the
twist movement, and only the feet
clll) remain perfectly still. Fig 110 illus¬
trates the commencing position, and fig 111 the final position
of yard-standing,-trunk-twisting to the right (G.R.).
9. Half lying, double-leg-separation (G.R.) and (P.R.)
The commencing position of the first movement, viz. with
the resistance of the gymnast, is illustrated by fig. 86. The
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44
On the Swedish Gymnastics,
leg-separation (P.R.) is done while the legs of the patient who
is in half-lying position, are placed near each other. Two
gymnasts, one on each side of the patient, stand near the legs
in crooked-walk position ; with one hand they grasp the leg
above the foot-joint and pull it towards themselves, thus
separating the legs while the patient resists; the other hands of
the gymnasts are placed above the knees to assist them in re¬
maining stretched.
Leg-separation (P.R.) acts very strongly on the abductors of
the legs, and thus differs entirely from the first part of the
movement in which the abductors are brought into activity;
the two movements are done one after the other, and the
adduction of the legs which precedes each action, is done
actively, that is merely by the patient
10. Wing-stride toe-standing-trunk-twisting (G.R.)
This is a twisting of the body, alternately on both sides, with
resistance of the gymnast on the shoulders of the patient, whose
hands are on the hips, and the feet apart on the toes. The
movement is done three times on each side.
11. Half lying-loin-lift-stroking is mentioned in the first
prescription.
The movements of the second prescription were done till the
6th of March, but only ten times, as a violent cold prevented
the patient’s attendance at the Institution for several days, but
notwithstanding this the improvement continued at increased
speed.
6th March, 1854. third prescription.
1. Half-lying, longitudinal arm-, leg-, and loin-lift-stroking.
2. Half-stretch-, reclined-, walk-standing-, upper- and fore¬
arm-flexion (G.R.)
3. Stride-toe-standing, arm^extension out and up (G.R.)
4. Half-stretch-, high-stride-sitting, trunk-twisting (G.R.) and
(P.R.).
5. Toe-opposite-fall-standing-, posture and raising (P.R.).
6. Rack-, crooked-, thigh-opposite close-standing, trunk-rais¬
ing (G:R.) and bending (P.R.).
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45
7. Stretch-grasp*, inclined-reclined-, squat-, lean-standing,
knee-down-pressure (P.R.) and raising (G.R.).
8. Wing-, jump-, half-lying; leg-extension (G.R.).
9. Wing-, long-stride-, fall-sitting, trunk-twisting (G.R.) and
(P.R.).
10. Stride-standing, head-raising (G.R.) and flexion (P.R.).
11. Half-stretch-, hip-lean-, walk-standing, trunk-sideways-
flexion (G.R.) and raising (P.R.).
12. Opposite-, inclined-reclined-standing, transversal-loin-strok-
ing.
1. Half lying, longitudinal arm-leg and loin-stroking was
mentioned partly at the end of the first and partly at the be¬
ginning of the second prescription.
2. Half-stretch-,reclined-,walk-standing, upper and forearm
flexion (G.R.) (fig. 112).
The patient stands with one leg
placed forwards {walk position), and
one arm stretched up {half-stretch),
while the other is either in wing po¬
sition or passively hanging down;
the body is slightly bent backwards
{reclined). The gymnast standing
behind the patient on a slight eleva¬
tion, takes hold of the stretched arm
at the wrist joint, and resists while
the patient bends the arm simulta¬
neously at the shoulder and elbow
joints till the elbow is brought near
the side of ihe body; the other hand of the assistant fixes the
other shoulder of the patient, where there is no movement.
The engraving shows the patient’s right leg in walk-, ;and the
right arm in rfrefcA-position. This position may he changed
so that the arm of one, and the leg of the opposite side are used
in the commencing positions, but in this case the effects differ
considerably on the two sides of the body. The dotted arms in
the engraving shew one of the intermediate positions of this
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46
On the Swedish Gymnastics,
movement, which was done three times on one side, and as often
with change of the arm and leg on the other side.
The following two engravings show also an upper- and fore -
arm-flexion (G.R.) done on both arms, while the patient is in
stretch -, fall-, stride full-sitting position, as seen in the figure
(113), one gymnast standing
behind the patient on the chair
in stride - left - twist position,
supports with the external side
of his left leg the patient’s body,
and resists by taking a firm
hold of both arms; a second
gymnast standing or kneeling
in front of the patient, fixes the
knees; the patient’s hfmds are
stretched and do not grasp the
gymnast’s arms in order to pre¬
vent the action of the flexors of
(us) the hand and fingers.
The second engraving (114) shews
one of the intermediate positions;
the thorax of the patient appears
more protruded, while his arms are
bent sideways and downwards. The
gymnast is in crooked position.
3. Stride-toe-standing,arm-extension-
out and up (G.R.)
The patient was placed with the
feet apart, on the toes, as the strength
now admitted of this attitude.
The patient makes the movements of first bending up the
forearm and then stretching it out (i yard ) or up ( stretch ) posi¬
tion, as seen in the stretch-and yard-position (figs. 9 and 40)
while a gymnast standing behind takes hold of both forearms
near the wrist joints and resists during the movement. The
stretching up as well as out are done each three times.
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47
11. Half-stretch*, high-stride-sitting, trunk-twisting (G.R.)
and (P.R.)
Is done as the movement of the same name in the two first pre¬
scriptions, from which it differs in this that the patient has one arm
stretched up, while the other is either in wing position, or freely
hanging down; the gymnast takes hold of the patient's stretched
arm, at the wrist joint, and resists the twisting, but at the same
time assists by a slight pull upwards the stretching of the arm;
the other hand of the gymnast is placed on the shoulder where
the arm is not stretched. -
5. Toe-opposite-fall-standing, posture and raising (P. R.)
The patient leans with the points of both his feet touching
each other against a wall, or any vertical surface, his whole body
with the arms stretched down near it, is kept stiff by his own
muscular force; and when in fall position supported by a gym¬
nast standing behind him, who places one or both his hands on
the part where the back of the head joins the neck (occiput);
the patient remains in this position from some seconds to half
a minute, and this is called holding , or posture; after this
time the patient’s perfectly stiff and resisting body is raised by
the gymnast, so that with the exception of the flexion of the
foot-joints, no movement in any other joint of the body of the
patient is visible, who must endeavour, as far as his strength
permits, not to bend the body at the spine, hip, or knee joints.
The holding and raising (P. R.) are alternately done each
three times.
6. Rack-, crooked -, thigh opposite-close-standing, trunk-raising
(G. R.) and bending (P. R.)
The positions of these two movements are illustrated by
fig. 90.
The trunk raising (G.R.) and bending (P. R.) are done
alternately each three times.
7. Stretch-grasp-inclined-reclined, squat-lean-standing knee-
down pressure (P. R.) and raising (G. R.) is described in the
second prescription.
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
8. Wing-jump -, half-lying , leg extension (G. R.)
The patient with his hands on the hip, is in half-lying posi¬
tion, one of his legs bent on the hip and knee joints similar to
the jump position , so that the anterior surface of the thigh is
directed towards the abdomen; the
bent leg is kept at the foot by a
gymnast standing at his side, who
resists, while the patient stretches
his leg.Y, The commencing posi¬
tion, figure 115, shows the gymnast
standing at the left of the patient,
whose left bent leg he holds at the
foot by grasping the heel with his
right hand, and the toes with his
115 . left; the feet of the gymnasts are
placed at right angles to each other, and the left foot (at an
interval of at least the double length of his foot) forwards, and
parallel to the direction of the left leg, the extension of which
he resists. Figure 116 ex¬
hibits the final position of the
movement, the patient's leg
is perfectly stretched, the
gymnast’s body and left knee
bent, while his arms are still
as stretched as they were in
the beginning; tbe other leg
of the patient and his hips
(ii6) are fixed by a second gymnast,
whose position is represented by the dotted line in the en¬
graving. This latter places his hands on the patient’s hands, in
order to fix his hips, and prevents the patient’s leg kept between
his knees from moving.*
* The hands of the assisting gymnast who fixes the patient’s hips and one
leg are differently drawn in this engraving, which represents the manner in
which the hands are applied for making a passive movement, called abdominal
concentric stroking, in which both hands of the gymnast make simultaneously
two concentric circles on the abdomen.
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49
9. Winy-, long-, stride-, fall-sitting, trunk-twisting (G. R.)
and (P. R.)
The patient with his hands on the hips is in a commencing
position, similar to fig. 71; the execution of the movement is
similar to other trunk twistings.
Stride-standing-, head-raising (G. R.) and flexion (P. R.)
Figs. 117 and 118.
The feet of the patient are in stride-,
and the hands either in wwi^-position,
/jb perfectly stretched down as indi*
Sljljy cated by the dotted lines, and down-
( war( * s < ^ recte( i forearms in the position,
I if) > the head is bent forwards,
IVY 'l I the gymnast stands a little elevated
t j \ I in front of the patient, on whose neck
(in) and occiput he places his hands with
the fingers interlaced, while his forearms near the elbows rest on
the patient’s shoulders as in fig. 117; the patient then raises
his head without any change of the position of his body, till the
head is somewhat backwards bent, (fig. 118) and must avoid
the protruding of his chin during the whole movement, which is
resisted by the gymnast; from this position (fig. 118) the head
is slowly bent forwards, while the patient resists; the flexion
and raising are done alternately three times, with the necessary
intervals.
11. Half-stretch-, hip-lean-, walk¬
standing , trunk-sideways flexion
(G. R.) and raising (P. R.).
Figs. 119 and 120.
This is a flexion of the trunk, done
sideways by the patient, while the
gymnast resists on the stretched arm,
which is vertical and inflexible, so that
it does not move except simultaneously
with the body. Figure 119 shows the
patient’s left arm stretched, his left
hip leaning against a horizontal pad-
VOL. XIII, NO. LI. — JANUARY 1855. E
( 119 )
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
ded bar, bis right leg in walk position; the gymnast in front of
the patient is in right-walk-position, bis left band on the patient’s
right hip fixes the body, while he takes hold with his right of
the patient’s stretched arm and resists as long as the patient bends
his body to the left; from this
position (fig. 120) he raises the
patient who resists, again into
the commencing position. After
a short interval the two move¬
ments are alternately repeated
three to four times, and as often
on the other side. The operator
as well as the patient must
move only in the spine, while
their feet and legs remain im¬
movable.
(1W)
12 . Opposite-reclined -, inclined-standing-, transversal-loin-,
stroking.
The patient is in the position illustrated by fig. 22; the
gymnast in walk position stands behind him, and places both
his hands with the fingers directed outwards on the loins, and
with the palms makes strokings from the spine forwards, at the
same time pressing forwards, so that the patient’s abdomen is
rendered very tense, and protrudes considerably forwards; the
stroking is done from twelve to fifteen times, and sometimes
repeated after a short interval.
Second Case. —Double Spinal Curvature.
Miss-, twenty-six years old, has been affected with double
curvature of the spine for many years, and continual pain in the
back. She cannot sit or walk without pain; the head turned
to the left, and bent forwards and downwards; the shoulders so
much drawn up towards the head that there is scarcely any neck
to be seen; impossibility of breathing deep. This lady thought
that nothing could be done for her, because she was so far
advanced in age, and her complaint of such long standing. She
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51
began the treatment only to please her parents. After three
months, although the treatment had been interrupted for ten
days on account of a violent cold, her figure had entirely
changed. She could sit two hours in church without pain, and
walk more than an hour; her spirits were much better; and she
felt herself quite different. This lady, who was sent to me, I
may observe, by Dr. Black, of Clifton, expresses herself in the
following manner upon her present state :—“ I asked Dr. Black
to spend an evening with us, on purpose that he might have an
opportunity of seeing me at leisure, and talking over the system.
He seemed very much struck, indeed, with my greater ease of
carriage, and look of health, and the marked improvement of my
figure. You would, I think, be gratified could you hear the
remarks made on the improvement of my figure, and especially
on my walking. I feel so much more sensible of this; and find
I am quite able to take walks that were quite impossible for me
to think of last year. I am very thankful for this, and also that
I never have any pain between my shoulders; and my general
health is better than it has been for years."
This patient, who suffered from general weakness, and was inca¬
pable of any exertion, began her treatment the 12th November,
1852, and continued it at the institution to the 16th of Feb¬
ruary, 1853, during which time she was sixty-eight times under
the prescribed gymnastic operations. The great benefit she
derived from the movements induced her to re-visit the institu¬
tion in March, 1854, about twenty times. Since last year she
has not been troubled with a cold, though previously she was
subject to that complaint; and enjoys such health as has been
unknown to her for many years, and I may add, was married
last autumn. The majority of the movements of the two first
prescriptions were done either in a lying or half-lying position ;
the more contracted right shoulder, right hip, and left ankle-
joints were acted upon by passive rotations; the cold hands and
feet were influenced by movements analogous to those in the
previous case. Several active arm and leg movements were
used to give more vigour to the limbs while the body in high-
stride-sitting position, supported by two assistants, was actively
moved forwards, backwards, and sideways.
e 2
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On Swedish Gymnastics,
The 6th January, 1853, began
THE THIRD PRESCRIPTION.
1. Wing-half-squat-lying, alternate leg extension (G.R.)
2. Right yard-left stretch-right twist-stride sitting, right arm
extension (G.R.) and flexion (P.R.)
3. Lying, right (stretched) leg-raising (active), and pressing
down (G.R.)
4. Stretch-lying, right upper and fore arm flexion (G.R.)
5. Wing-high-stride-long sitting, trunk raising (G.R.), and
twisting to the right (G.R.)
6 . Trunk lying, double leg and chine left-rolling (passive).
7. Right yard-left wing-curtsey standing, knee-extension (G.
R.) with pressure on the right wrist joint.
8. Back grasp-stride standing, head back flexion (G.R.) and
forwards flexion (P.R.)
9. Left stretch - right wing-left hip lean-right walk standing,
left sideways trunk flexion (G.R.), and raising (P.R.
with pressure on the left wrist joint, right hip, the spine,
and both knees).
10. Climbing backwards with assistance.
11. Right walk standing, arm extension, out and upwards
(G.R.)
12. Right yard-left stretch-right twist-close standing, forwards
flexion (active), and hack flexion (G.R.)
13. Half-lying, arm fulling.
14. Half-lying, longitudinal hack stroking.
3rd February, 1853. fourth prescription.
1. Half squat lying, right knee down pressure (G.R.)
2. Lying, left leg raising (G.R.)
3. Left rest-right angle-crooked-thigh opposite standing trunk,
raising (G.R.)
4. Right rack-left stretch-lying, right arm extension (P.R. and
G.R., with fulling of the left arm).
5. Right yard,-left stretch,-left oblique-chine lean-stride-stand¬
ing, trunk right twisting (G.R.)
6. Right yard-left stretch-right twist-right step-left toe-curtsey
standing, knee extension (G.R.)
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63
7. Best-right twist-tibia opposite-standing, trunk raising (G.B.)
8 . Stretch-left oblique-right walk-kneeling, right upper and
fore arm flexion (G.B.)
9. Bight yard-left span - stride sitting, trunk left twisting (G.
B.), and right-twisting (P.B.)
10 . Stretch grasp-inclined-standing, head forwards flexion (ac¬
tive), and back flexion (G.B.)
11. Span-forwards lying, trunk raising (active), and trunk
down pressure (P.B. with head, and wrist-joint pres¬
sure).
12 . Wing, fall-toe-opposite-standing, trunk raising (P.B.)
13. Half-lying, longitudinal back stroking.
14. Half-lying, loin lift stroking.
12 th February, 1863. fifth prescription
contained the majority of the preceding movements, and the
following were substituted for those which were left off.
1 - Left rest-right angle-reclined-stride-standing, trunk for¬
wards-pulling (P.B.) with abdomen, and head pressure.
2 . Span-stride-standing, hip-left-twisting (G.B..)
3. Forwards-leg-lyingj trunk raising and twisting to the right
(active).
4. Left pass standing (left toe), arm-extension in different
levels.
5. Left balance standing, arm rotation (active).
The three last active movements, and many others which I
thought suitable to preserve the improvement hitherto obtained,
were assiduously continued by the lady for a long time at
home; and when she returned in March, 1854, the following
movements were prescribed:
1 . Inclined-thigh-opposite standing, trunk raising (G.B.)
2 . Left yard-right stretch-chine lean standing, trunk right
twisting (G.B.), and trunk left twisting (P.B.) with left
arm pressure).
3. Left yard-right stretch-stride standing, right upper and fore¬
arm flexion (G.B.), and extension (P.B.)
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On Swedish Gymnastics,
4. Wing-half-lying, leg separation (G.R.)
5. Left yard - right stretch ■ inclined - high - stride - standing (on
two pegs), trunk raising (G.R.)
6 . Hanging-leg-abduction (G.R.), and adduction (P.R.)
7. Right stretch-right twist-high stride sitting, trunk left flex¬
ion (G.R.)
8 . Left yard-right span-grasp close-standing, hip-left-sideways
guiding (G.R.)
9. Stretch grasp-right squat standing, right knee down pres¬
sure (P.R.)
10 . Fore arm support high stride kneeling, alternate hack-trans¬
versal stroking.
11 . Half-lying, loin-lift stroking.
Third Case. — Sleeplessness, Low Spirits, Cold Hands and
Feet.
Mr.-, age forty-two, an artist of eminence, suffered for
three months from the above symptoms, and was unable to
paint, partly in consequence of the want of sleep, the weakness
of his eyes, and inability to hold the brush steady when
painting. This inability to work added to his sufferings, which
appear to have been at first produced by some mental emotion
(grief). Being rather predisposed to hypochondriasis, he had
suffered about two years ago from an abdominal complaint.
Having tried other medical treatment for several months without
any result, he began to attend my institution the 22nd June,
1854, and at the end of the first week, already felt a slight im¬
provement, which continued till his health was perfectly re¬
stored. The treatment lasted about six weeks, during which
time the following movements were used, in combination with
two Russian baths per week. The suitable directions as to
regimen were strictly followed by the patient.
22 nd June, 1854. first prescription.
1 . Half-lying, foot rotation (passive), foot flexion, and exten¬
sion (G.R.)
2 . Elbow support, half-lying, fore arm flexion, and extension
(G.R.)
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3. Yard-high-stride sitting, trunk twisting (G.R., P.R.)
4. Half-lying, knee extension (G.R.), and flexion (P.R.)
5. Lean-rack-stride standing, arm extension (G.R.), and flexion
(P.R.)
6 . Stride-ourtsey-lean standing, leg extension (G.R.)
7. Half-lying, arm-fulling.
8 . Lean-grasp-half-standing, leg forwards guiding (G.R.), and
backwards guiding (P.R.)
9. High-stride sitting, trunk forwards and backwards swinging
(passive).
10 . Half-lying, longitudinal hack stroking.
19th July, 1854. second prescription.
1 . High-opposite standing, foot flexion (G.R.), and extension
(P.R.)
2. Rack-right-walk standing, arm extension (G.R.), and flexion
(P.R.)
3. High-stride sitting, trunk sideways flexion (G.R.)
4. Climbing, and deep breathing.
5. Yard-high-stride-inclined sitting, trunk twisting (G.R. and
P.R.)
6 . Wing-thigh supported-half standing, knee extension (G.R.)
and flexion (P.R.)
7. Yard-inclined-tibia-opposite standing, trunk forwards flexion
(aotive), and raising (G.R.)
8 . Lean-grasp standing, leg forwards guiding (P.R.), and back
guiding (G.R.)
9. Wing-thigh-opposite-crooked standing, trunk raising (G.R.)
10 . Opposite-inclined-reclined standing, loin forwards stroking.
Fourth Case. —Sequela of Chronic Rheumatism.
(The history of this case was written by the patient.)
This case of rheumatism was brought on by sleeping in the
bush, standing for hours in cold water, washing sheep, and
generally great exposure to cold and wet during six years.
The writer was first attacked in 1845. Symptoms: the
knee joints got suddenly inflamed and swollen. The pain and
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stiffness increased to such a degree that he was obliged to keep
his bed.
The disease then attacked the other joints and the trunk of
the body, the jaws also being fixed.
These symptoms were accompanied by high fever, and the
writer could not move or breathe without great pain.
Treatment —large doses of calomel, followed by purgatives;
leeches were frequently applied to the joints.
When pain had abated, turpentine and hartshorn were also
applied. These having failed to remove the pain, mustard and
fly-blister were frequently applied to the body and limbs, also
croton oil; a state of perspiration being constantly kept up by
heaps of blankets and warm drinks.
Diet —chicken broth and gruel.
Sleep was procured by large doses of laudanum. After
suffering under the disease for six months, the writer was very
much reduced in flesh and strength, but pain being nearly gone,
was able to sit up in his room.
He, however, never completely recovered from the effects of
the attack, but continued for many months to suffer from pains
in the back, chest, and loins; great oppression and difficulty in
breathing.
In August, 1846, the writer experienced a second attack,
which confined him to bed during September, October, and No¬
vember of that year. The symptoms were similar to those of
the first attack. Treatment—calomel and purgatives, stimu¬
lating liniment, and blisters. The diet was light; sleep was
with difficulty obtained by means of opiates.
During December, 1846, and January, February, and March,
1847, the writer continued to suffer from chronio rheumatism,
till January, 1848, at which time he experienced a third attack,
which proved to be more serious than any of the preceding
ones. Treatment—calomel and purgatives, Colchicum hydro-
iodate of potash, mustard, and turpentine poultices and blisters,
and leeches were applied to the knee and toe joints for months
together. The joints were then frequently painted with tincture
of Iodine, and bandaged, all to no purpose. During this
attack the whole system seemed to be affected with the disease.
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In consequence of excruciating pain, loss of blood, want of
sleep, low diet, and the constant use of opiates for such a
length of time, the writer was reduced to a state of extreme
debility.
After the fever and pain had abated, hot water and vapour
baths were frequently given.
He then began slowly to recover, being able to walk about
the house on crutches, after a confinement of five months on
this occasion, and suffering under chronic rheumatism, and
great debility and depression. In June, 1848, with the advice
of his physicians, the writer went to Germany, and took a
course of hot mineral baths at Aix la Chapelle, and also at
Wiesbaden, without any good effects. He returned to Glasgow
in August, 1849 ; and in October of that year, acting on the
advice of his physicians, he sailed for Madeira, and during the
passage (thirty-one days) was constantly confined to his cabin*
suffering from pain in the joints and back, inflammation and
swelling of the feet and ankles, being unable to walk, or even to
sit, without support. During his residence at Madeira, from
November, 1849, till April, 1850, notwithstanding great atten¬
tion to diet, air exercise, and a course of galvanic treatment,
the chronic effects of the disease still remained.
In May, 1850; having been, nearly six months in Madeira,
he returned to Glasgow, in better health, although still suffering
from stiffness and general debility ; but he began to get rapidly
worse towards the end of October, 1850, when, as a last
resource, he went to Rothsay, almost without hope, put himself
under Dr. Paterson’s care, and was under the water treatment
till the end of April.
During these six months no crisis appeared; and he left
Rothsay in good health; and throughout the whole summer,
autumn, and part of the winter of 1851, the writer continued
the water system at home, taking the pack, cold hip bath, &c.,
and occasionally a vapour bath, and walking generally from six
to eight miles daily. ' Under this system the chronic symptoms
continued gradually to disappear, and he rarely experienced pain
or inflammatory action, his strength increased, and he was alto¬
gether in a better condition than he ever had been subsequently
to the first attack of rheumatism.
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
In February, 1852, be was again suddenly seized with violent
inflammation of the eyes; was obliged to exclude light altogether.
Treatment—caustic and fomentations.
This was quickly followed by contraction of the knee joint,
great pain and stiffness, which was somewhat abated by hot
slops. This was followed by violent inflammation, excruciating
pain in the hands and wrists, which continued for several weeks.
This pain was somewhat mitigated by wet stupes constantly
applied.
After several weeks' suffering the pain abated, and settled
down in one hand into permanent contraction of the finger-
joints. Although the inflammatory symptoms began to abate*
the chronio ones continued till July, when the writer was so far
recovered as to be able to undertake the journey to Dr. Barter’s
water establishment at Blarney, County Cork, where he remained
ten months, under the following treatment.
For the morning a rubbing sheet; at noon a vapour bath,
followed by cold plunge. This was continued every day except
Sunday.
The result of this treatment was a gradual disappearance of
the inflammatory symptoms; then the chronio symptoms gave
way, and a rapid improvement of the whole system followed by
increased strength, appetite, &c.
During the last month of his residence at Blarney, the writer
had begun to use the wave and perpendicular douohe with ex¬
cellent effect; and left Ireland in the very act of rapidly
throwing off all symptoms of rheumatism.
During the past two months he has taken a rubbing sheet in
the morning, and four vapour baths per week; and has gained
14 lbs. in weight in ten months.
So far the patient’s description of his sufferings. I noted the
following in this case
1 st September, 1853: Mr. T-, about thirty-eight years
old, had suffered for the last nine years from rheumatic gout,
was sent to me by Dr. M‘Leod, of Ben-Rhydding, where he had
been considerably relieved from his painful symptoms. Present
state: both -shoulders considerably raised, the head stiff,
impossibility of raising his right arm without assistance further
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59
than into speak position, (fig. 14,) the right shoulder more drawn
forwards than the left; right hip joint very stiff; both sides of the
groins contracted, which gives the appearance of the so-called
cock’s walk, especially as his spine is almost immoveable, and
can scarcely he bent or twisted in any direction; left knee can¬
not he bent more than 30 to 35 degrees; right ankle joint
very stiff; muscles rather rigid, but general strength good.
He left for Australia, ten weeks later, in perfect health, having
entirely recovered the free use of his limbs. When he began to
use his right arm, a sensation of tickling was produced, and
consequently a kind of irresistible laughing followed, which I
have not yet seen in any other case.
2nd September, 1853. first prescription.
1. Lying, right arm rotation (passive).
2. Half-lying, right hip rotation.
3. Forwards lying, left knee flexion (G.R.)
4. Lying, arm extension (P.R.)
5. High stride sitting, trunk-bending sideways (G.R.)
6. High opposite standing, alternate leg sideways raising (G.R.)
7. Abdomen opposite crooked standing, trunk raising (G.R.)
(with pressure on both shoulders).
8 . Yard grasp squat standing, alternate knee down pressure
(PE)
9. Trunk lying double leg rotation (passive).
10. Stride standing double knee flexion (active) and extension
(G.R.)
11. Half lying, loin left stroking.
5th October, 1853. second prescription.
1. Half lying, right arm rotation (passive).
2. Half lying, right arm extension (P.R. and G.R. obliquely
forwards and upwards).
8 . Lying, right hip rotation.
4. High opposite grasp half standing, left knee flexion (G.R.)
5. Abdomen opposite standing, trunk twisting (P.R. and G.R.)
6. Thigh opposite standing, trunk forwards flexion (active), and
backwards flexion (G.R.)
7. Hip-lean walk standing, trunk sideways flexion (G.R.)
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
8. Span lying, arm walking.
9. Trank squat lying, alternate knee down pressure (P.R.)
10. Yard standing, trunk twisting, with assistance on the right
arm (P.R. and G.R.)
11. Lying, right arm (obliquely out and up) rotation (passive).
12. Walk and pass positions (active).
13. Opposite inclined reclined standing, chine knocking.
14. Half-lying, transversal loin forwards stroking.
1st November, 1853. third prescription.
1. Right speak standing, right arm in and outwards turning
from the shoulder (G.R.)
2. Inclined leg opposite standing, trunk raising (G.R.)
3. Right yard left sideways lying, right arm rotation (active
with assistance).
4. Jump trunk lying, alternate knee down pressure (P.R.)
5. Yard trunk lying, leg abduction (G.R.), and adduction
(P.R.)
6. Lying, right leg rotation outwards (active).
7. Span lying, posture.
8 . Swim hanging, double elbow flexion (active), and arm
extension (P.R.)
9. Right heave-right pass standing, right arm extension
upwards (G.R.)
10. Yard stride curtsey standing, arm movements (active).
11. Yard curtsey standing, trunk fore and back flexion (active)•
12. Half lying, transversal back and loin stroking.
I have selected the preceding four cases, with the prescrip
tions of the movements which effected their cure, partly to show
practically the effects of medical gymnastics when scientifically
applied, and partly to awaken more interest for this most impor¬
tant branch of medical science, hitherto almost entirely neglected
because not sufficiently known. The engravings and minute
descriptions of each gymnastic operation in the treatment of the
first case will suffice to prove that much more study and skill
are required in the practice of this method of cure than is
generally supposed.
The prescriptions of the three other cases can be understood
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61
only by those of my colleagues who will take the trouble to
study the descriptions of the various movements, which I shall
submit to their notice, if the editors of this journal accord me
the opportunity. It is Dr. Neumann’s merit to have assiduously
collected the movements during his mission to Sweden, where he
was sent by the Prussian Government to study Ling’s medical
gymnastics.
FLEXION AND EXTENSION.
Also called bending and stretching, are movements in which
two or more parts of the limbs or body approach each other
(flexion), or are removed from each other (extension) by a
change in the angle formed at the joint by the moved parts.
The farther the flexion is carried, the more acute the angle
becomes, and thus the bent parts assume a more crooked or
angular form; the contrary takes place in the extension. In
the limbs there is a bending and a stretching side perfectly
defined, which is not the case with the trunk and head. Here
each bending forwards, backwards, or sideways, is designated
as flexion, and still further specified by the addition of forwards,
backwards, sideways, oblique, oblique-backwards, oblique-for¬
wards, right side, left side, right oblique forwards, right oblique
backwards, left oblique forwards, and left oblique backwards, to
the word “flexion.”
Generally, all the movements classed under flexion and exten¬
sion, are half-active movements; while similar movements, but
executed passively, have also different names. In the half-active
flexions of the head and trunk, we suppose that the patient makes
the movement, and the gymnast resists; but if these movements
are done by the gymnast, while the patient resists, they come also
under the beads of pulling, pushing, and pressure movements.
In the half-active movements of the arms and legs, the move¬
ment is generally done by the patient, while the gymnast
resists, but as this is not always the case, it is necessary to add
in the prescription the letters (P. R. or G. R.).
(To be continued.)
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OBSERVATIONS ON THE CHOLERA EPIDEMIC,
WITH ILLUSTRATIVE CASES AND REMARKS.
By John Anderson, M.R.C.S., L.A.C.
(Read before the British Homoeopathic Society and the Hahnemann
Medical Society, November , 18540
In the following communication it is proposed to offer some
observations on the cholera epidemic with illustrative cases and
remarks, the only value of which arises from the fact that they
are neither copied from hooks nor borrowed from the experience
of others; hut, right or wrong, the result of personal experience
and observation.
There were four aspects or types under which the cholera
epidemic presented itself to my notice, each one manifesting
special and characteristic symptoms.
I. The first type or aspect of the epidemic was chiefly marked
by a rumbling or griping pain in the abdomen, accompanied by
diarrhoea more or less watery and frequent, the evacuations
varying in colour, occasional sickness or nausea; in some cases
much constitutional disturbance and accompanying fever, in
others the general health scarcely at all affected, the attack
lasting from two to four or eight days, and being essentially dif¬
ferent from an ordinary diarrhoea. In these cases (a few doses
of Camphor having generally been taken by the patient himself )
Veratrum did the most good, the mode of administration being
2, 3, or 4 drops of the 1st or 3rd dilution as a single dose, fol¬
lowed by drop doses at intervals of one, two, or four hours,
according to the urgency of the symptoms. When sickness was
very prevalent, Ipecacuanha 1 was very serviceable, and in some
cases where there was much abdominal pain, but no diarrhoea*
Nux did good, and in a few cases where there were some dysen¬
teric symptoms, Mercurius Corrosivus was of use. One hundred
cases of this type of the epidemic came under my care ; they oc¬
curred in the young and the aged, the rich and the poor; some '
were slight, others very severe and protracted, but all happily
recovered. The following are selected as illustrations :
Case 1. September 30, 1853. Mrs. P., set. 44, Clapham,
seized with vomiting, diarrhoea, and cramps, which had continued
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Observations on the Cholera Epidemic. 63
at intervals for four days. Arsenicum and Veratrum produced
immediate relief. Well in three days.
Case 2 . October 81, 1853. Lewis L., set. 3 months, Clap-
ham. Diarrhoea two days, evacuations watery and frequent, no
sickness. Arsenicum checked the diarrhoea but the next day there
was evidence of much pain. Veratrum gave relief, and in four
days the child was well.
Case 3. September 5, 1854. Mr. B., set. 50, Stockwell.
Seized rather suddenly with griping pains and continued watery
diarrhoea. A single full dose of Veratrum was given and
smaller doses subsequently at frequent intervals. Well in three
days.
Case 4. September 6, 1854. Mrs. A., set. 37, Clapham.
Obstinate and continued diarrhoea, evacuations watery or thin
and feculent, occasional pain. Camphor, Arsenicum, and
Veratrum did no good, Mercurius did some good, China cured
at once.
Case 5. September 7, 1854. Miss L., set. 50, Clapham.
Continued watery diarrhoea with occasional sickness, and much
abdominal pain, tongue furred, fever, loss of appetite, prostra¬
tion : these symptoms continued, more or less, for some days.
Arsenicum, Veratrum, Chamomilla, and Secale, were given ac¬
cording to the indications. Recovery complete, but gradual.
Case 6 . September 9, 1854. Harriet F., set. 20, Newington.
Vomiting and diarrhoea; cramp in legs; some prostration.
Camphor was given which stopped the sickness at the second
dose, afterwards Arsenicum and Veratrum in alternation. Well
in three days.
Case 7. September 18, 1854. Mr. H., set. 30, Clapham.
Seized rather suddenly with griping pain ; no diarrhoea. Nux
was given, afterwards Veratrum. Well in two days.
II. The second type or aspect of the epidemic was that
where after a full meal, or some error in diet, vomiting more or
less violent came on, the evacuations not watery but feculent,
the vomiting more or less bilious and acrid; some accompanying
fever, prostration of strength in a variable degree; cramps none
or very slight; no collapse. Eight cases of this type came
under my care, and the treatment consisted chiefly of Arsenicum
and Veratrum, (in alternation, preceded sometimes by Nux. In
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64 Observations on the Cholera Epidemic,
one case, that of an elderly lady, the attack was very severe and
sudden, and the prostration considerable. In another case,
that of a child, there was severe vomiting for a few days, but no
diarrhoea, and afterwards a severe diarrhoea but no vomiting.
All these cases did well.
III. The third type or aspect of the epidemic, was that in which
superadded to vomiting and diarrhoea there was raging thirst,
cramp, prostration or collapse, and sometimes suppression of
urine, the seizure being for the most part sudden and the
symptoms alarmingly severe. Twenty-six cases of this type
came under my care, of which twenty-two recovered and four
died, giving a mortality of rather less than 16 per cent. Of the
four that died, two were in complete collapse when first visited,
a third, a female of spare habit, 71 years of age and subject to
diarrhoea, had allowed a severe purging of watery evacuations
to continue twenty-four hours unnoticed; and the fourth, a
strong, elderly man, continued five days with severe vomiting
and purging before he sought medical advice, and fell into com¬
plete collapse very soon after my first visit to him.
The following cases in detail are selected as illustrations of
this type of the epidemic in its different phases of development
and manifestation.
Case 1 . September 16, 1854. Miss G., at. 13, 25, St.
George’s Road, New Kent Road, was seized on the evening of
the 15th September (being previously in good health) with
diarrhoea, and at 3 o’clock the next morning with violent
vomiting, which continued at intervals until 8 o’clook, when
severe cramps came on in the lower extremities which lasted
incessantly for five hours. Up to this time she had been under
Allopathic treatment, but refused to take much of the medicine
that was ordered. At 9 o’clock collapse came on, and at 10 her
mother arrived, who (being herself a zealous and intelligent
Homoeopathist) immediately gave her a few doses of Cam¬
phor, and afterwards Yeratrum at frequent intervals. My
attendance was requested at half-past 3 (twenty hours after
the seizure) when I found her in a state of complete collapse,
the extremities cold; no pulse at the wrist; skin livid colour;
most intense thirst; extreme restlesness with incessant vomiting
of a thin fluid, and occasional diarrhoea. The cries of the poor
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65
girl were most piteous, and the case was in many respects the most
distressing I had yet witnessed; her entreaties for water to assuage
the raging thirst, the subsequent retching and vomiting, with the
continued jactitation, together with the anxiety of the relatives
and the feeling that but little good could be done, made the case
one of the most trying description. I gave at once a most decided
prognosis of an unfavourable character, and scarcely thought she
could live until the evening, judging from what I had seen in other
cases. Camphor and Arsenicum, in alternation, with occasional
intercurrent doses of Digitalis in the mother tincture, were
ordered, and in the evening there was a slight improvement.
The whole of the night was passed in a most restless state, hut
at half-past nine the following morning there was improvement
and at noon I was delighted to find the pulse returning, the
extremities warming, the sickness less, and occasional intervals
of ease and quiet; hut no urine had been passed since the after¬
noon of the previous day. Yeratrum and Camphor were left to
be given, either alone or in alternation with the other medicines,
as the symptoms indicated, and to the judicious management and
careful oversight of the patient’s mother, who understood clearly
the indications for the several medicines, and who carried out
the instructions most rigorously, I am indebted to some extent
for the successful issue of this interesting case. The next day
improvement was more manifest, although the sickness conti¬
nued at intervals, and no urine had yet passed. From this time
she gradually progressed until the 22nd (the urinary secretion
returning on the 21st), when there was a slight relapse, owing
apparently to some error in diet. This passed away, however,
and slight reaction came on, for which Aconite was given. At
length a rash broke out over the body, and an erysipelatous
inflammation attacked the face and chiefly the nose, for which
Belladonna was given. On the 24th she was convalescent, and
on the 26th quite well.
Remarks. —In this case the most marked symptoms were the
vomiting, the collapse, the suppression of urine, but more espe¬
cially the raging thirst. This was most intense, and I am assured
most positively by the friends of the patient that she drank fifteen
gallons of water in two days. The possibility of this will be seen
VOL. XIII, NO. LI. — JANUARY, 1855. F
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Observations on the Cholera Epidemic,
when it is remembered that having drank to repletion she imme¬
diately vomited the whole and then drank again. The vomiting,
which at first was of a white thin fluid, became afterwards of a
beautiful, clear grass-green colour; this symptom was evidently
aggravated by the constant drinking, but the poor girl preferred
the vomiting, distressing as it was, to the more dreadful thirst
which wasquenched, though but for a moment, by the draughts
of water. No medicine seemed to have any marked influence
upon the vomiting at this stage, but subsequently, when the
fluid ejected was of the bright grass-green colour just mentioned,
the pure Tincture of Veratrum, in two drop doses, did essential
service. The suppression of urine was of some duration, and
taken in connection with the other symptoms, made the case
still more alarming. No urine passed from the Saturday after¬
noon until the following Wednesday, afterwards at intervals.
The collapse, also, was well marked; there being no pulse at
the wrist, the extremities blue and cold ; the face pinched and
anxious; the eyes sunken ; the tongue cold. The pure Tincture
of Digitalis, in drop doses, appeared to be of service at this
stage. All food was withheld for seven days. Altogether the
case was one in which the symptoms were well defined, and the
action of the medicines well marked; its successful result adds
another trophy to the cause ef Homoeopathy. The second case
to be narrated differs in many respects from the one just des¬
cribed, as the following details will shew:
Case 2. September 26, 1854. A. B., ®t. 20, Park Hill,
Clapham, a healthy-looking servant girl, was seized suddenly
at half-past 9 in the evening of the above date, with crampy pain
in the abdominal region, for which Camphor was immediately
given. In half an hour I saw her, and found her in bed, suf¬
fering the most intense agony from cramps ; she writhed about
in the bed ; sometimes holding her breath; at other times
shrieking aloud ; now buried in the bed-clothes ; and again lifted
up almost out of bed, and striking her head with violence against
the wall. During the brief intervals of ease she would sit up
and stare about her in the most wild and unconscious manner;
the pulse was full, the skin hot, the tongue clean, no vomiting,
no diarrhoea, no appearance of collapse. After a few doses of
Camphor, Cuprum in the second trituration, and Veratrum in
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the first dilution, were given in alternation every ten or fifteen
minutes; at the end of two hours there was marked improve¬
ment, and I left her at midnight sleeping. At 2 a.M. I was
again called to see her, and found that the cramps had returned
with increased violence, and that the fingers were becoming
cold. The prognosis now was unfavourable. Cuprum second
trituration and Veratrum mother tincture were given frequently
in alternation, with occasional intercurrent doses of Camphor,
and at 4 a.m. I left her sleeping again. At 9 a.m. there was
decided improvement; the coldness had left the fingers, the
cramps were less frequent- and violent, the countenance less
anxious and distorted, and a copious stream of urine had passed.
Cuprum 5 and Veratrum 3 were ordered in continuance, but to
return to the strong medicines if the cramps increased in vio¬
lence. From this time there was gradual and steady improve¬
ment ; occasionally the violent cramps returned, but they were
speedily subdued by the medicines administered. In a few
days she was convalescent, and on the ninth day she was quite
well.
Remarks. —In this case, the most marked, in fact the only
symptom was the cramp, and this exceeded in violence any¬
thing I had ever witnessed before. The contortions of the
poor girl could only be compared to the writhing of the weaker
animal when struggling to escape from the deadly grasp of its
more fierce and powerful opponent. The incipient oollapse
marks the true nature of the dissase; and had this increased, in
all probabilily the result would have been fatal. The nurse in
attendance had been with some other cases (allopathically
treated) precisely similar, when collapse came on and death
ensued. She anticipated the same result in this case, and never
having herself witnessed homoeopathic treatment, was quite
surprised at the effects produced. Being an intelligent and
conscientious person, and withal an impartial judge, I am
inclined to record her opinion, which was, that the Camphor
seemed to have more influence upon the violent cramps than
either the Cuprum or Veratrum. An interesting feature in this
case was the absence of diarrhoea, the bowels had been relieved
the morning of the attack, but there was no action until four
days after, when a natural motion was passed. No food was
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Observations on the Cholera Epidemic,
given for some days, and there was no re-action of any kind.
The next case presents some other distinctive features of the
type of the epidemic now under 'consideration.
Case 3. August 23, 1854. Jessy B., ®t. 21, 1, West Ter-
raoe, Albert Street, Walworth, a stout healtliy-looking servant
girl, was seized in the morning of the above date with choleraic
diarrhoea, which in the afternoon became incessant, and was
accompanied by vomiting of a thin fluid, severe cramp chiefly
in the calves of the legs, general coldness, extreme restlessness,
and jactitation with occasional shrieking. A few doses of Cam¬
phor were administered, afterwards Arsenicum and Yeratrum in
alternation, subsequently Cuprum. In the evening collapse
came on, and the above symptoms continued at intervals varying
in intensity until the third day, when the fluid evacuated both
from the stomach and bowels became of a most beautiful grass
green colour; the vomiting now was very severe and frequent,
and a few doses of Veratrum in the mother tincture did much
good. Food was entirely withheld; and on the fifth day the
severe choleraic symptoms subsided, and violent re-action came
on. There was much furious delirium, with incessant violent
screaming; much heat of skin, full pulse. Aconite and Bella¬
donna were given in alternation, the hair was closely cut, and
these alarming symptoms gradually subsided. Then a scabby
eruption broke out all over the body, being especially abundant
and ichorous at the mouth and anus, after which several boils
appeared. These were critical, and she began to improve
rapidly until the 7th September, fifteen days after the first
seizure, when, owing to imprudence in eating and drinking, a
relapse occurred, and vomiting and diarrhoea set in violently;
these yielded to Arsenicum and Yeratrum in alternation; she
rapidly recovered, and on the 14th of September she was quite
well.
Remarks. —In this case the most marked symptoms were the
vomiting and purging, especially the former, the grass-green
colour of which was most peculiar. Another distinctive feature
of the case was its duration; the symptoms were constantly
recurring, and it appeared as if a tremendous struggle was
going on between the disease on the one hand, and the vital
powers on the other. The re-action also was very marked and
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protracted, the delirium being very violent, and the power of
consciousness quite suspended; the screams of the poor girl
were incessant and so loud during one night as to alarm the
whole neighbourhood. The effect of the medicines was very
marked, especially the Veratrum in mother tincture, which
appeared to have great influence in checking the distressing and
peculiar vomiting.
The two next cases are interesting, as illustrative of the
power of Camphorated chloroform in arousing the vital energies,
removing pulmonary congestion, and restoring free respiration.
Case 4. October 9, 1853. Mrs. T., eet. 26, 16, Vauxhall
Row, Vauxhall, fell down suddenly at 2£ p.m. on the bed stiff
and faint, great pain, choking and oppression at the chest, with
severe dyspnoea, burning in the throat, cramps all over: she
had received a blow on the breast the night previously. Cam¬
phor was given six times by a neighbour, and on my arrival at
half-past 6,1 found her in a state of complete asphyxia, gasping
for breath, and apparently dying, although the skin was warm
and the pulse full. A few doses of Arsenicum were given with¬
out any apparent effect, then Camphorated chloroform was
administered three times in doses of three drops each, which
gave speedy relief, and at nine o’clock she was able to speak
and breathe freely, her first words being “ You have saved my
life.” The Camphorated chloroform was continued in drop
doses at intervals, and at half-past 11, I found she had slept
quietly for two hours, her breathing was easy, the skin hot, and
pulse full. She slept occasionally through the night, but the
next morning there was some gasp in the breathing, with
burning in the throat and chest; the skin was hot and the pulse
full, some urine had been passed, but no evacuation from the
bowels. Arsenicum 3 was given at intervals, and in the evening
she was very much better; on the 13th she was convalescent,
and on the 17th quite well.
Remarks. —In this case the most marked symptom was the
asphyxia, and the appearance of the patient was precisely that
of a person who had inhaled carbonic acid gas, or one who was
labouring under severe venous congestion; there was no appear¬
ance of collapse, not even of prostration ; no want of consci-
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ousness, and yet she was evidently dying. The neighbourhood
was in a state of the greatest commotion, the room was filled
with a constantly changing succession of visitors, the priest
came to administer extreme unction, and altogether the scene
was one of the most intense excitement. Camphor and Ar¬
senicum failing, and the woman gasping for breath and dying,
I felt for a moment bewildered, and was led to the use of Chlo¬
roform solely from the marked resemblance of the poor creature
to a woman I had previously seen under the influence of Chlo¬
roform for a surgical operation. The effect was speedy, deci¬
sive, qpd gratifying; my reward was not the customary fee of
silver or gold, but the intense delight of having saved a valu¬
able life, the unbounded thankfulness of a truly grateful heart
for the assistance rendered, and the conversion of many of
the by-standers to homoeopathy.
Case 4a (Supplementary). October 3, 1853, noon. Mrs. G’s
child, 8Bt. 20 months, 1, Little Acre Court, Clapham, seized
thirty hours previously with diarrhoea, vomiting, pain, coldness;
attentively treated by the parish surgeon with Chalk mixture
and Laudanum ; case pronounced hopeless. A kind and phi¬
lanthropic young lady thinking that homoeopathy might do some
good, urgently requested my attendance, which was continued
by the consent of the surgeon before-mentioned. I found the
child completely collapsed, pupil firmly contracted, left arm
purple and deadly cold, the rest of the body pallid and cold, no
pulse at wrist, no perceptible beating of the heart, clammy per¬
spiration on the face. Camphor was given, afterwards Cam¬
phorated chloroform, and animation gradually returned, the
effect of the latter medicine being most marked. A mustard
plaister over the region of the heart, with drop doses of Digi¬
talis, hot bottles and warm baths completely restored the child
to life, and a tranquil sleep occurred, giving some hope of future
recovery. Be-action now set in so strong that the hair was cut
close and cold applied to the head, appropriate medicine was
given, and for some hours there was hope, but cerebral conges¬
tion increased, then coma, the bronchial rattle, and at last death
closed this most exciting scene, at noon on the 4th instant,
twenty-four hours from my first seeing the child.
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Remarks. —In this case, the most marked symptom was the
collapse, which was so complete that the child was left for dead.
The action of the Camphorated chloroform was most marked,
and the transition from a state of almost actual death to that of
a powerful reaction, is conclusive evidence of the amazing
power of these remedies in arousing the vital energies. The
case is also interesting as shewing what may he done by diligent
perseverance even under the most unfavourable circumstances.
As my attendance upon this case was purely experimental,
almost like trying to recall the spirit of the little being whose
death the official functionary and parochial surgeon came to
register during the process of resuscitation, I have not thought
it just to record it amongst my general return of cholera cases.
The remaining cases will be given in very brief detail, the
chief symptoms, treatment, and result being described in suc¬
cession—the numbers correspond to the Board of Health
returns, and the particulars of each case with the treatment are
the same as those furnished to the Board.
Case 1 . September 9, 1852. Mrs. P., set. 37, 3, Little Fred¬
erick Place, Southwark Bridge Road. Simple diarrhoea absent;
severe vomiting and rice-water purging, coldness and lividity.
Treatment: Camphor* afterwards Arsenicum and Veratrum in
alternation. Recovery in four days.
Case 2. October 2, 1852. Anna W., mt. 60, 1, Ashley
Terrace, Manor Street, Clapham, cook in a family. Simple
diarrhoea absent; rice-water evacuations; vomiting; severe
cramps; partial collapse. Treatment: Camphor, afterwards
Arsenicum and Veratrum in alternation. The action of the
medicines very marked. Recovery in two days.
Case 3. September 24,1853. Mr. M., eet. 36, 57, Lant Street,
Borough, commercial traveller. Simple diarrhoea one hour, after¬
wards rice-water evacuations and vomiting; violent cramps.
Treatment: Camphor, afterwards Arsenicum and Veratrum in
alternation. The Camphor, gave speedy relief. Recovery in two
days.
Case 4. October 2, 1853. William Early, set. 28, 16, Vaux-
hall Square, labourer in the gas works. Choleraic diarrhoea two
days; afterwards incessant vomitiDg, rice-water evacuations, and
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Observations on the Cholera Epidemic,
cramps. Treatment: Camphor, Arsenicum, Veratrum, Ipec¬
acuanha. The action of Ipecacuanha very marked in checking
the vomiting. Recovery in 6 days.
Case 5. Mrs. T., 16, VauxhallRow. (Case already recorded
in full with clinical remarks.)
Case 6. August 13, 1864. Walter E., set. 3, Clapham Rise,
son of a grocer. Simple diarrhoea absent, choleraio diarrhoea
eight hours; cholera three hours; collapse nine hours; in collapse
when visited. Treatment: Camphor, Chloroform, Arsenicum,
Veratrum, Acid, hydrocyan., Carho vegetahilis. Digitalis. No
medicine had any sensible effect. Death in twenty hours from
the first seizure.
Case 7. August 21, 1854. Miss Jessy Anderson, set. 3,
4, Bedford Terrace, Clapham Rise, daughter of a surgeon. Simple
diarrhoea three days; seized at 1 a.m. with sudden and violent
rioe-water evacuations, with vomiting; at 3 a.m. with cold sweat
and collapse, great restlessness, but no cramps. Treatment:
Camphor, Arsenicum, Veratrum. The medicines were given
promptly, and their effeot was speedy. Recovery in thirty-six
hours.
Case 8. August 19, 1854. Miss M., set. 3, School House,
Red Cross Street, Southwark, daughter of a schoolmaster.
Choleraic diarrhoea two days, afterwards rice-water evacuations,
vomiting, collapse. Treatment: Camphor, Arsenicum, Vera¬
trum, Ipecacunha. The action of the medicines marked. Re¬
covery from cholera in three dyas.
Case 9. August 28, 1854. Mr. G., set. 64, 7, King’s Row,
Horsleydown, Corn Meter. Choleraic diarrhoea five days, without
medical advice; Cholera five hours; collapse ten hours. Treat¬
ment : Camphor, Arsenicum, Veratrum; fell into complete
collapse two hours after my first visit at 10 a.m., and died at
ten o’clock the same evening. No medicine produced any sen¬
sible effect. v
Case 10. Jessy B. (Case already recorded in full, with
clinical remarks.)
Case 11. August 30, 1854. Alfred Born, set. 4, 6, Park
Plaoe, Park Road, Clapham, son of a gardener, Simple
diarrhoea absent; seized at 1 a.m. with choleraic diarrhoea, at
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4 a.m. with rice-water purging, at 7 a.m. with collapse. Treat¬
ment : Camphor, afterwards Arsenicum and Veratrum in alter¬
nation. All the symptoms were well marked, and the action of
the medicines very decided. Recovery in thirty-six hours.
Case 12. September 1, 1854. Mr. B, set. 64, 7, King’s
Row, Horsleydown. Simple diarrhoea absent; choleraic diarrhoea
thirteen hours, afterwards severe rice-water purging and vom¬
iting. Treatment: Camphor, subsequently Arsenicum and
Veratrum in alternation. Action of the medicines very marked.
Recovery in two days.
Case 13. September 11, 1854. M. H., set. 28, Clapham
Common, housemaid. Simple diarrhoea absent; choleraic
diarrhoea thirty-six hours; afterwards rice-water evacuations,
vomiting, some cramp; the symptoms remitting and recurring
frequently; general health not good prior to the attack. Treat¬
ment : Arsenicum, Veratrum, Ignatia, Chamomilla. Action of
medicines not well marked. Recovery in seven days.
Case 14. September 16, 1854. Mrs. C., set. 72, Acre Lane,
Clapham. Simple diarrhoea four days—choleraic diarrhoea
absent; in collapse when first visited at 9 a.m. ; death in six¬
teen hours afterwards. Treatment: Camphor, Arsenicum,
Veratrum, Acid hydrocyan., Carb. veg.. Digitalis. No medicine
had any sensible effect.
Case 15. September 12, 1854. Mr. G., set. 70, 7, Maltby
Street, Great George Street, Bermondsey, Corn Meter. Simple
diarrhoea absent; choleraic diarrhoea seventeen hours; after¬
wards severe, frequent and protracted rice-water purging and
vomiting, with very little pain. Treatment: Arsenicum, Vera¬
trum, Secale. Action of Veratrum and Secale very marked,
especially the latter. Recovery in seven days. '
Case 16. Miss C. (Case already recorded in full, with clinical
remarks.) „
Case 17. September 16, 1854. Jane W., set. 14, Servants’
Training Institution, Clapham, servant. Simple diarrhoea ab¬
sent—choleraic diarrhoea twenty-four hours; afterwards inces-
ssint rice-water evacuations. Treatment: Camphor, Arsenicum,
Veratrum, Secale, Pulsatilla. Action of Veratrum and Secale
well marked. Recovery in seven days.
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Case 18. September 17, 1854. Isabella E., set. 17, Servants’
Training Institution, Clapham. Simple diarrhoea absent—
choleraic diarrhoea twenty hours; afterwards incessant rice-water
evacuations, some prostration. Treatment: Arsenicum, Vera-
trum, Secale. Recovery in five days.
Case 19. September 18, 1854. Mrs. P., set. 37, 3, West
Terraoe, Albert Street, Walworth, wife of a clerk. Simple
diarrhoea absent—choleraic diarrhoea four days; afterwards con¬
tinued rice-water purging and vomiting; cramps in legs and
abdomen; general collapse; urine suppressed for three days.
Treatment: Camphor, Veratrum, Secale, Chamomilla. Recovery
in twelve days.
Note. —Two deaths from cholera occurred in the same house,
and one next door; the tardy recovery was greatly due to con¬
stant mental excitement.
Case .20. September 28, 1854. Mrs. P., set. 71, 27, Great
George Street, Bermondsey. Severe choleraic diarrhoea for two
days, without medical advice; afterwards rice-water evacuations
and vomiting for 12 hours, then collapse lasting thirteen hours,
and ending in death. Treatment: Camphor, Arsenicum, Vera¬
trum, Acid, hydrocyan., Carb. veg., Digitalis.
In this case, the collapse came on both suddenly and unex¬
pectedly ; there was suppression of urine for twenty-four hours
before death.
Case 21. September 28, 1854. Mr. M., set. 56, Park Road,
Clapham, china shopkeeper. Simple and choleraic diarrhoea
absent; incessant rice-water purging, nausea, no cramp, some
prostration. Treatment: Camphor, Arsenicum, Veratrum, Se¬
cale. Recovery in seven days.
Case 22. A. B. (Case already recorded in full, with clinical
remarks.)
Case 23. September 29, 1854. Joseph Swaine, set. 10, 36,
Park Place, Park Road, Clapham, son of a gardener. Simple
diarrhoea absent—choleraic diarrhoea six hours; afterwards rice-
water evacuations and severe vomiting. Treatment: Camphor,
Ipecacuanha. Action of Ipecac, very marked. Recovery in
two days.
Case 24. October 5, 1854. A gentleman, set. 45, Clapham
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Common. Choleraic diarrhoea twenty-four hours without medi¬
cal advice; afterwards rice-water purging and vomiting, great
thirst, much gastric fever and prostration of strength, tongue
white and coated, pulse feeble. Treatment: Yeratrum, Secale,
Mercurius, Pulsatilla, China. Action of the medicines not well
marked. Recovery in nine days.
Case 25. October 6^ 1854. Josiah B., set. 30, 1, Smith’s
Place, Lower Park Road, Peckham, painter. Choleraic diarrhoea
five days; afterwards watery evacuations, peculiar vomiting, the
matter ejected looking like yeast or mortar, with a thin fluid
underneath; severe cramp. Treatment: Camphor, Mercurius,
Cuprum, Yeratrum. The Cuprum relieved the cramps speedily.
Recovery from choleraic attack in ten days.
Case 26. October 28, 1854. Mr. B., set. 49, 6, Dockhead,
Bermondsey, master baker. Simple and choleraic diarrhoea
absent; sudden, frequent, and violent rice-water purging; no
vomiting. Treatment: Camphor, Veratrum. Action of Vera-
trum very marked. Recovery in two days.
IV. The fourth type or aspect of the epidemic was very
peculiar, difficult of description, but worthy of more obser¬
vation than appears to have been given to it. The following
remarks may serve to illustrate it. During the prevalence of the
cholera epidemic in its widest extent of duration, many cases
occurred to me where the symptoms were so anomalous that no
specific nomenclature could be adopted. In some, the ordinary
symptoms of bilious or malignant cholera occasionally mani¬
fested themselves, but at distant intervals and separately, or
more combined, of short duration, but frequent occurrence;
the individuals appearing to be under a special influence, always
threatening to have but never having a decided attack of one kind
or another. In other cases there was much dread and mental
anxiety without a yielding to fear, in fact, where the mind was
strong, sensible, and vigorous, but several anomalous symptoms
would shew themselves, not amounting to any actual disease,
but keeping both the patient and practitioner in a constant
state of suspense. Ignatia, and espe*ially Chamomilla, were of
great service in these cases, treating any marked symptoms by
the appropriate remedies, namely, Veratrum for the rumbling
pain, Ipecacuanha for the sickness, Pulsatilla for gastric dis-
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Observations on the Cholera Epidemic ,
turbance, Nux for constipation. Sometimes the symptoms
would assume the regular form of a gastric fever, which instead
of running its course as on ordinary occasions, manifested a
peculiar eccentricity of character, requiring the utmost care and
watchfulness in reference to treatment. One instance occurred
in the case of a lady, who was residing in a house where a
death from cholera took place; she was subject to frequent
attacks of gastric disturbance, hut on this occasion she had a
severe attack of gastric fever, which presented many anomalous
symptoms, and which, though it ultimately did well, yet was
very obstinate and unmanageable. In another case, that of a
lady who had had chblera some years back, a violent attack of
cramp came on, not at all associated with true cholera symptoms,
but which yielded to Yeratrum and Cuprum in alternation.
And another lady, who lost two near relatives from cholera,
being herself in very delicate health, was for some days on the
very borders of a severe choleraic attack; in this case Chamo-
milla and Veratrum were of much use.
In a few cases, persons labouring under other diseases
appeared to have their symptoms modified by the prevailing
epidemic. In one instance, a lady who had been under my
care for several weeks with menorrhagia, of rather an alarming
character, accompanied by occasional diarrhoea and great debility,
was seized with sudden and extreme prostration, not at all like
the collapse of cholera; and but for brandy freely administered,
would, in all probability, have died. In this case (cholera being
in the immediate vicinity) there appeared to be a special epi¬
demic influence affecting her; and for some time there was
alternate menorrhagia and diarrhoea, which subsequently yielded
to Secale and Mercurius. In another case, a lady, who, had
suffered from uterine haemorrhage to an alarming extent, and
whose husband afterwards died of cholera, had her symptoms
very much modified by the prevailing epidemic ; and although
there was a most heroic determination not to yield to the mere
impressions of fear, yet the combined mental and physical influ¬
ences by which she was surrounded at times overcame her, and
on more than one occasion her life was nearly sacrificed. China
in the pure tincture and Ignatia in the first dilution were of
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essential service in this oase. • Altogether twelve cases occurred
to me of this peculiar epidemic influence ; and although much
anxiety was felt for many of them, all happily recovered.
I have thus endeavoured most imperfectly, and without much
attempt at careful preparation (for which incessant occupation
must be my excuse), to present to the notice of my professional
brethren, and others whom it may interest, such observations on
the cholera epidemic as most forcibly presented themselves to
my own mind, endeavouring, as far as possible, to discard
theory, and aiming only to be practically useful.
In conclusion, the following subjects are suggested as worthy
of attentive consideration. •
I. The precise symptoms of Malignant Cholera. —Are there
any by which the disease may be easily recognized, and in the
presence or absence of which the case is or is not one of malig¬
nant cholera ? The importance of this inquiry will be at once
seen, when viewed in connexion with statistical results of oppo¬
site modes of treatment; and although at first sight the inquiry
appears to he easy of solution, it is in reality beset by many
practical difficulties.
II. The treatment of the collapse stage of Malignant
Cholera. —Chloroform, Acid, hydrocyan, Carb. veg., Arsenui-
retted hydrogen. Digitalis, Tobacco are these of any use, or
are there any other medicines or means yet untried likely to be
useful ? The man who could successfully contend with this
most dreadful collapse stage of cholera would indeed be a
blessing to humanity and a benefactor to his race.
III. The appointment of a Cholera Committee. —The pre¬
cise object of which should be to examine the reports of cholera
cases that have been treated homoeopathically, to judge of the
correctness of their diagnosis, to draw up a statistical table, and
to present this to the profession as an authorized document,
which, whilst it would serve as a standard of appeal for com¬
parison in treatment, would also contribute towards the com¬
pilation of a general table of statistical results, both as regards
cholera individually and disease generally.
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Observations on the Cholera Epidemic
Tabular Summary of Cases Treated.
Disease.
No. of Cases.
Deaths.
Kecoveries.
Type 1.—Cholerine..
100
None.
100
Type 2.— Bilious cholera ....
8
None.
8
Type 3.— Malignant cholera .
20
4
22
Type 4.— Epidemic influence.
12
None.
12
Total .
146
4
142
Collapse, 14; no collapse, 12; consecutive fever, 2.
Tabular Summary of Medicines used in the twenty-six
Cholera Cases, with Dilutions, Frequency, and Re¬
sults.
The medicines used consisted invariably of tinctures in the
1st, 2nd, or 3rd decimal dilutions; occasionally the pure or
mother tincture was given (marked <J>). The dose varied from
one to two or three drops every five, ten, fifteen, or thirty
minutes, or every one, two, or four hours. Occasionally a single
dose of three or four drops was given, followed by drop doses at
intervals. The Tincture of Camphor consisted of one part
Camphor to five of Spirits of Wine, the dose being two to four
drops.
Medicine.
Dilution.
No. of cases
in
which used.
Action.
Veratrum.
1,2,3
24
Very marked in the majority of
the cases.
Camphor.
0
22
Ditto ditto
Arsenicum ....
1,2,3
21
Ditto ditto
Secale.
1
6
Marked, especially in two cases
Very marked, especially in 2 cases
Cuprum .
1, 2,5
4
Digitalis.
*
4
Apparently beneficial in one case
Ipecacuanha ..
1
3
Marked, especially in two cases
Acid hydrocy..
2
3
No sensible effect
(jarbo vegetab..
2
3
No sensible effect
Chloroform..
2
Well marked in one case
4
In addition to the above, Mercurius, Pulsatilla, Chamomilla,
China, Ignatia, Aconite, and Belladonna were used in a few
cases as the symptoms indicated.
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HOMCEOPATHY AND THE CONCOURS IN
FRANCE.
In England the medical officers of hospitals are usually selected
by the so-called governors, a miscellaneous and heterogeneous
body, consisting generally of the subscribers to the charity. In
order that a homoeopathist should receive one of the appoint¬
ments in the existing hospitals, it would he necessary that the
majority of the subscribers or governors should be favourable to
the homoeopathic system. The subscribers to most of the hos¬
pitals are such a very miscellaneous collection of individuals,
that they may stand for an unpicked sample of the community
at large; and a homoeopathically-disposed majority of sub¬
scribers would presuppose a homoeopathic majority of the
general community. Before a homoeopathist, therefore, could
be elected to office in the existing hospitals homoeopathy must
have infected the majority of the public. When once this
is the case the election of homoeopathists to our large endowed
hospitals will he sure; hut until such is the case no homoeo¬
pathist has a chance of election to our large hospitals. We are
thus in England reduced to the necessity of creating hospitals
with exclusive homoeopathically-inclined subscribers, in order to
create medical offices for ourselves. But as the number of
homoeopathists among the community, as compared with the
number of non-homoeopathists, is still small, and the charitably
disposed of these still smaller, our hospitals have hitherto been
on a correspondingly minute scale. Nor do we see much hope
of exciting the enthusiasm of our friends and patients to such a
degree as to induce them to sink their cash in the endowment
of any hospitals at all comparable to St. Thomas’s, Guy’s, or
Bartholomew’s. In fact, we may remark enpassant, we believe
the charitable spirit that led former generations to establish
richly-endowed hospitals for the sick has become nearly extinct
in these latter days. The proof of this is, that though the
population of London has quadrupled itself and more within the
last century, only two or three hospitals have been added to the
existing establishments for the sick during that period; and the
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Homoeopathy and the
modem hospitals, as is too well known, are languishing for
want of funds, whereas the older hospitals, which date, some of
them, from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, are wallowing
in wealth. These richly-endowed hospitals we must hope one
day to see under the direction of homoeopathic governors, and
served by homoeopathic practitioners ; for it would seem to be a
more feasible task to homoeopathize the governors than to
loosen the purse-strings of wealthy homoeopathic patients. It
would be out of place here to inquire into the causes of the de¬
cline of the charitable spirit in England in the matter of hos¬
pitals for the sick. Our charity has of late taken other direc¬
tions, and finds a vent in the establishment of educational
institutions, alms-houses, and asylums for the maintenance of
the destitute of all classes—some of which are good and useful,
whilst others serve only to perpetuate among us the race of
paupers and idle dependents on eleemosynary assistance. We
might write a chapter upon the abuses naturally flowing from
the method common to most of these charitable institutions,
whereby the recipients of the charity of the founders or sub¬
scribers are chosen, but our business is with hospitals and their
management on the other side of the channel.
“ They order these things better in France,” to our thinking.
Hospitals for the sick there are state institutions, not left to
gather a precarious support from the uncertain charity of the
public.
That there shall be sickness among the poor is, in France, an
acknowledged state fact, and the duty of providing for such sick¬
ness is recognized by the state;—hence hospitals are state esta¬
blishments, not private institutions. Hence, also, the mode of pro¬
viding medical officers for these hospitals differs from that which
obtains in this country. In France a commission of the medical
faculty is appointed to ascertain by examination the qualifica¬
tions of the different candidates who may offer themselves for
the vacant appointments; and they select from among these
candidates those whom they consider best fitted for the offices
to be filled up. The direction of hospitals appoints those thus
recommended by the medical faculty. Thereafter, it would
seem, the medical faculty has no further concern with the
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medical officers appointed, who retain their places daring good
behaviour, and are promoted, in their turn, to higher situations.
Thus Dr. Tessier, some years since, while still allopathic, ob¬
tained by the so-called concours the appointment to the Hopital
Ste. Marguerite. When he became convinced of the truth of
homoeopathy, and changed his treatment accordingly, the
members of the medical faculty were highly scandalized at the
heresy, but could do nothing to get Dr. Tessier removed from
the situation he had obtained by virtue of their recommendation.
Dr. Tessier’s promotion has gone on as well as if he had been an
allopath of the purest water; and our readers have seen in our
pages that he has lately been appointed to the Hopital Beaujon.
The Hopital Ste. Marguerite was apparently but a sort of chapel
of ease, or auxiliary branch of the Hotel Dieu, but the Beaujon
is one of the primary hospitals of Paris; therefore an appoint¬
ment to it from such a hospital as Ste. Marguerite is considered
honourable promotion.
Infinitely preferable as is the French method of appointment
by the trying test of the concours to that prevailing in England,
by the degrading solicitation by the candidate of votes from
pursy subscribers, it must be confessed that the chances of the
admission of an avowed heretic are nearly as small through the
straining sieve of the medical faculty as they are here in the
face of an orthodox majority of subscribers. For though the
examiners are bound in honour and in conscience to recommend
for office the candidates who shall exhibit the greatest pro¬
ficiency in medical science, we can easily believe that they
could not reconcile it with their honour to promote an avowed
partisan of the hostile school; and that their conscience would
not upbraid them for rejecting one whose therapeutic creed they
held to be false and erroneous. We were, therefore, not much
surprised to learn that several gentlemen of avowed homoeopa¬
thic faith, who had presented themselves at the Paris concours ,
had been rejected by the examiners of the medical faculty. We
can well believe that those gentlemen may have been among the
best qualified of the candidates for the situations they aspired to
fill, and can sympathise with them in their indignation at losing
the desired appointments; but the antecedents of orthodox
VOL. XIII, NO. LI.—JANUARY, 1855. G
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Homoeopathy and the
medical faculties in general, and of the Parisian faculty in par*
ticular, led us to expect no other result. We can well believe
that had the candidates, in place of being believers in Hahne¬
mann, avowed any other therapeutic creed, or no therapeutic
creed whatsoever, there would have been no difficulty about
their election. They might, with the sanguinary Bouilland, have
held that there was no cure for a pneumonic patient except
in bleeding “ coup sur coup ,” or they might have confessed
with the expectant Dietl that all medication whatsoever was
useless and injurious in curing pneumonia; riimporte ,—such
therapeutic extremes would not have disqualified them in the
eyes of any one of their examiners for an hospital appointment.
They might have held either of these views, or adopted any
intermediate therapeutic belief, they had still belonged to the
one true church, beyond whose pale there is no salvation. But
homoeopathy—that is quite another affair ; homoeopathy is
heresy; heresy aims at nothing less than the destruction
and annihilation of orthodoxy. It is, therefore, an affair of
self-preservation for orthodoxy to keep down this avowed and
redoubtable enemy. The odium medicum burns as fiercely as
the odium theologicum, and persecutes rampant heterodoxy in
physic, if not with the rack and stake, at all events with the
ecclesiastical weapons of commination and excommunication.
It is cheering to note, as we do in friend Tessier’s case, that a
medical officer in France changing to homoeopathy does not lose
his office; but there is still in France, as with us, no hope for
open and avowed homoeopathy obtaining admission into the
hospitals. Before that can happen the majority of the medical
faculty must be themselves homoeopathic, or must have subsided
into a state of indifferentism regarding therapeutic creeds—a kind
of latitudinarianism not to be looked for in our day; for the
nearer homoeopathy advances towards its inevitable triumph, the
more fiercely will it be combated by its enemies—just as the
hard-pressed soldier when he despairs of coming off with his
life fights all the more fiercely— desperately as we say.
The account given by an indignant rejected candidate at the
Parisian concours —rejected because of his homoeopathy—of the
proceedings of himself and companions in misfortune, in refer-
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83
ence to their rejection, which may be read by all men in our
Gallican contemporary, is interesting to us, chiefly on account
of the defence of the conduct of the medical faculty set up by
the various allopathic journals of Paris.
Four of the homoeopathic candidates, whose conversion to
homoeopathy had apparently been effected or confirmed by the
instructions of Dr. Tessier, having found that whenever they
presented themselves before the concours a dead set was made
against them by the examiners, at length retired from the hope¬
less contest, and addressed the following protest to the direoteur-
g£n£ral de Tassistance publique—the grand functionary who
presides over the administration of hospitals and infirmaries for
the sick.
“ Monsieub,
“ For nearly six years a veritable coalition against us by
the medical men of the Parisian hospitals has constantly pur¬
sued us in all the concours before which we had the honour of
presenting ourselves. You, sir, know the pretext for this
coalition; you know that it was formed on account of homoeo¬
pathy, when, thanks to the generous hospitality of the adminis¬
tration, and the initiative of our master (Dr. Tessier), this the¬
rapeutic system received an important testimony to its truth in
the wards of Ste. Marguerite.
“ The storm that was then raised was not long in bursting on
our heads, and a violent proscription rejected us systematically
from all the concours , where we no longer meet with impartial
judges, but with declared adversaries.
“As early as 1850 two of us, more particularly menaced in a
sentence of condemnation pronounced by one of the judges in
the name of his colleagues, before the examinations had even
commenced, had resolved to withdraw from the concours about
to be opened; but yielding to your request, M. le directeur, and
grateful for your esteem, they at length consented to present
themselves before a tribunal bent on making them the victims
of their own prejudices.
“ It was, however, but reasonable to expect that time would
have calmed the violence of those passions; that truth would
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Homoeopathy and the
eventually be able to penetrate through the prejudices of the
moment; and that in the meantime the moderation of our con¬
duct, and the good faith of our testimony to the success of
homoeopathy, would succeed, sooner or later, in creating in our
favour those sentiments of toleration which every conscientious
conviction has a right to expect. It is in this hope that we
have continued, year after year, to submit uncomplainingly to
the examinations of the successive concours, and to the judg¬
ments pronounced by them.
“ But this hope has hitherto proved futile. In vain has testi¬
mony upon testimony been given, justifying our convictions; in
vain have facts been adduced, documents published; in faot, all
the elements of a rigorous verification been submitted to a
searching criticism; in vain has the administration of public
assistance itself, in a spirit of wise independence that cannot be
too highly commended, published the statistics of the homoeo¬
pathic treatment in the hospitals during a period of three years.
The light of truth, far from diminishing the blindness of our
adversaries, or the intolerance of our judges, has only served to
intensify the opposition directed against us.
“ At present this systematic hostility is a circumstance well
known to all the world. No secret is made of it; it is boasted
of; and on more than one occasion we have ourselves heard an
avowal of this unjustifiable spirit.
“ Indeed, what justification could be offered for the avowal of
a proscription based upon suspicion of bolding certain doctrines,
or accusation of certain tendencies—a proscription that revives
for us the sentence of outlawry passed upon suspected persons!
And how ought we to characterize such severity towards us who
have always openly professed the sincerest and deepest respect
for the study of traditional truths; whilst at the same time wo
endeavour, in the interest of our patients, to avail ourselves of
the progress of recent truths.
“ It is sad to see at the present day in France, in the middle
of the nineteenth century, medicine, alone among the liberal
sciences, offering to the world the sad spectacle of intolerance
towards ideas, and persecution of individuals; but especially is
it sad to see this persecution exercised by men otherwise
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85
eminent, who avow their ignorance of a question of such serious
interest to humanity, and on whioh they decide without infor¬
mation, hut from whose decisions there is no appeal. That,
however, is an affair between them and their consciences, for
which they alone are responsible.
“ As for us, we have the consciousness of having faithfully
fulfilled our duty towards science in sacrificing our future to
truth. Now we have no further care but to defend our
honour.
" In the face of this increasing opposition, we find it impos¬
sible to resign ourselves henceforth to an exclusion which
cannot fail to become an outrage to our personal dignity; there¬
fore we this day retire from the unequal strife, but whilst doing
so we declare unanimously—
“ Seeing that the coalition of whioh we oomplain is a fact of
public notoriety;
“ That it constitutes a real departure from the fundamental
principles and laws of the coneours ;
“ That it is a violation of the freedom of science, and that it
is an unjust infringement of our legitimate consideration ;
"We protest against the denial of justice to us, and claim the
restitution of our rights.
" We beg you to accept, M. le directeur, the expression of
the respectful and grateful sentiments with which we have the
honour to subscribe ourselves your devoted servants,
“ F. Gabalda, Jules Davasse, Champeaux,
Alph. Milcent,
“ Doctors of Medicine, late internes of the Parisian Hospitals.
" Paris, 26th January, 1854.”
These four are but a portion of those who have suffered by
the machinations of the “ coalitionfor we learn that several
other promising "late internes,”—young men of parts and
diligent habits, in every way fitted to fill with credit the post of
hospital physicians or surgeons, discouraged by the systematic
hostility displayed by the examiners, refused to present them¬
selves in the coneours, being thoroughly convinced that with
such judges the verdict of condemnation was already settled
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Homoeopathy and the
before the trial commenced. Two others, hoping against hope,
continued to present themselves regularly at the concours , after
the above four had retired, but their fate, as might have been
foreseen, was only to be rejected on every occasion. One un¬
just judge, we read, could be wearied into acquiescence; for one
man, how unjust soever, has still some conscience, some sense
of shame, and some dread of the consequences to himself of
flagrant continued injustice; and the importunate client can
attack him on any or all of these weak parts; but a body of
unjust judges it were vain to attempt to move into acquiescence
by any amount of importunity, for collectively they offer none
of those weak points which individually they may display.
Accordingly our two hopeful " anciens internes ” were at last
obliged to abandon hope, after a manful struggle with their
unpitying and inexorable judges.
Not without curiosity we turn to see what the French allopa¬
thic journals have to say to the protest of the indignant four.
We know, or at least can guess, how such a protest would be
treated by the allopathic journals of this country. In one of
two ways, either by contemptuous silence or by outrageous
abuse. The Lancet , which our other journals affect to despise,
gives the tone to them all in the matter of homoeopathy. If
the Lancet chooses to revile homoeopathy, forthwith all the
other journals commence shrieking in the same key. If the
Lancet affects to ignore the existence of homoeopathy (as at
present), all the other journals are profoundly silent respecting
the banned subject. “ Oh, no, we never mention it," they sing,
in sweet chorus; and they lay the flattering unction to their
soul that elsewhere “ its name is never heard." But mayhap the
French medical journals are not Lancet- led. We shall see.
The Moniteur des Hopitaux published the protest entire in
its number for April 11, 1854, and added the following re¬
marks :—“ The signers of the above letter and protest being all
late internes of hospitals, former colleagues of our own, whose
honourable character is well known to us, we have found a
sufficient guarantee in their names; so that wu have thought it
impossible not to comply with their request that we should
bring the eircumstances of the strife in which they were
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eDgaged before the supreme judge, the medical profession at
large.”
This is certainly not Lancetish , rather the contrary; it is
what we might expect from a chivalrous enemy. The Moniteur
gives the facts of the case as they are represented by the
aggrieved parties, hears testimony to the high character of the
latter, and so leaves the matter for the decision of “ the supreme
judge, the medical profession at large.”
Another journal, the Gazette Hebdomadaire, of April 28th,
speaks of the protest, but does not publish it. It tacitly admits
the truth of the allegations contained in the protest, hut takes
up the cudgels in defence of the conduct of the judges. “ Of
what,” it says, “ does this small group of malcontents complain ?
They denounce a systematic hostility on the part of the jury,
an organized proscription. But in truth what is the meaning
of it all ? That all the successive juries have refused to admit
the practitioners of homoeopathy to hospital appointments.
Where is the harm ? The concours is open to all who possess
the conditions required for inscription, to homoeopaths as well
as to allopaths. But they all, likewise, on the day of examina¬
tion, fall into the hands of judges perfectly free to form their
own conclusions, and to record their votes ; free even to form a
coalition, if a coalition is required to stop the entrance of doc¬
trines which they may hold to he illusory or dangerous.
To speak seriously, does any one imagine that a talent for
speaking and skill in diagnosis are the sole things a judge has
to look to in deciding on the fitness of the candidate ? Were
that the case, then, no doubt, more than one of those who
signed the protest would have had a right to an appointment in
the hospitals; but the essential merit of one who is to be
placed at the head of an institution for the sick does not consist
in being able to argue well, or to percuss expertly. He must
hold and practise sound therapeutic doctrines. Now, the
homoeopathic candidates, if they are sincere, must, when under¬
going their examinations, give an account of their method of
treatment. Well, rightly or wrongly, the jury consider this
method to he detestable.”
This, at all events, is a candid avowal of open and uncompro-
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Homoeopathy and the
mising hostility to the therapeutic principles professed by the
disappointed candidates, while, at the same time, their talent
and ability in other points is admitted; and it almost seems to
us that a hint is given that if the candidates would not be so
open in acknowledging their heretical creed, they might yet
escape in future concours stern ejection into the limbo of
obscurity.
“ Oh, wad ye tak* a thocht an’ men*
Ye aiblins might, I dinna ken,
Still hae a stake.”
Had our rejected candidates professed any other therapeutic
creed, how widely soever it might have differed from that of
their judges, they would have found that skill in diagnosis, and
ability in argument, would have been all that was looked to in
judging of their fitness for hospital appointments. But homoeo¬
pathy—that our jury, with one voice, agree to pronounce detes¬
table. “ Elle est insupportable,” said Talleyrand of some lady
he disliked, “ mais elle n’a que ce defaut-la.” And in like
manner the sole fault our impartial Gazette can find in homoeo¬
pathy is that it is detestable.
A third journal. La France Medicale (April 15th), notices
the controversy in a different style.
“ We cannot conclude this article, already too long,” it says,
“ without saying a word respecting a serious accusation brought
by some homoeopathic colleagues against the judges of the
concours of the central bureau of the Paris hospitals. This
question affects too nearly that professional liberty whose cham¬
pion we have constituted ourselves, to permit us to pass it over
in silence. We shall consider it with that independence which
gives equal rights to all honest sects in medicine.
“ Homoeopathy, which we do not ourselves believe in, has
amongst its partizans zealous and honourable men; if it be
erroneous, let us point out the false path it has pursued, and if
it be true, let it bring proof sufficiently strong to convince us.
This is liberty as we understand it, and as we defend it. There
is room for all; no one is denied the privilege of speaking, nor
is any one prohibited from using his pen. Maintain your
principles, exhibit their greatness and their justice, attack ours ;
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89
demonstrate to us their vicious and faulty character; hut for
heaven’s sake do not presume to pry into the consciences of
your fellow men ; conscience is a sanctuary, where God alone
has the right to penetrate. You accuse of injustice the judges
of the concours of the central bureau; you allege that they
systematically keep you out of the hospitals, and select, in pre¬
ference to you, candidates less worthy of the appointment than
yourselves. It is a matter of public notoriety, you say. Your
bare assertion is the only proof you oan offer—you cannot pro¬
duce others; for what reply would you make to one of these
judges, were he to say to you, ‘ Perhaps I may not be capable of
judging correctly,' [resign your office, then, shout the indig¬
nant four,] ‘ but, at all events, I am conscientious.' [One-
sidedly so, as it would seem—0 most upright judge.] ‘You
appear to me—I may be wrong or I might be right—to be
inferior to the candidate I have nominated.’ [0 honourable
judge, did you not condemn us before even you commenced to
examine us?] ‘I may have erred from ignorance,’ [nay, most
wise judge, you surely would not make such a disqualifying
admission,] ‘ hut I have not neglected my duty.’ What would
you reply, and what proof would you oppose to this cry of con¬
science ? [Alack, no such cry has reached our ears, but con¬
trariwise, a cry of quite another sort—a cry, namely, that
sounds to us most like threat of rejection under all circum¬
stances ; no cry of conscience that—a most unconscientious cry
truly!]
“ Be homoeopaths, be hydropaths, what you choose; discuss,
experiment, labour, we shall defend your rights as if they were
our own; we may attack your doctrines from the stand-point of
science, but we never shall accuse you of lack of sincerity; we
may accuse you of error, but never of falsehood; for we recog¬
nise but two barriers to liberty, and these we shall always
respect,—they are God and conscience.”
This is what we should call (saving certain theatrical decla¬
matory expressions) a quiet, gentlemanly view of the contro¬
versy ; unfavourable to us certainly, as is natural in an adver¬
sary, but not hopelessly, rabidly inimical. “ We may accuse
you of error, but never of falsehood,” says Medical France.
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Homoeopathy and the Concoure of France.
What a contrast does medical England, as represented by the
best allopathic journal published in these kingdoms, present to
this calm, dignified tone. In the very last number of the
British and Foreign Medico- Chirurgical Review (for October,
1854), Dr. T. K. Chambers tells all whom it may concern that
the secret of homoeopathy is simply “ lying.” Truly an easy
way of settling the dispute. Homoeopathy lays its facts and its
arguments, its statistical proofs, its logical deductions, its tradi¬
tional corroborations, before the face of all men. Dr. T. E.
Chambers steps forward, the self-constituted champion of allo¬
pathy, and thinks to settle the whole question by the cabalistic
words, “ You’re a liar.” Alas ! for poor old allopathy in these
realms ; what miserable shifts she is put to to defend her own,
when the great argument she brings forward in the year of
grace 1854 for the annihilation of homoeopathy is after all only
the ultima ratio, or final argument of the gamins in our streets
—“ you’re a liar !” Alas ! how strangely transformed is the
British and Foreign Medical Review, so long conducted with
courtesy and scientific dignity by our gentlemanly opponent.
Sir John Forbes, under its new title and anonymous editorship,
when the sole method that occurs to it of replying to a trouble¬
some rival is to assert roundly, without mincing matters, that
its rival lies. But sooth to say, the argument of Dr. T. E.
Chambers is the sole one that we have met with in England
against homoeopathy of late years. “ You lie,” written in every
possible manner, now openly expressed, now covertly insinuated, is
the abracadabra with which our allopathic compatriots have en¬
deavoured to ward off the catching influence of the new faith. It
is the argument used against us by every allopathic journal,
from the British and Foreign Medico-Chirurgical Review
down to th5 foul-mouthed Lancet; by every allopathic writer,
from Dr. Alexander Wood up to Dr. J. Y. Simpson. The
freshness of this magic answer to all homoeopathic reasoning
seems never to depart, and each new opponent uses it as though
it were his own discovery, and as though he had no douht what¬
ever of its settling the dispute now and for ever. To the credit
of our Gallic neighbours be it said that they have discovered
that hard names do not always answer the same end as good
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91
arguments, and that the happy idea of calling your opponent a
liar is not to the impartial on-looker a convincing proof that you
are in the right. On the contrary, they have made the very
notable discovery that even in the arena of scientific discoveries
the amenities of gentlemanly life may be with advantage pre¬
served, and they at once declare their resolution not to resort to
the foul weapons of discourteous accusation.— “Nous pourrons
vous accuser d'erreur, mats jamais de mensonge.”
REVIEWS.
Die Homoopathie , eine Einleitung zum richtigen Verstandniss
und zum Selbststudium derselben. Von Dr. Bernhard
Hirschel, &c. Dessau, 1851.
Organon of Specific Homcepathy; or, an Inductive Expo¬
sition of the Principles of the Homoeopathic Healing
Art; addressed to Physicians and intelligent Laymen. By
Charles J. Hempel, M.D. Philadelphia, 1854.
Tracts on Homoeopathy. By William Sharp, M.D., F.R.S.
London: Ayjott & Co.
North American Homoeopathic Journal. No. XII. Conducted
by Drs. Hering, Marcy, and Metcalf. Radde: New York.
Quarterly Homoeopathic Magazine. Edited by Drs. Pulte,
Gatchel, and Williams. Cleveland.
If a sceptical and philosophical Roman of the third century,
after reading in his favorite author Tacitus of Christianity:
“ this pernicious superstition was in part suppressed, but broke
out again not only over Judea, whence this mischief first
sprang, but in the city of Rome also, whither do run from
every quarter and make a noise all the flagrant and shame¬
ful enormities," took into his head to dip into the writers* in
favour of the despised sect, and procured the only works then
existing, those of Justin the martyr and Origen, he could
hardly fail to be astonished at finding that they were in great
part controversial, and that the controversies maintained with
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Review .
extreme bitterness were not against Fagans, but against here*
tical Christians, and he would on further enquiry be informed
that the latter writer and the most celebrated had been de¬
nounced and excommunicated by one Bishop for expounding
the Christian creed at the request of another Bishop; we
should hardly be surprised if he flung away the books with
impatience, and said to himself, “ Well, this is really marvellous.
Here is an insignificant sect depicted by our ablest writers as
utterly unworthy of respect, and instead of propounding their
doctrines in a calm philosophical spirit, so as to win favour with
thoughtful men, they occupy themselves in violent personal
altercations perfectly unintelligible to every one who is not in
the secret of their petty quarrels. It is plain that this bubble
will soon burst; for even supposing there is some truth on their
side, the world will be disgusted with their violence and mutual
abuse; and so, till they are agreed among themselves what
Christianity is, I certainly shall not trouble my head about the
matter.” But that matter, had he lived on, would have in¬
volved him and all his interests in its course, and he would
have been forced to confess, that although successive ages so
far from obliterating controversies among Christians, vastly
increased both their number and intensity, so that the believers
in the same original creed strove which should shew the greatest
zeal by the vigour with which they killed one another; yet so
far from there being any appearance of the decay of the system
he would see that its introduction had become the land-mark of
the world’s history, from which all events took their date; and
although we are as far from unanimity as ever after some eigh¬
teen hundred years, yet that the return of Paganism is a sheer
impossibility.
Such was the train of reflection suggested by the perusal of
the works and articles to which we propose to direct the atten¬
tion of our readers. And we now intend to consider in what
we all profess to agree, and in what we seem to differ; nor do
we doubt, that if we only conduct the enquiry with patience and
candour, we shall discover that the seeming disagreements are
far less serious than any one dipping into our literature for the
first time would be led to imagine.
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In the first place, we are all pretty well agreed in what we will
not do; we will not employ hot irons or moxas or caustics, we
will not bleed and blister; in fact, we will have nothing to do
with the whole stock-in-trade of a general practitioner. As a
rule, we know not diuretics, nor purgatives, nor diaphoretics,
nor emmenagogues ; neither black draughts nor pill-boxesare to
be found in our patients’ rooms; we have one and all renounced
the use of the old physio, with its nauseous mixtures and san¬
guinary apparatus of torture. Now this in itself is an enormous
step to have made together. Nor will we admit there is any
difference of opinion upon this head. As a rule we give neither
purgatives nor emetics. We profess all of us to have other
means in which we trust for overcoming disease. Nor shall we
allow the question of auxiliaries to confuse us here; their em¬
ployment may be right or wrong, necessary or unnecessary, but
they do not constitute our system. We all of us agree in not
using them as the old school do, but only occasionally and
accidentally; and none but a pedant will ever confound the
occasional use of an extraordinary method in sudden or peculiar
emergencies with the habitual trust to such a method as the
only one. No, we are not pagans, although some of us may
be convicted of exclaiming “ by Jove!" when taken by surprise.
In the second place, we all agree in the truth of the maxim,
“ Similia similihus curantur.” It is true one of the hooks be¬
fore us startles our ears by its title of “ Organon,” and at first
we feared that our laborious energetic colleague, whom we hold
in great esteem for the really most important service he has
rendered to our cause, was going to abandon us ; but a perusal
of his work allayed our fears, and we found that although called
an Organon, it was not like Bacon’s, a “ Novum Organum,” hut
that its novelty was only apparent not real. Indeed, its greatest
novelty is its style and language. “ It is a law of human de¬
velopment, that appearances of truth should at first be mistaken
for the actual facts. Sensual perceptions constitute the first
truths to the dawning intellect. In reality, all such perceptions
may be as false as they seem true to the senses. They might
be termed true illusions. Even the positive sciences were ori¬
ginally based upon sensual illusions. * ******
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Revieu)*
In geography, the earth was supposed to be what it actually
seems, and what some Indian tribes believe it to be even now,
an expanse of land floating upon the waters, or fastened to the
heavens by invisible chains, and touched by the clouds at the
outer borders, beyond which a frightened fancy conjured up an
abyss of chaotic darkness, inhabited by devouring monsters, or
illumined here and there by the lurid flames of the infernal
abode.” Dr. Hempel in this passage reveals the tendency of his
mind to range under one heading wholly distinct ideas to pro¬
duce on the reader the sensual illusion he deplores in nature.
It is manifest that under the head of sensual illusions he com¬
prehends the imperfect observation of objects, and also the
phantastio inferences from such imperfect knowledge. That the
earth is a plane is not an illusion of the senses, it is simply an
imperfect observation. It would not be fair to take the observa¬
tion of a person living in a pit as the example of a sensual illu¬
sion, if he came to the conclusion that the world was a cylinder
made of coal. The rotundity of the earth is a visible reality, if
we look on the boundless plain of the ocean. So obvious as
to he used by way of illustration—
“ Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail,
That brings our friends np from the under world;
Sad as the last that reddens oyer one
That sinks with all we love below the verge.”
If the flatness of the earth be not, properly speaking, a sensual
illusion, still less can the notion of its being fastened to the
heavens by invisible chains be called an illusion of the senses.
If the chains are invisible, how can they delude the senses ?
We find this style of inaccurate writing pervade the whole book,
and when he attempts to rectify these sensual illusions by
calling reason to his aid, he uses the word in a sense wholly
different from any in which it has hitherto been employed. And
we confess that we are surprised at this from so good a German
scholar, for he must be well acquainted with the technical limi¬
tation of the word Vernunft to the faculty by which we take
cognizance of the infinite and absolute, and he could hardly
bring such a faculty as this to bear upon the determination of
the accuracy or inaccuracy of observed phenomena on which
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95
the natural sciences are based. Although such a confusion
seems hardly possible, yet we confess that no other explanation
of his strange invocation of reason whenever he gets into trouble
about symptoms, offers itself to our mind. Now considering
the novelties in language, and we may add in type, we did
apprehend, after we had fretted over his sounding periods, some
dismal disclosure at the end of his work exhibiting him in the
light of a “ lone star” bent upon a new and perilous excursion
into regions of unexplored therapeutics. How great was our
astonishment when we came to the following conclusion of the
whole matter ! “ And having offered these recapitulations of
the general principles which I have endeavoured to develope, I
will simply ask my readers once more to dwell with particular
attention on the important truth that the specifically ascertained
character of a drug depends upon the identity of the starting
point of its action upon the organism with the point of inva¬
sion of the morbific principle. If these points be identical, the
whole action of the drug will correspond with the nature of the
disease, not otherwise, be the perceptive symptoms ever so
similar. If the true formula of the specific law of cure be then
Similia similibus curantur, this formula should not be under¬
stood as referring to an outward similarity of the drug-symp¬
toms to the symptoms of the natural disease. This similarity
should be understood in a compound sense as applying to the
drug-disease reflected by its pathogenetic symptoms, and to the
morbid condition of the organism or the pathological state as
manifested to the senses by its characteristic phenomena. The
formula should therefore imply a perfect correspondence between
the drug-disease and the natural pathological disturbance as
morbid states, not a mere series of symptoms; and in order to
leave no doubt that this compound similarity or perfect corres¬
pondence is the import of the formula, a more adequate expres¬
sion WOUld be ‘ CORRESPONDENTIA CORRESPONDENTIBUS CU¬
RANTUR.’ And so the murder is out! and in future, instead of
trying to find medicines similar in the character of their effects
to the symptoms of the disease for which we give them, we
should try and find medicines which correspond in the character
of their effects, &c. &c.”
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Review.
Before we have time to congratulate ourselves upon being
really at one on this matter, we are clamourously reminded that
there is a great controversy going on about the meaning of the
maxim “ Simiiia similibus,” or “ Correspondentia correspon-
dentibus,” curantur, that one party have chosen as their battle
cry, “ Hahnemann and Symptoms, and down with pathology
and the other, “ Pathology and Progress, and down with Hah¬
nemann.” Are these then irreconcilable terms? Pathology
is the science which teaches the order of succession of morbid
actions or processes; the connection of these one with another;
and the methods by which they may be best recognised and
discriminated. It would be as absurd to represent Hahnemann
as opposed to this as it would be to speak of him as opposed to
chemistry or astronomy. The only question that can arise is,
how far this independent science can be useful to us. Now this
obviously turns upon its state of advancement. So long as
pathology was a mass of conjectures on the possible changes in
the state of the fluids or solids which compose the body, it is
plain it could give no more certainty to practice than itself
possessed; and a conjectural treatment was the inevitable result
of a hypothetical pathology. So long as this was its condition
it had not realised for itself the famous formula of Newton,
that in order to a satisfactory explanation of any phenomena
we must be prepared to shew that the supposed causes were
actually in existence, and being there, were capable of producing
the supposed result. If we were to give as an explanation of
a cutaneous eruption the acid state of the blood, (as is still done
by our allopathic brethren,) we must be prepared to prove that
the blood of the patient is too acid, and that too acid blood
does produce such an eruption as he exhibits. Having done so,
it would be reasonable to treat the superacidity according to the
best method. But if we cannot prove either of these propo¬
sitions, if it is a mere conjecture that the blood is too acid, and
another that too acid blood produces an eruption, then it is
plain that if this conjecture be a mistake our treatment founded
upon it must be a failure. Such pathology as this we all readily
renounce, and such pathology as this it was which Hahnemann
condemned. But this does not deserve the name of pathology.
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97
as it does not fulfil the essential conditions of a science laid
down by Newton, and universally admitted at the present day.
But because we regret this pseudo-pathology are we free
therefore to treat symptoms without reference to their cause?
We are at once delivered from this ridiculous position by refer¬
ence to the meaning of the word. Symptom implies something
beyond itself. A condition becomes a symptom when it mani¬
fests a morbid change: till then it is no symptom. Blackness
of the face is a symptom when it arises from the disease of the , 4
heart, but is it a symptom in a negro ? Opisthotonos is a symp¬
tom when it arises from affection of the spinal chord, but is it
a symptom in a clown at Astley’s ? “ Symptom" is a transitory
noun governing “ of.” To talk of symptoms per se is simply
to talk nonsense; we might as well speak of a proprietor, and
on being asked of what ? reply of nothing—simply a proprietor,
or of a manifestation which disclosed nothing.. The thing
which a symptom always and necessarily discloses is a morbid
condition; unless we believed such a condition to be in the
back-ground, we never should dream of treating the symptom
any more than we should give a globule of the thousandth potency
of Argent, nit. to a negro in order to remove the blackness of
his face. The moment we recognise a condition or appearance
to be a symptom, that moment we enter upon pathology, a
department of which is the relation of symptoms to their causes.
There is no help for it. We are all pathologists, whether we will
or no. Moreover, every man uses all the pathology he knows.
Those that know least and pride themselves upon their igno¬
rance, use least of soience and most of conjecture. Hahnemann
knew all the pathology of his day, and used it all. The only
scientific branch of that day was semiology, or a correct obser¬
vation and record of the symptoms of disease. So anxious was
Hahnemann to work this out in perfection, that he has exposed
himself to the ridicule even of Dr. Hempel for the minute
attention he bestowed upon every particular connected with a
patient, resembling in this his great archetype Hippocrates. Is
it within the bounds of possibility to imagine, that if he had
lived in our day he would have neglected the advanced methods
of investigating diseases which would have led him to the same
VOL. XIII, NO. LI.—JANUARY 1855. H
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end by surer and quicker paths ? To object to his not using
the stethoscope and the light of morbid anatomy, is to object
to Archimedes not sinking the Roman galleys with a Lancaster
gun, instead of setting them on fire with his burnished mirrors,
which all engineers of the present day would denounce as a
most clumsy substitute for a battery.
There can, in fact, be no difference of opinion as to the use
of pathology among physicians; nor is there really among our-
. selves. The apparent difference has arisen from the difficulty
of tracing the connection between a symptom and its cause in
all cases. A symptom is only a syllable, and as there are words
of one, two, up to ten or twelve syllables, so there are diseases
of one, two, or ten symptoms. The skill of the physician is
shewn in arranging these syllables into an intelligible word*
Shivering, heat, sweat, are the three essential syllables of ague.
To apply the rule of similia to this word, all we have to do is
to find among the records of our medicines the corresponding
three syllables, as Dr. Hempel would say, and as they too
would spell ague, so the medicine would cure it. In fact, it is
perfectly impossible to imagine anything better fitted for prac¬
tice than the Hahnemannic formula. Given a disease, find a
medicine which produces similar symptoms, and you will cure
it. It is really frivolous to talk of curing all the symptoms
and yet not curing the disease. The symptoms are the bodily
manifestation of the abstraction we call disease; if they are
taken away, nothing but the ghost will be left, and how to get
rid of this is rather the affair of the Spirit-rappers than the
physician. Nor have we much patience with our great homoeo¬
pathic tractarian, highly as we appreciate his services in giving
popularity to the doctrines of Hahnemann, when he takes the
founder of our school to task for not having written his
Organon in the same plan as Newton wrote his Principia.
Surely our learned colleague must be well aware that the objects
of mathematical investigation are so peculiar that they are
capable of an amount of precise definition unattainable in any
branch of knowledge which deals in qualities as well as quan¬
tities. A disease is neither a circle, a triangle, nor a parallelo¬
gram. We cannot define its boundaries and measure its area.
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Sharp upon Hahnemann.
and therefore we cannot apply the term likeness as it is appli- v
cable to two equal and similar triangles to the resemblance
between the symptoms of a malady and those of its curative
medicine. Another objection to Dr. Sharp’s proposed plan of
such an Organon as Hahnemann’s is, that all mathematical disco*
veries are capable of immediate and certain verification. Within
six months after their publication mathematicians will have
repeated them and decided their fate. But if Hahnemann had
contented himself with announcing his formula, how could he
have proved it? His only plan was to persuade others to join
him, and in order to do this something very different from the
repulsive abstruseness of a mathematical treatise was required.
After all the strictures written on his great work, there it is
speaking in all the modem languages to thousands of intelligent
persons, not yet superseded by any books or tracts written since,
and with all its faults a monument of learning and sagacity of
which medicine has reason to be proud.
Having then all agreed to be guided by the rule of similarity
or correspondence, whether we call it a formula of practice or a
law of nature, we all agree in the second place, that in order to
carry out this rule we must ascertain in some way or other the
effects of those substances on the sound which we intend to
give the sick; in technical language, we agree about the neces¬
sity of proving our medicines. Indeed, it was the proving of
medicines that transformed Hahnemann’s system from an inge¬
nious speculation into a practical innovation ; it gave feet and a
“ locus standi" to his doctrines, and removes him to an enormous
distance from such a speculator as Paracelsus, to whom he has
been frequently compared. “ Here,” said Hahnemann, “ is Syden¬
ham’s picture of scarlet fever, and here is my picture of Bella¬
donna.” Let those who recognise a likeness, and wish to try
my system, administer this medicine in this disease. The
unanimous verdict of posterity will be in favour of Hahnemann.
When cholera first appeared, and even homoeopathists were awe¬
struck and bewildered, Hahnemann pronounced the corres¬
ponding word to be Camphor. * Again, he is found to be right.
Then, before we too severely criticise his provings, we must
consider the enormous benefit they have been to us. At the same
ti 2
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Review.
time we agree with a great deal that Dr. Hempel says upon this
matter, and with him we deeply regret that some of our most
zealous colleagues, especially in America, should waste their
valuable time and taleuts in heaping up a mass of provings,
which must be utterly valueless to the world at large, even if
they are of use to those who make them. We wish these gen¬
tlemen would reflect, that in order to bring the new medicines
which they are shipping to Europe every mail into general
repute, it is not enough that they should be good in themselves,
but they must also command our confidence. Now we assure
them that this is not the case, with few exceptions we have no
confidence whatever in the recent American provings. The
reason is plain enough, we find nothing but a mass of syllables
and no words, and we cannot, therefore, adapt them to the dis¬
eases for which, perhaps, they may be suited. As Dr. Hempel
well observes, we wish to have the effects of reallv-admitted
active agents upon the living ceconomy; we know Arsenic produces
many important changes in the animal organism, and we know,
therefore, before-hand that Arsenic must be useful in restoring
some morbid conditions to health; and hence we take an
interest in the proving of such a substance, from our conviction
of its containing hidden virtues which require only to be ex¬
hibited in order to be accepted. But we have no proof of the
specifically morbific or poisonous effect of many of the new
substances recently introduced into our materia medica, such,
for example, as fishes’ skins, deers’ hides, diseased potatoes, ill-
cooked puddings, excrements of foetal horses, lice, &c. The very
multitude as well as diversity of the so-called symptoms they
produoe is fatal to their character. If we carefully examine our
best provings, those of the so-called polychrests, we shall find
that the number of actual symptoms, that is, definite morbid
effects, is not nearly so great as at first one might imagine. So
many are repeated, and there is such detail of the conditions
and circumstances under which they were observed. But in
these spurious records of sensations to which we now-a-days
have the name of proving gi\jen the number of registered
peculiar effects is enormous. The reason is obvious. The
moment we sit down to observe the effects of a globule of a
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Our New Provings.
101
triturated louse, we call as it were to our nerves and ask them
what they have to say. Sure enough they will answer as we
know hysterical nerves do. But what answers ? They speak
not the language of men, least of all of science; but squeak
and gibber out of their vacuity because they are thrown upon
themselves, and have to feed their sensations from within by
their fancies, instead of from without by their sensible impres¬
sions. Shall we learn nothing from the phantastic exhibitions
of the electro-biologists ? Shall we not be taught by these expe¬
riments that the most intense and real sensations may he excited
from within as well as from without ? After we have seen, as
most of us probably have, a person of intelligence and unim¬
peachable veracity cry out in positive agony from the burning
she feels when touched by a feather which she is told is a red
hot coal,—shall we any longer implicitly and uninquisitively
accept of all the sensations said to he derived from the millionth
of a grain of the wing of a gnat ? Surely the time for this
foolery is over; surely we should take a lesson rather
from the manly conduct of the Vienna provers, who took active
poisons in such quantities as to make them really ill. If this
rule were adopted it would tell in two ways, for while it afforded
us indubitable effects of energetic substances upon the animal
ceconomy, it would blow away off the face of the waters those
fair-weather sailors who offer themselves up at present as mar¬
tyrs to animalculi,—our homoeopathic Fakirs who gaze them¬
selves into a trance, and give us the benefit of the visions they
enjoyed.
We have expressed ourselves strongly upon this matter, but
we assure our readers not half so strongly as Dr. Hempel, who
has laboured a good deal in the symptom-galley while trans¬
lating the chronic diseases. It may exonerate us from the
charge of using extravagant language to quote a paragraph of
his work.
“ What shall we, what can we say of an enormous mass of symp¬
toms, which have been incorporated into the homoeopathic Materia
Medica, by men who never knew how to to distinguish between a
fancy and an actual truth. In what way are the symptoms which
are set down to the account of many drugs which have been introduced
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Review.
Bince Hahnemann’s demise by a number of provers in different
countries, distinguished from the numerous unpleasant sensations by
which thousands of nervous systems are disturbed in the course of
twenty-four hours, while merely exposed to the common influences
of life, the anxieties and cares of business, the irritating action of
atmospheric impurities, changes in the weather or wind, unwholesome
food, excessive heat, dampness or rawness of the air, &c. Look at
these pretended symptoms, and then ask yourselves the question
whether a single one bears the test of a critical examination. Read
the head symptoms of a great many newly added drugs, or the throat
symptoms, the chest symptoms, or any other portion of the symptoms,
dwell upon them with your mind’s eye, and see whether you do not
arrive with me at the inevitable conclusion that most of the recorded
symptoms, if not all, are not likewise experienced by most men while
engaged in the daily pursuits of life; and whether a most dis¬
couraging sameness in the symptoms does not expose the accuracy of
the prover to legitimate suspicion. We have such vague and
unsatisfactory statements, as pain in some part of the head above the
eyes, in the temples, forehead, or occiput; or a beating, drawing, or
jerking in the head, or insignificant sensations, all of which are
stated in such a loose, flippant, and superficial manner that they are
not only perfectly valueless in practice, for the simple reason that
nobody ever cares to apply to a physician for such trifling ailments,
but that at the same time they cast a legitimate suspicion on those
few symptoms—few and far between—rari nantes in gurgite vasto,
scattered here and there over the immense abyss, which otherwise
might seem to be attributable to the drug, but which when dis¬
covered among such a mass of unreliable testimony, must be set
down as the accidental results of some other disturbance of the
organism, physical fatigue, constitutional debility, an unpleasant
emotion, cold, an indigestion, or some such cause. A premium might
safely be offered for every genuine drug symptom, which may be
found among many of our provings; and if such a symptom should
really exist, we are at a loss to determine to what disease it points in
practice. It is pain in the head, pain, in the throat, pain in the
chest, pain in the shoulder, pain in the elbow, pain in the knee, pain
in the back, pain here, pain there, pain all over; and this is a
tolerably fair summing up of the pathogenesis of many of our newly
added drugs; and new drugs are continually being added, with
frightful lists of symptoms.”
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Dr. Hempel versus Dr. Hering.
103
While we thus frankly acknowledge the justice of Dr.
Hempel’s strictures, we cannot approve of the personal ani¬
mosity he displays towards Dr. Hering, whose zeal and labours
for homoeopathy have deservedly won for him a reputation, both
in Europe and America, which will not be overthrown by the
bitter diatribes his opponents have indulged in, both in Germany
and his own country. And it is but right and fair to remember
that while we all agree about the necessity of proving medicines,
there is still a great diversity of opinion as to the best plan for
rendering our provings useful, that the subject is beset with
great difficulties, both theoretical and practical, which no one
who has not himself engaged in the task can altogether realise;
and it seems to us that if, besides criticising so unmercifully the
work of others, Dr. Hempel and in general critics would give us
an example, as Hahnemann did, of the best way to do the work,
and publish the full and exact effects of one single medicine,
they would render more service to the cause than by volumes of
the most rigid and successful criticism. “ Pronounce medita¬
tively the name of Jenner,” says Coleridge—and for Jenner let
us substitute Hahnemann,—“ and ask what might we not hope,
what need we deem unattainable, if all the time, the effort, the
skill which we waste in making ourselves miserable through
vice or error, and vicious through misery, were embodied and
marshalled to a systematic war against the existing evils of
nature." Such an array is presented by Hahnemann in the six
volumes of his Materia Medica Dura ; and we would strongly
urge upon the young practitioners, who have leisure and health,
to do this service, for which they are well adapted. They will
by so doing acquire knowledge, which is the first thing, and
also a far more real and lasting reputation, than by compiling
elementary pamphlets about homoeopathy, of which there is now
an ample stock for the present century. “ It is only the
young,” says Hahnemann, “ whose heads are not yet deluged to
overflowing with a flood of every-day dogmas, and in whose
arteries there runs not yet the stream of medical prejudice—it
is only such young and candid natures on whom truth and
philanthropy have got a hold, who are open to our simple doc¬
trine of medicine. It is only those who, impelled by their own
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natural impulse, as I gladly observe in my pupils, to restore to
the light of day, by their devotion to the truth, those treasures
of medicinal action—inestimable treasures which have been
from of old allowed to lie unknown in obscurity by self-com-
placerft false-reasoning ingenuity.”
In the third place , we all agree about the dose; that is, we
all agree upon the principle which ought to regulate the dose ;
and it is this agreement and this principle which builds up a
wall of partition between us and the adherents of old physic.
We all agree that our medicines are intended to cure, without
producing any disturbance in the system, whereas old physic
strives to cure by means of the disturbance it sets up. Our
medicines cure without purging or sweating, theirs through
purging and sweating. Here is the great stumbling-block to
old physic. “ Our venerable mother,” as Sir John Forbes calls
old physic, cannot conceive how we can effect insensibly what
costs her—good old soul—so much pains to achieve sensibly.
We give impalpable doses, and produce impalpable results.
This double negation, although it really becomes an affirmative,
seems folly to her; and she is not to be made a fool of in her
old age. Nor should this disbelief surprise us; indeed, the
wonder is all on the other side; for although we by long habit
are now reconciled to impalpable doses, and credit tasteless and
transparent solutions with possessing powerful virtues, and even
talk among ourselves about large and small doses of our medi¬
cine, yet to those without the pale of homoeopathy they are all
alike ridiculous and impotent, a sham and a delusion, an insult
to their common sense, and a culpable deception on our patients.
It is on this point Hahnemann showed his immense moral
courage. To maintain in the face of all Europe that the
million-millionth of a drop of a well known drug, such as
China, which old physic gave in drachms, was sufficient to
arrest a fever, displayed an amount of heroic self-confidence
and indifference to the clamour and ridicule of his own pro¬
fession, which we believe to be unrivalled in the history of
science. On this point it behoved him to be dogmatic. There
was no middle course; either he was right and all were wrong
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Hahnemanns Dogmatism.
105
besides, or else he was a wild enthusiast, who mistook his
inward fancies for external facts.
That our opponents should believe this is not wonderful; but
we grieve to find Dr. Sharp, in one of his tracts (No. 5), quietly
suggesting that Hahnemann’s mind had fallen into the state of
lunacy “feelingly and vividly” described by Johnson as the
condition of the mad astronomer in Rasselas. Such a charge
from such a quarter is really a provocation; but it does not
require refutation. It is only the random* remark of a popular
preacher. His trick of art is to surprise by saying striking
* things. On this the popularity of his writings depends. Perhaps
after he has achieved his present ambition, and found that such
fleeting popularity is but the echo of clamour and shadow of
renown, he will seriously devote his well-stored mind to the
study of the subject, and produce something of use to science.
To us the dogmatism of Hahnemann seems to indicate no
aberration of intellect, but to have been quite essential to the
emphatic pronunciation of an apparent absurdity and extrava¬
gance. “ Sugar,” begem the great Chatham, onoe in the House
of Commons, “ sugar,” and there was a general titter, the word
was so absurd. Instead of varying his phrase, as he might
easily have done, he repeated in an angry tone, “Sugar” twice
over, and having produced silence, “ who’ll laugh when I say
sugar now ?” he exclaimed. He brought his personality to
bear upon the point, and impressed his audience by his own
intolerant earnestness. So with Hahnemann: he, too, has im¬
pressed the world by his intolerant earnestness; he has won
for his most inconceivable dogma that the 30th dilution is the
only right dose such a large belief that, under the shadow of
it, we are looked upon as dealing in material quantities if we
prefer the 3rd.
That some of us do prefer the 3rd, nay, the 1st dilution, or
even the mother tincture, is no secret; and the slight differences
—for in reality, as we shall see, they are slight—have been
magnified into the appearance of a schism in our faith. Again
we repeat that so long as we give medicines in doses too small
to produce any good by the disturbance of the system, such as
purging, sweating, &c., we walk within the pale of homceo-
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pathy, and there is no schism. But it would not be fair to
baulk our combative colleagues of their grand tournament; and
so we shall give a programme of the points of controversy,
about which there has been so much din and uproar.
First in the field are the 30th dilution men. The ground
they take is simple enough. To Hahnemann, say they, we owe
homoeopathy; to him it is due that we should practise it as he
directs. He was not only its founder, but was its most suc¬
cessful practitioner. Till a greater than he appears, let us con¬
scientiously follow his directions to the very letter. Now, one
of these is that we should give all medicines in nothing but the
30th dilution. Let us do so.
To this we remark that if the term Hahnemannism is to be
given to a strict and literal adherence to the minute practical
directions given by Hahnemann, instead of the far higher and
nobler aim of developing his fundamental doctrines, then by all
means let it be so understood. In order fairly and honestly to
bring the matter to an issue, let us advert for a moment to
those minute details, as laid down distinctly and unequivocally
by Hahnemann; and let it be once for all understood that none
can olaim the appellation of Hahnemannist save such as believe
in and aot on his technical preoepts in all their integrity. It is
to the last edition of the Organon we are constantly referred for
a full aooount of Hahnemann’s technical rules. We there find
him to say that the best dose for aoute as well as for chronic
diseases is the 30th dilution (coxlvi note); that the best method
of administering this dose is to let the patient smell at a single
globule of this dilution (cclxxxviii note); and that the medicine
should be repeated in chronic diseases at intervals of fourteen,
twelve, ten, eight, or seven days, and in acute diseases every
twenty-four, twelve, eight, or four hours, and oftener, up to as
often as every five minutes (ccxlvii note). Such are the posi¬
tive directions of Hahnemann, and such must be the practioe of
every one calling himself a Hahnemannist, supposing the
Organon is to be held to contain the indisputable rules for
homoeopathic practice. But we need scarcely remark that no
one who knows the history of homoeopathy, and especially the
history of its progressive development by Hahnemann himself.
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Who are Hahnemannists ?
107
would regard the last edition of the Organon as containing any
immutable laws whatever for homoeopathic practice. It is wel
known that Hahnemann’s directions for the dose, administra¬
tion, and repetition of medicines underwent the most violent
changes with every successive edition of the Organon ; and
even after the publication of the last edition of that work, he
promulgated quite another set of technical rules in the last
edition of the Chronic Diseases.
Without going into details on this point, which have already
been amply furnished by several writers in this country and in
Germany, and also occasionally in our own pages, we may
merely refer the reader to the great variety of technical maxims
to he found in the last edition of the Materia Medica Pura,
the Organon , and the Chronic Diseases. To which of the
codes of laws dogmatically set forth in each of these works it
would he requisite to swear allegiance, in order to merit the
appellation of Hahnemannist, we shall not attempt to deter¬
mine ; nor do we believe there exists in this country, or on the
continent, a single homoeopathist who follows implicitly in prac¬
tice any of those codes. Hahnemannism in the sense of a strict
adherence to Hahnemann’s rules for practice has no actual
existence among living men, but has a mere literary existence,
which, like a foot-ball, is continually being kicked at us in
controversy by our allopathic opponents, and as heartily
kicked back again by homceopathists of every shade of opinion,
while arguing with allopathists. There is, however, a small
section of our own body who make use of it with a most
ridiculous and disingenuous inconsistency, when endeavouring
to exalt themselves at the expense of their brethren by preten¬
sions to being a better or purer kind of practitioners. In the
latter decades of the history of homoeopathy, though real
Hahnemannists no longer exist, there has been a succession of
pseudo-Hahnemannists or pretenders to Hahnemannism. The
chief characteristic of this class is that their writings are mostly
appeals to the non-medical public, decrying the practice and
writings of every one else, and putting themselves forward as
the only real followers of Hahnemann, the only practitioners of
pure homoeopathy; but when they attempt to establish any
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difference between themselves And others in point of principle,
they indulge in vague platitudes, and make use of terms that
may mean anything or nothing. It is a significant fact that
the writers of this class usually shelter themselves under the
shield of anonymity. At this we need not wonder, for they
would find some difficulty in proving the purity of their Habne-
mannism.
Let us take the least uncertain of Hahnemann’s rules for
practice; viz., the invariable administration of medicines in the
30th dilution for acute and chronic diseases. Is any self-styled
Hahnemannist prepared to give an unqualified subscription to
this article of the Hahnemannist creed ? We venture to say
not one of our anonymous censors, who are eternally parading
their purity, and trying to fix on others the stigma of impurity,
could honestly do so: hence their prudence in remaining
anonymous. They would run with the hare and hunt with the
hounds, enjoy the credit of being strict followers of Hahnemann
in the eyes of the dilettanti and public, whilst they have the
benefit of liberty of action like other homoeopathists. The un¬
qualified rule Hahnemann lays down in many parts of his works
relative to the exclusive use of the 30th dilution of all medi¬
cines, has long been felt by us all to be a great difficulty and
stumbling-block. We are quite willing to believe that those
doses were found to be best in his cases; but on the other hand,
we have one and all failed to obtain the entire usefulness of
the medicines from their administration in that potency, and
have been forced to abandon it frequently for others. Such
being the case, who among us can lay claim to be considered
pure Hahnemannists ?
But what shall we say to those who have out-Heroded Herod,
and gone on diluting and triturating up to the two thousandth
potency as they call it ? With them we confess we have no¬
thing to do, until they»shall establish by a series of incontro¬
vertible facts that their thousandths are better than our lower
dilutions. And we can assure them, that if they wish to con¬
vince the profession of the truth of their extreme and purely
empirical dogmata, they must pursue a very different plan from
the one they have hitherto taken. It is not by violent decla-
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How we are classed by Dr. Marcy. 109
mation, but by severely sifted evidence that we shall be led even
to give a trial to their wonder-working globules. Let them not
imagine that because Hahnemann succeeded by the very vehe¬
mence of his dogmatism, a similar success awaits them. If a
young puppy were to imitate Chatham, and get up in the House
of Commons and roar out “ sugar,” he would most assuredly be
heartily laughed at for his pains. Let them have the claim to
our attention and confidence that Hahnemann had before they
attempt to make us believe in extravagancies infinitely greater
than any he permitted himself to utter.
The large remaining party consist of all who do not consider
themselves bound to give any particular dose, and who range
freely up and down the gamut, according to their individual
experience or their notions of the patient’s sensibility to the
medicine; who neither swear by nor laugh at the 30th ; who give
a drop of the mother tincture of Ruta or Sambucus, and also
a globule of the 30th of Silicea. That in this country at least
this is by far the most numerous we have no manner of doubt.
Whether it be so in other countries we cannot say. From the
tone of some American writers one would be led to imagine
that our transatlantic brethren were more inclined to form sects ;
but as the author from whose tone and testimony (we mean our
respected colleague Dr. Marcy) we are led to this inference, has
evidently an itching for shutting people up into separate pens
like cattle whether they will or no, possibly he may have exag¬
gerated the tendency of our energetic brethren on tbfe other
side of the water in this particular, and it may not be true, as
one would suppose from reading Dr. Marcy’s articles, that the
homoeopathic army in America is marshalled in regiments
according to the particular number upon their colours. There
may not be after all a household brigade of foreign auxiliaries,
which smacking of the appanage of royalty excites in the mind
of our stem republican a feeling of patriotic horror; and this
brigade may not be followed by the 1st regiment of Royals, and
that by the 2nd up to the 30th, which though not so popular as
the 3rd and 6th, is far more so than the 29th. Indeed, we very
much doubt if it would be possible for the most brilliant re¬
cruiting seijeant to enlist a respectable number of men in the
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despised 29th, and yet it is very near the 30th. Dr. Marcy
must excuse us, but really his proposed division into four classes
seems to us not one whit less 'absurd than the one we have
imagined him to have had in his eye. No, there are no eclectics
among us; when we subscribed to the truth of Hahnemann’s
formula, similia similibus curantur, we made our election, and
by this we must abide, we are all at one in all that is of the
slightest importance, whether we will acknowledge it or not; we
are at one on all matters of principle, and can never be at one on
matters of practice till the infinite diversities of the human
constitution which we have to regulate have disappeared. When
this shall have taken place, we rather believe that the question
of homoeopathy will he at rest.
Perhaps we were unjust to the defenders of the very" high
dilutions when we said that their assertions of the wonderful
power of their potencies were supported only by empirical data,
they may claim for them also a theoretical basis, and rest them
as they do upon the hypothesis of dynamization. If this were
an admitted principle among us we should admit the justice of
their defence. But this is not the case. It may be true that
we cannot explain in what way new, strange, and undeniable
medicinal powers of the greatest importance should be mani¬
fested after trituration by substances such as Chalk, Silex, and
Alumina, which in their crude state are known to be wholly
inert. Nor does it surprise us that Hahnemann should have
promulgated the doctrine that these hidden forces were not
materia], but were developed out of the matter in the inverse
ratio of extension, weight and other ordinary properties attri¬
buted to matter. This doctrine is thus contemptuously dis¬
missed by Dr. Sharp. “It is easy to see that ‘spiritual dynamic
derangements’ are as much hypothetical assumptions as any of
those which Hahnemann denounces. Tbe preparation and
effects of these small doses are rendered apparently absurd by
the same mystic style. Medicines, when triturated or diluted,
according to the method of Hahnemann, are called by him
dynamizations, are said to act dynamically (5uv«/xe/f) or spirit¬
ually. But what evidence have we that rubbing in a mortar
solid matter, a grain of charcoal, or of lead for instance, can
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Dr. Sharp upon Dynamization. Ill
convert it into spirit. There is nothing so separate or distinct
in nature, according to our present knowledge, as spirit and
matter; and to suppose that by a mere mechanical process, such
as rubbing or shaking, the one can be turned into the other,
brings confusion into every notion we possess of either. Nor
do we know any middle state or connecting link between them.
It is true that they are for a time mysteriously united in the
living body, and that during the continuance of that union they
act upon each other, but how we know not. All the conclu¬
sions of reason enforce the immateriality of the mind, and all
the notions of sense and investigations of science concur to
prove the unconsciousness of matter.' We have no facts to
justify the supposition that inert dead matter, however divided,
can act upon the living body otherwise than by acting upon the
matter of which that living body is composed.” This passage
conveys a rebuke to those who attempt to separate matter from
its properties, and to raise the latter to the rank of independent
existences, and if there be any in this country as there seem to
be in Germany, who do so, it will be well for them to weigh
these remarks. But it seems to us to be rather a caricature
than a criticism of Hahnemann. By the use of the word
it is evident that he meant force and not mind or
soul, otherwise he would have used the Greek word 4>v%vj.
From the word he does use comes our term dynamics, as
also the corresponding French word, and we believe that
Newton’s and D’Alembert’s famous treatises on dynamics do not
pretend to reveal spiritual mysteries in the sense Dr. Sharp em¬
ploys the term spiritual, as synonymous with mental, but the
relation of the forces of matter. And when Dr. Sharp ascribes
to Hahnemann the invention of the dynamical hypothesis of
matter, surely he reckons very largely upon the ignorance of
his readers, for it is impossible that he is not well aware that
this theory was first promulgated by Boscovich in 1759, when
Hahnemann was only four years old; and, therefore, we may
charitably hope guiltless of any revolutionary purposes. Bos-
covich’s celebrated theory produced a great sensation at the
time of its publication, and has since been keenly discussed by
all standard writers on natural philosophy. It is spoken of
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with the greatest respect by Leslie, who is not partial to any¬
thing of a spiritual kind; and it lias of late rather risen into
more general favour than it had during the prevalence of the
sceptical philosophy of Hume. The theory is a very simple
one, being merely this, that matter in its ultimate constitution
consists of points of force, that these centres of force repel one
another with an almost infinite resistance, within certain limits,
and attract one another beyond these limits. The repulsive
force is the reason of the impenetrability of matter, for were it
possible to overcome this matter would be annihilated; the
attractive force is the origin of atomic attraction and combina¬
tion. Thus, a sphere of repulsion surrounded by a sphere of
attraction may be called a naked atom of matter. This theory
has been carried out by others who have clothed this primordial
force-atom with chemical and mechanical properties, representing
that beyond the sphere of atomic attraction lay the sphere of
chemical force which gave to each atom its personal individuality
so to speak. A body of properties, chemical, physological,
medicinal, making it acid, sweet, baneful, &c., that beyond this
sphere of chemical repulsion lay the sphere of chemical attrac¬
tion, rendering chemical combination possible; and beyond
this again, another spere of mechanical repulsion surrounded in
its turn by one of mechanical attraction. Jf we accept this
theory, it seems to reconcile various contending views about the
effects of trituration or dynamization. It meets Dr. Sharp’s
objection to Hahnemann’s getting rid of matter altogether, be¬
cause these various forces are forces of matter, without them
matter would not be perceptible to our senses, and it seems to
agree with Hahnemann’s doctrine of the emancipation of the
forces by trituration and succussion. A particle of flint is inert,
it may be said, because the inner sphere of chemical or physio¬
logical force touches at so few points the external surface;
extend the surface by trituration, break away the enveloping
material, and you will enlarge the hidden force and convert a
dead and inert substance, not indeed into a spirit, but into a
living or active power corresponding to the perceptite capacities
of an organized being. While this explanation brings into
harmony the views of those who adhere to the sensible doctrines
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Dynamizations and Aggravations. 113
of dynamization, it is in direct antagonism to the adherents of
the infinite dilutionists. The atomic theory destroys all notions
founded upon the presumption of the infinite divisibility of
matter, a notion rather derived from metaphysics than from
physics. It is plain, however, that the infinite dilutionists be¬
long to a certain ghostly latitude, the notions and language of
which are altogether at variance with this world of work and
sense. "A very curious people these Germans seem to be,”
remarked a plain Englishman one day after hearing a German
ghost story, “ they seem never fairly to get into the world, and
never fairly to get out of it.”
So much for the theory of trituration and dynamization,
which was, as we observed, forced upon Hahnemann in the
course of his practical investigations upon the effects of dilution.
The dilution of his medicine again was forced upon him by
encountering aggravations when he used homoeopathic medi¬
cines in ordinary doses, and this leads us to another famous
battle field, that of aggravations.
When we administer to a sick man a dose of homoeopathic
medicine, it may do one of four things. 1st. It may cure
him cito et jucunde without any unpleasant effect what¬
ever. 2nd. It may cure him tuto et cito , but not jucunde, for
before the final result of cure is accomplished all his symptoms
may burst out into a great flame before they die out. 3rd. It
may cure him, and although all his symptoms gradually disap¬
pear, other pains and penalties may be incurred peculiar not to
the disease but to the medicine; and 4th, it may not cure him
at all, but his disease may progress with an increased rapidity.
In the first case there is no question of aggravation, the ques¬
tion is confined to the three last. Of these, the second is the
type of a true medicinal aggravation, and its occurrence, how¬
ever rare, may be accepted as an undoubted fact. When
homoeopathy was yet in its infancy, and sought to strengthen
itself on the theoretical as well as the practical side, it was no
wonder that Hahnemann observed this fact with peculiar satis¬
faction, for it seemed to corroborate his theory of the action of
homoeopathic medicine. Now, however, that we are out of
school, and that homoeopathy rests not on the labours and
VOL. XIII, NO. LI.—JANUARY, 1855. I
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teaching of Hahnemann, but upon the happy experience of
millions, we need care very little for these scintillations whicli
predict the dawn, as we are well secured of the certainty of the
sun’s course and appearance in due time. And as far as our own
experience goes, true aggravations cease to interest practitioners
in the direct ratio of the amount, variety, and success of their
practice.
The 3rd class of medicinal action is the curative combined
with the physiological or pathogenetic. That is, a drug besides
curing the morbid condition for which it is given, produces, into
the bargain, certain symptoms of its own which have nothing
to do with the case. To this class the name of medicinal per¬
turbations has been applied. These perturbations may depend
either upon a preternatural degree of sensitiveness of the cha¬
racteristic action of the medicine, as in the instances published
by Dr. Henderson in his last work, one of which was the saliva¬
tion of an old lady by a few globules of the 6th dilution of
Mercurius solubilis—or they may depend upon personal idiosyn¬
crasy, that is, some individual peculiarity of constitution which
we can neither ascertain before it displays itself, nor account for
when it appears. The former variety is interesting by giving
an exaggerated picture of the real action of the medicine;
and provings made by supersensitive persons would be highly
valuable; in fact, they are habitually in the state of exalted
sensitiveness to particular drugs similar to the occasional and
morbid sensitiveness produced by disease, which enables minute
doses to produce their specific effect. But the latter variety are
wholly valueless except as physiological peculiarities. And yet
we fear that such useless idiosyncracies have been not unfrequently
promoted into the place of genuine supersensitiveness, and have
helped to encumber with their presence the recorded action of
many of our medicines. It is almost inconceivable that any
rational observer should be misled by phenomena so essentially
different in their nature as preternatural sensitiveness to the
action of Ipecacuanha, for example, and the swooning at the
sight of a hare or a cat. And yet when we read some of the
extravagances of the Kio de Janeiro school we should hardly
be surprised to learn that their next achievement in therapeutics
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True and False Aggravations.
115
was pounding a cat in a mortar and administering a globule of
this potential puss in all cases of fainting. Follies like this
one have exposed our system to ridicule, which in all fairness
should be confined to the perpetrators of the absurdities, and
in this country, at least, they have neither been imitated nor
defended.
The 4th class of medicinal action, or rather no action, is
when a medicine has no influence on the progress of a disease
which goes on from bad to worse, aggravated in a sense, but
not by medicines, rather by the want of the right medicine.
That such cases occur in the experience of young practitioners,
and also of the oldest, there can be no doubt, and that their
occurrence has been a fertile source of error is quite certain.
A timid man with a profound appreciation of the power of a
globule of a thousandth dilution, derived from Dr. Bonning-
hausen, after hesitating for twenty-four hours, at last screws his
courage up and deposits it with a trembling hand on the tip of a
patient’s tongue who has been shivering for a couple of days.
Early on the following morning he hastens to observe the con¬
sequences of his foolhardy act. He gathers hope from observing
the blinds of the house not pulled down. His patient has sur¬
vived the night. But behold when he sees him, he can scarcely
recognise his too confiding friend. The voice, indeed, is still
the voice of Jacob, but the face, yesterday so palp and thin, is
now red, swollen, and seems to reproach him for his wicked
experiments. The eyes are buried by their puffed eyelids, his
head aches, and he is very ill. Stealthily from out his great
coat pocket our man of the million draws his trusty Jahr, and
turning to Belladonna, the fatal drug he had tampered with,
there he sees all his forebodings realized; he has produced the
most frightful aggravation, and he must wait the result. He
attends most assiduously, and notes with the greatest precision
the progress of the aggravation for a space of ten days. Then
the flood subsides, and he sees again the green earth. His
aggravation has passed, and has made so deep an impression on
his mind, that he resolves to communicate it to his unbelieving
brethren. He sends it,—but we must not betray editorial con¬
fidences ; perhaps, if our contemporary revive, he will tell what
i 2
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11G
Review.
became of this communication, unless, indeed, the conductors
of that periodical, awakening to the error of their former ways,
adopt as their motto—
“ Tempera mutantur nos et mutamur in illis.”
So much for aggravations, about which we hope by and bye to
agree as well as we do about
The kth general proposition that only one medicine should
be given at a time. We all agree about this, except Dr. Simp¬
son of Edinburgh, who has been represented by some writers as
a homoeopathist on the strength of his treatise upon the subject
of homoeopathy. He certainly has done us good service, but we
suspect unintentionally. However, whether he is or is not one
of us in disguise, he strives to shew that it is a mistake to sup¬
pose we give only one medicine at a time, for he says, when we
give Opium we give some twenty different things, and that
Opium is not a simple. He must have trusted much to the
simplicity of his readers when he impeached that of Opium.
Did it never occur to our learned antagonist that if his greut
authority for the complexity of Opium, Dr. Christison, were to
put Dr. Simpson himself into a retort, and subject him to a
process of distillation, that the list of chemical ingredients
which would come over would occupy as many pages as those
of Opium do lines. To say nothing of Stearine and Eleine,
let him call to mind all the constituents of his bile alone;
and suppose, after subjecting him to the milder process of
heating in a retort, Dr. Christison were afterwards to put the
residue into a crucible, and the crucible into his furnace, what
would remain of the rash ubiquitous obstetric braggart but a
handful of compost? And yet Dr. Simpson is an individual, (we
do not use the term in an offensive or Pickwickian sense,) as an
individual, he eats, he drinks, he thinks, he writes, he acts upon
the world—especially the weaker part of it—and not as so many
ounces of Fibrine, so many pounds of Stearine, and so many
grains of Sulphur. In the same way, although Opium contains
twenty or fifty substances, still as Opium we recognise its indi¬
viduality, and regard it as a single medicine.
While we thus agree on the general proposition of giving but
one medicine at a time, there is, however, a considerable diver-
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Single Medicines. Long Prescriptions.
117
sity as to the frequency of the repetition, of the dose, and the
propriety of giving various medicines in alternation. The first
point is so purely one of degree that it is hardly to be expected
that we can have any fixed principle to guide us. As a rule, we
observe that those who delight in other extravagances, who
deal in their thousandth and ten thousandth dilutions, carry
their constitutional fondness for extremes into this field also,
and give one of their magical globules at long intervals, burying
them in the patient, in the hope that they may germinate there,
and in due season bear fruit; while, on the other hand, those
who prefer large doses, look for quick returns, like ready-
money shops.
The plan of giving medicines in succession or in alternation
lias been adopted on various grounds. First, we have the
fashionable physician, who is waited on in his town residence by
an expectant multitude of patients, many of them from the
country. What is he to do ? To give but one medicine for the
special state he finds his patient in, and that medicine to fail
(for, alas! even our great metropolitans are not infallible)
would be hazardous to his reputation, and might suggest
paucity of resources. No, it is much easier to give a goodly
list of medicines, so that if one fail, another may suit. In the
bunch of keys surely the patient will find one that fits his lock.
These bunches contain, some of them, as many as twelve or
fifteen individual keys; and thus the patients leave him in high
satisfaction, and go down to their remote country quarters, sup¬
plied for the season from town. How far this easy practice is
conducive to the progress of our science, or to the elevation of
our professional character, we leave our readers to decide.
A more legitimate reason for prescribing a succession of
medicines is, that as we cannot remain all day by the bed-side
of one patient, but must be content to visit even an acute case
at considerable intervals of time, it is not unreasonable to
expect a progress of the disease out of one medicinal sphere into
another, and to anticipate this expected change in the malady
by a corresponding change in the remedy. The foe may be
detected in the country of Aconite, and the forces of that sove¬
reign sent in hue and cry to exterminate or expel him ; but over
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118
Review.
tho border lies the province of the utnwhile god Mercury; and so
we give notice here, too, that the moment the enemy, diminished
and harassed by the assaults of Aconite, makes his appearance
in the domain of Mercury, he may be forthwith pursued, and,
if possible, slain! And if only frightened back again into Aco¬
nite, why let Aconite again deal with him ; and so we arrive at
the alternation as well as succession of medicines. -Besides, it
is believed by some that when there are two independent foci of
disease, that towards both simultaneously may be directed the
appropriate specific antidote ; only as the immediate impulse of
a medicine must be simple to ensure the individuality of its
action, these medicines cannot be given in combination, but one
after another. It is with this view that Aconite and Bryonia
are alternated in pleurisy, and Aconite and Spongia in croup.
Aconite is supposed to control the morbid changes which take
place in the blood and vascular system ; while Bryonia bears a
specific relation to the Pleurae, and Spongia to the Trachea.
Aconite, in both instances, checks the febrile action; Bryonia
in the one case, and Spongia in the other, extinguish the local
morbid changes in their respective provinces. Whether this
method be the best or not must be .decided by experience; but
there is no doubt that it opens a door for much careless and
hap-hazard practice among those who feel insecure as to the
medicines altogether suited to a particular case, and cut the
knot instead of untying it, by prescribing the two or three
nearest the thing, to save themselves the trouble of determining
the comparative claim of the different candidates.
What a grand agreement there is among us after all! We
agree as to the formula by which we select our medicine in any
given case; we agree how to set about discovering such a
remedy; when we find it we agree as to the kind of quantity
we shall give it in; and we agree to give it, and it alone. If
we were to take some common acute disease, we might predict
with full confidence that we could find a thousand medical prac¬
titioners over the globe who should, without previous concert,
treat this disease with the same remedy. What a contrast does
this present to the old school of physic, out of which it would
be difficult to find half a dozen who agreed about any treatment
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Practice uniform—not routine.
119
whatever, much less who agreed as to the entire course of treat¬
ment. Old physic is not cumulative; one generation of physi¬
cians explodes the systems of their ancestors to have their own
exploded in their turn.
“ As clouds that rake the mountain summit,
Or waves that own no curbing hand,
How fast has system followed system
From sunshine to the sunless land .’ 1
Our very excellence has become our reproach. We are accused
by some of our colleagues of being guilty of a mere routine.
But if there are certain fixed and well marked forms of disease,
may there not be for these equally fixed and certain medicines?
It seems to us quite impossible to imagine any medicine more
perfect for its office than, let us say, Aconite for pure vascular
excitement; Bryonia for pleurisy; Phosphorus for pneumonia;
and many other examples, which will instantly occur to the
practitioner. And why should we go beating about the bush,
and trying to discover something new to give in those diseases
where the old medicines answer perfectly ? When these fail us,
by a change in the character of diseases, it will be time enough
to pursue a new quest.
To this wonderful ease and perfection of the homoeopathic
system in dealing with many common and dangerous diseases,
we feel inclined to ascribe the jubilant tone of recent converts,
which, were it not that we were fully satisfied of their sterling
worth and perhaps real humility, would give to their writings an
air of too great self-satisfaction. The change the adoption of
homoeopathy has made in them is so great and so delightful,
that they seem to imagine the whole world will be amazed at
their transfiguration.
If this triumphant tone were confined to their expostulations
and appeals to those of the old school they had left in darkness
it would be perfectly intelligible, even if we differed about its
tastefulness; but it approaches the ludicrous when addressed to
the body of which the author is a noviciate. These reflections
were forced upon us by this pompous exordium of Dr. Sharp’s
fifth tract: “ Plutarch says in his Life of Demosthenes , * I live
in a small town, and I choose to live there lest it should become
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smaller.' For myself, I have joined a small company of phy¬
sicians, and I choose to remain with them for Plutarch’s reason,
hut still more for Lord Bacon’s.” From this sentence it is
plain that Dr. Sharp has confounded in his own mind the vast
consequences of homoeopathy to him with the importance of
himself to homoeopathy. With every wish to show him respect,
and with a full acknowledgment of the value of his popular
tracts, it might be well for him to remember that hitherto he
has had no influence whatever upon the development of our
system; and were he, as he hints, to secede from our small
band, a “ scoffing voice ” might reply to the threat— ■
44 And will truth’s beam be less intense
If thy peculiar difference
Were cancelled from the world of sense ?”
No, gladly as we welcome all who accept of the truth of the
great reforming principle, the justice of Hahnemann’s prediction
has been verified by the history of our progress.
“ Before a great man joins us,” writes Hahnemann to Stapf,
“ he must tread under foot all his mock consequence before he
could even begin to be our disciple; and what would then
remain of the great man who could raise us by his countenance,
since his infallibility must be laid in the dust, and the halo of
universal knowledge for which he was indebted to his exalted
station alone, must first be extinguished by the study of a new
truth, before he will become a worthy scholar of ours. How
could he become our protector , without first receiving the truth
to teach; that is, without having first entered our school; and
then must be thrown away all that rendered him great in the
eyes of the world, and even to perform a moderate service in
our cause, he would stand in need of our protection , not we of
Ms."
Agreeing, then, as we do about so much, about what do we
differ ? About Psora ? More in words than in ideas. That
in a civilised community there are some born to health, others
born to disease, is undeniable. That there is some fundamental
difference in the original organisation of the two classes seems
highly probable. What the morbific principle is which exercises
a malignant influence oyer the growth and development of the
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121
tainted—whether it be an impression or impulse at the moment
of conception, when that mystery we call life springs into inde¬
pendent existence and Sfetivity, or whether in the germ there is
planted the seeds of future diseases, ready to develope into
actual morbid phenomena whenever the requisite conditions are
afforded, as white clover shoots up when new soil is broken—we
may not be able to discover; but there seems no great harm in
expressing the obvious difference we all acknowledge, by using
a common denomination for these various inherent and radical
causes of disorder in the human oeconomy; and in lack of a
better word, Hahnemann proposed the old-fashioned term Psora.
If in consequence of this doctrine he had promulgated the
notion that there was for this evil one remedy, one antipsoricum ,
then we could readily join with those who have indignantly de¬
nounced this portion of his teaching as subversive of all the
rest. This, however, he did not do. All he says is, find for
your disease its corresponding remedy; but if the disease be of
a psoric character—that is, if besides being a derangement of
the vital action in any part, it is, moreover, a sucker from a
noxious root, tainting the entire vitality of the body—then
must your medicine not only correspond to the morbid pheno¬
mena, but must also be of such a nature as to destroy the evil
root. And this double power is confined to a certain class of
remedies, which exert a deep influence upon the primary
nutrition of the body; and to this class let the name of An-
tip8orics be given. Experience may demonstrate that this
division was premature and erroneous, but the acceptance of his
doctrine does not prevent us the free use of all the treasures of
his Materia Medica in every case for which they seem adapted ;
nor does our rejection of his doctrine, and the division founded
upon it, seriously modify our treatment. In fact, it is merely a
pathological hypothesis, without any immediate bearing upon
practice. If it were renounced by us all to-day there would be
no perceptible change in the practice of any one of us to¬
morrow in consequence. When the hypothesis of Phlogis¬
ton, which had pervaded chemistry, and seemed much more
important to all the prevailing notions of combustion than
Psora ever was to homoeopathy, was abandoned, it made no dif-
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Revieic.
ference either to housemaids who light fires, or to firemen who
put them out. No more will the abandonment of Psora affect the
practical progress of reformed medicine. The chief purpose it
has served of late has been by presenting a favorite mark for the
jocular artillery of our opponents, to call forth much sound and
excellent exposition on the part of our pathological teacher,
Professor Henderson, whose observations upon this subject we
should gladly quote, but that we know the book to be in the
hands of most of our readers.
But what shall we say of auxiliaries, the grand heresy of the
day ? and of the great heresiarch, Dr. Black ? Shall we, with
our eager and energetic, but perhaps somewhat hasty colleague.
Dr. Marcy, call aloud for a Council of Nice, that the medical
church may decide definitively and finally what is in future to
be regarded as orthodox, and what as heretical ? Shall we pro¬
ceed to elect a Pope ? Shall we pronounce what writings are to
be held as authoritative, what as damnable? Shall we bum Dr.
Black at once, and so extinguish by one example the spread of
dangerous innovation ? If some such steps are to be taken for
maintaining a wholesome and becoming uniformity in our body,
then we entreat of Dr. Marcy to set about the preparation of a
creed directly, to be framed in precise and unmistakeable terms^
for it would not do to burn a man upon an equivocal sentence.
We must have something of this sort—“ I, Jacob Faithful, so¬
lemnly swear that I believe every word written in the Organon of
Hahnemann, last edition, in its full and natural sense, and that
under no circumstances will I depart from the teaching of this
work, including the notes and the introduction; and I also believe,
although not so fully, all the other writings of Hahnemann, and
I am prepared to act upon their directions so far as they do not
contradict those of the Organon. I solemnly swear never to
give any medicine in a larger dose than one globule, weighing
the 300th of a grain, of the thirtieth dilution at a time to a pa¬
tient, and in no circumstances to repeat the dose within an in¬
terval of seven days. I moreover solemnly abjure the use of all
external applications, saving Arnica and a few others; and I
solemnly engage never, on any account whatever, to administer
a dose of Castor-oil, or of any other medicine which operates
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Be Heretico comburendo.
123
laxatively.” But no sooner is the oath taken than a hoy is
brought to you who has eaten a pound of cherry-stones. We
speak of what actually did take place at the Leipsic Homoe¬
opathic Hospital, and what may happen to Dr. Marcy, unless
the accounts of the celerity of American deglutition be altogether
fabulous. Well, what will our orthodox friend do here? We
fear that his Materia Medica wont help him much. His com¬
mon sense tells him as plainly as it ever spoke in his life that a
globule of the 30th will not propel the cherry-stones out of the
coecum, that unless they are assisted in some way, the caput
coecum is likely soon to be caput mortuum. Give a dose of
Castor-oil, says common sense; give a globule, says the oath.
Common sense, you are in the right; oath, you are a fool,
thinks Dr. Marcy. Let the boy die, says the council of or¬
thodoxy. Beware, says the council of the conscience. Be
consistent and useless, says the one; do your duty as a man,
as a man bound to save life; this vow you took before your
oath, this vow you cannot annul, says the other. Humanity
is stronger than sectarianism in Dr. Marcy’s heart. 'He pours
out a table spoonful of Castor-oil, and gives it on the spot,
and bids the boy take the bottle home. This we venture to
predict would be the termination of the first conflict between the
oath and a practical difficulty in^the way of keeping it. In fact,
all this talk about auxiliaries is, as Lord Palmerston would say,
sheer nonsense. There is no room for discussion or disagree¬
ment on the matter. We all of us do our utmost with the legi¬
timate weapons of regular warfare, our homoeopathic medicines,
but when we are in a position where these do not avail, we use
what we can. It would be hardly fair to represent an officer as
having abandoned scientific warfare because, when suddenly set
upon by a couple of Russians, he knocked them down with his
naked fist. It is not less unfair to represent Dr. Black as
having in any degree whatever lost his full former confidence in
homoeopathy because when he cannot effect a dislodgement of an
offending body from the intestines by any other means, he
orders a dose of Castor-oil. And Dr. Marcy’s attempt to
classify homoeopathists on the plan he proposes of the users and
abusers of auxiliaries is liable to this objection, that as he him-
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self used them a short time ago, and does not use them now, he
has moved out of one class into the other once already, and
probably before the year is out, he will find himself back again
jto where he came from ; so that it will be impossible for him or
any practitioner to abide in the appointed class; and as the
notion of arrangement is to facilitate the search for an individual,
it is manifest that to fix the name by the temporary position,
would be as absurd as to call one part of the earth day, and the
other night, seeing that what is day now is night then, what is
day here is night there. We feel quite convinced that practically
there is no difference at all among us in this matter, that we all
would gladly be without the aid of these troublesome auxiliaries,
that as we improve in our knowledge of medicines, and as our
patients improve in their constitutions, Such rude resources will
be gradually abandoned, and that the question will cease to be
agitated. At present it is too plain that this cuckoo cry of or¬
thodoxy is not unfrequently raised, like most other senseless
noises, for the purpose of making the passer by look at the
person who raises the clamour. To those who seek notoriety
by such a device, the true penance would be to keep them at
their word, and if they use any of the auxiliaries they denounce,
to convict them of their insincerity.
If we feel disposed to indulge in the pleasing idea that the
halcyon time of peace is at hand, and that all angry contention
among us will soon come to an end, we have but to cast our eye
over the pages of our American cotemporaries to be satisfied of
the delusion of such a dream. We find that there is a bitter
contest there going on, and each party is doing its utmost to
exterminate the other. When we strive, however, to pierce the
cause of the quarrel through the dust and smoke raised by the
combatants, we can hardly discern what the uproar is all about.
It seems that there are two homoeopathic universities, one in the
north, and the other in the south, and that between the two, as
in duty bound, there is a keen rivalry and opposition, the one,
as far as we can understand, hoisting the liberal, and the other,
the conservative flag. We have no desire to bring upon ourselves
the redder's stroke by meddling with other people’s affairs, and,
instead of presuming to adjudicate upon the comparative claims
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The American Colleges.
125
of these institutions to the support of young America, we should
prefer taking a lesson from their zeal in having so soon got them¬
selves established and acknowledged by the State; and it is
with envy rather than any other feeling we look over the long
and yearly increasing list of the graduates of homoeopathy, who
leave those colleges to practise, without hesitation, according to
the reformed system of medicine. It is much that youths, when
full of enthusiasm, and prepared to respect what their respected
teachers admire, are presented with a true likeness of the wise
and learned Hahnemann, instead of hearing his name coupled
with abusive and contemptuous epithets, as the students in our
schools are in the habit of doing; it is much that their medical
education is presided over from its commencement by a great
ruling idea, which will grow with their growth and strengthen
with their strength, and bring forth fruit in distant lands and
distant times. If, besides this enormous advantage, it were pos¬
sible to give an academic tone to their mind, if it were possible
for their teachers, besides stimulating their zeal by the ardour
of their own language and temperament, to assuage the tem¬
pestuous character of the American youth, and graduate the
sturdy manliness of their nature to a gentler demeanour, by the
moderation of their language, even when engaged in contro¬
versy with a rival—if this could be, and if the young physi¬
cian, taught at our colleges, was not only fully educated up to
the highest scientific point of possible attainment, but was
so penetrated with the lofty mission he is appointed to fulfil, as
to regard less the golden harvest in the distance than the requi¬
site tillage at hand, surely if this were possible, these homoeo¬
pathic colleges would be acknowledged as the most useful insti¬
tutions in the world. Indeed, when we turn our eye homeward,
and observe, as we do with anxiety, the small efforts here made
for the advancement of the science of our profession among
ourselves as homoeopathists, and when we see how little con¬
sideration our profession at large receives from those occupying
a high position, we cannot but fear that, in our anxiety to grasp
the fruit, we have starved the tree. Can we expect that we shall
ever be respected as the members of a liberal profession ought
to be, if we seek university degrees, not through the channel of
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university attainments, but by short cuts which render the
honour ridiculous, and, in fact, convert it into a patent, or
trade licence, and thus, instead of asserting for our profession
the foremost place in social consideration as it is foremost in
importance, (at least second to none, embracing so many of the
duties of the divine in its intercourse with the sick and dying,)
sink into the position of tradesmen; and when we have made se¬
cret compacts with tradesmen for a share of their profits, can we
express our wonder and displeasure that Lord Baglan, or any
other official, wont treat us as he does other officers and gentle¬
men? We hear a clamour raised about medical decorations.
It is not stars and garters we require; “ the fault is not in our
stars, but in ourselves, if we are underlings.” We have it in
our power to command the respect we now entreat. But we
must very much alter both our views and habits; and as we,
the followers of Hahnemann, claim for ourselves to lead the
medical profession, it surely becomes us' to set an example of a
little more devotion to our art rather than to its immediate gains.
We may say that we have now silenced our loudest opponents.
When they betake themselves to the desperate expedient of
suggesting to the public that the reason homoeopathy does good,
is because old physic has done so much harm, and that now,
before we claim the prize, we must try our speed against Dame
Nature; it is plain that they consider the game is up. Indeed,
it is rather amusing how suddenly they seem smitten with a
wonderful desire to be impartial. Fair play is all their cry now.
Let sick people alone; dont interfere with nature. All very
fine, gentlemen, for you to say that now. When sick people
seem inclined to let you alone, you make a merit of necessity,
and exclaim, “ we were always opposed to much medicine; in
fact, we are homoeopathists.” However plausible, the trick is
too late. The public wont form a total abstinence league on
any such terms. Men wont encounter sickness and death un¬
attended by medical aid of some kind. To talk of Nature to a
man overwhelmed with agony, is to add mockery to his other
trials of patience. And even if we agreed with our allopathio
brethren, that it would be well to let us have a chance of ob¬
serving the natural course of disease, it is for those who disbe-
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Old Physic in Despair.
127
lieve in homoeopathy to carry out the enterprise, not for us. It
is too much to expect that we are to sit with our hands folded,
and look on at a man drowning in a pool at our side, calling
aloud to us to help him, just that some inquisitive allopath.
One that would peep and botanize
Upon his mother’s grave,
might accurately note the exact time a man of such a size, such
an age, with so many pounds of blood, &c., required to expire.
This may seem an extravagant example ; it is not so in reality.
To prevent a man ill of cholera from sending for ahomoeopathist
is not one whit less culpable on the part of those who proclaim
their conviction that all allopathic treatment does harm.
We have been led into this digression to establish our re¬
mark that, as the opposition of the old school had really as¬
sumed a suicidal character, the best thing we could do was to
leave it to the consequences of this its last operation, wishing it
all the success it deserves. And when we are once clear of this,
then perhaps it will not be deemed necessary for every aspirant
to distinction among homceopathists to commence his career by
a philippic against our opponents. After all, this is not a very
profitable kind of thesis. Nor will it be considered as the
surest way to practice to write an expository treatise about ho¬
moeopathy. When we consider that the great bulk of our
British homoeopathic literature consists of elementary treatises,
few of which even pretend to novelty, but are merely a repeti¬
tion in another form of what has been said at least fifty times
before in this country, whither it was imported, after it had be¬
come too stale for the German market, we hope and trust, for
the sake of our good cause, that our young adherents will
devote themselves to a higher task. What that task is we might
best explain by recommending them to read the first book at
the head of our list— : Die Homoopathie, eine Anleitung zum
richtigen Verslandniss und zum Selbststudium derselben, von
Dr.Bernhard Hirschel —and if any one of our young friends ex¬
postulates with us, that he cannot read this because he does not
understand German, then we reply, that we would strongly urge
him to lose no time in acquiring the knowledge of a language
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Review.
which he will find it quite essential to have attained before he
can take honours in homoeopathy. To induce our earnest stu
dents to study Dr. Hirschel’s work which, besides being a very
good exposition of the present state of homoeopathy, differs from
the other publications we have had occasion to criticise in enter¬
ing into homoeopathy proper, and considering in what way we
are to improve ourselves in a knowledge of its treasures, and in
applying our knowledge to the care of the sick, which after all is
the end of all medical writing, or ought to he, we shall give
a specimen of his work. ' Dr. Hirschel apologises for venturing
to, write upon homoeopathy, since, having been only ten years
in practice, he thinks he can hardly be expected to have any¬
thing new to say upon the subject. We fear this apology
will confirm the idea prevalent among us, that the Germans
are a slow people, for our native writers contrive, after ten
months’ practice, to .produce far more dogmatical treatises
than this. He then carefully goes over the various points
which we have, touched on in this article, and the latter part
of his book is upon the best method of mastering the Materia
Medica. This leads to a notice of the various manuals and
repertories, of which he gives specimens, that his readers
may compare them for themselves. Our present repertories
which, by the bye, have all been the work of Germans, as far as
we can recollect, have one radical defect, which is, that, while
they present very full catalogues of all the fragments and details
of the symptoms to be found in the Materia Medica, they afford
no means of reuniting these fragments and details into their
original order. We can find all the medicines which produce
cough, and all which produce pain in the chest, and all which
produce haemoptysis, but we cannot discover which of these
medicines that produce the cough, have also the pain and the
haemoptysis; so when we have to prescribe for pneumonia for
example, we are thrown out. It is as if in the London Di¬
rectory all the surnames and all the Christian names were
separately entered in distinct lists, but the relation of the one
set to the other not specified. Suppose in such a work we
wished to find the residence of our friend John William Thomas
Smith, we should have to look first over all the Smiths, then all
the Johns, then the Thomases, and lastly, the Williams, and in
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Dr. Hirschels plan of Study.
129
time we might discover that only in some particular house those
various common appellations met. But how much easier is it
when we can find at once where the only individual who we
suppose to possess this name is to be found. The Repertory
now preparing by a committee of the Hahnemann Publishing
Society, and which will be published in the course of the pre¬
sent year, is designed to remedy this great defect, as well as to
give a more trustworthy catalogue than any we now possess.
By a simple expedient of figures and letters of reference the
disjointed parts of a symptom are speedily recombined, and we
can find in it, without any loss of time, not only all the medi¬
cines which produce cough, and those which produce pain in the
side, and those which produce haemoptysis, but those which pro¬
duce cough, with pain in the side, with haemoptysis, and also
the kind of cough, the time of day it is worst, the kind of pain
in the side, and the character of the haemoptysis. If the work
come up to the design its utility will be very great. The labour
of constructing such a book can only be estimated by those who
have engaged in this or similar tasks.
Dr. Hirschel recommends as the best means of acquiring the
double knowledge of what virtues lie in a medicine, and the
particular affections for which they are adapted, that we should
each of us for his own use and education carefully analyze one
or more of them in the style of which he gives us a specimen
in his analysis of Bryonia. We cannot do better than conclude
this article by giving a translation of the way in which he treats
the head.
I. Symptoms, a.
b Pains.
11. Locality.
III. Conditions.
Practical Deductions.
A. HEAD.
Giddiness (symptoms*
I, 2, 3, 6, 7, 9, 10,
II, 13, 17, 66), as if
one were turned
ronnd, or as if every¬
thing turned round
one Ts. 2.)
A dull, giddy confu¬
sion (s. 3).
in head
(3).
On standing
(6, 2).
I a . The most remarkable
symptoms here indicate fulness
of blood and congestion 1,5,8,
9, 10, 13, 19, 41,47,54,70, 71,
74, 76, 77). These and the
heat of the face (20, 47, 71),
indicate that the appearances
are not purely nervous, hut
arise from vascular congestion.
The dulness of the movements,
attended with giddiness and
* These numbers refer to Hahnemann’s Materia Medica, from which all the symptoms
are taken.
VOL. XIII., NO. LI.—JANUARY, 1855. K
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I, Symptoms, a.
A kind of giddiness
as if one were drunk
(4, 5, 7), and as if
the blood rushed to
the head violently
(4).
He feels as if drunk,
he wishes to lie down
thin? turned round
( 6 ).
Giddiness like drunk
enness (7).
Confusion.
Giddiness with sense
of weight (9, 22, 30,
31, 32, 51, 62, 56),
everything seems to
move round him in a
circle (9).
Giddiness and fulness
(10,18, 68).
Giddy, with a sensa¬
tion in the chest as
if he should faint
( 11 ).
Giddiness and stag¬
gering backwards as
if he would fall (12,
13 ). ^
He staggered as if he
would fall back¬
wards (13).
Staggering from side
to side, as if he could
not stand firm (14).
Staggering to one side
(15).
Giddy, and turning
round as if he went
round in a circle (16).
Giddiness of head and
weakness of legs (17).
b Pains.
II. Locality.
III. Conditions.
posterior¬
ly (4).
As soon as he
rose from his
seat; after
walking alit-
tle it went
off(61) '
The whole
day (7, 17),
in the morn¬
ing (8, 16,
36, 37, 61,
61, 63, 73).
head.
on sitting up
in bed (11).
head.
while stand¬
ing in the
evening(ll).
when he
would walk
<13) - IV
on walking
14).
after moving
(15, 38, 42,
75), while
standing (15)
on rising from
bed in the
morning (16)
all day.
Practical Deductions.
mental torpor (19), the confu¬
sion (20), absence of thoughts,
also the symptoms (23, 24, 29)
the dull pain, point to an action
on the inner part of the brain,
as well as to an affection of the
sensorium, and to an incipient
derangement of the elements of
the blood, as is found in or¬
ganic diseases, such as typhus
fever and similar diseases. The
more precise explanations of
these, as well as the deductions
to be drawn as to the true cha¬
racter of many of the head-
symptoms, such as headache,
dulness, &c., will be learned
when we arrive at the fever-
symptoms and the gastric de¬
rangements. Chirping and
gurgling are symptoms fre¬
quently met with in organic
diseases which depend upon
some hyperemia.
b. The pains, afford us im¬
portant knowledge. The most
prominent are the aching pains
(druck), they are sometimes
violent, and sometimes like a
sore. As varieties of these
aches we find pressing, squeez¬
ing, expansive. These are
manifest symptoms of too great
fulness of blood and inflam¬
mation when they are combined
with the symptoms previously
(a) catalogued. The aching
and pressure seems more deep,
from within outwards (51* 53,
59, 88,) as if everything would
fall out at the brow. . This is a
symptom both of simple hy¬
peremia and also of organic
disease of the brain, it points
especially to a fluid extravasa¬
tion. Besides, we find fre¬
quently shooting; less so, throb¬
bing , jerking , tearing , jerking -
tearing , raging . The latter
symptoms indicate deep organic
affection, and also a nervous
condition depending upon con¬
gestion. The shooting points
to the serous membrane as the
seat of disease, particularly of
inflammation. The extension
of the tearing pain to the face,
8rc., indicates fts neuralgic cha-
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Dr. Hirsche&'s plan of Study.
131
I* Symptoms, a.
He can scardy move
his head from a sense
of fulness (18).
Dull movements in
the head, causing
giddiness and mental
torpor (19).
Confused rather than
giddy (20).
Weakness of mind, so
as to lose all power
of thinking; like a
faint with heat (21).
Mental illusions, her
head seems too heavy
( 22 ).
Heaviness of head,
(24, 25) with stri¬
king forgetfulness
(23, 29).
She did not know ex¬
actly what she did
(23, 25), and let
everything fall out
of her hand (25).
The head is heavy, re¬
flection difficult (20).
He desires things
which do not exist (27)
He longs for things,
but does not like
them when they are
got (28).
Mental torpor (29).
The head feels like a
weight (30).
Great heaviness (31).
Very heavy (32).
Deadness, &c. (33,34,
35, 37).
Headache (36, 37,
41, 52, 63, 64, 57,
60, 61, 62, 63, 71,
75).
ConfiiBion and pain
(37).
6 Fains.
Aching
(38).
II. Locality.
head.
occiput
and
forehead
(19).
head (20).
face (21).
and
ach-
head (31).
all the
ing
(32,
pain from
38,
40,
behind
43,
45.)
44,
forwards.
head (33,
34, 35).
III. Conditions,
[chiefly while]
standing.
worse on ly¬
ing down
(24).
head (37).
head (38).
Digitized by
Gck .gle
on going to|
bed.
begins early,
not on wak¬
ing, but on
opening the
eyes and
moving the
head,
reluctance to|
rise.
on walking
(38).
Practical Deductions.
racter, which is probably con¬
gestive and rheumatic.
II. In regard to the locality,
both the entire head and par¬
ticular parts are affected. The
anterior part of the brain, the
forehead, the region over the
eyes, and the temples, are par¬
ticularly affected. We learn
from this that Bryonia acts up¬
on the branches of the trige¬
minus nerve. Affections of one
side of the body are not well
pronounced in the action of
Bryonia. It is most important
to observe the general affection
of the brain which indicates the
intense character of the diseased
action. That the pains extend
to the bones of the head indi¬
cates some material obstruc¬
tion, probably a fluid deposit.
(58, 60.)
III. Under the special indi¬
cations we find that most of
the symptoms appear early in
the day, few in the evening.
Movement, and especially stoop¬
ing (15, 38,41, 42, 53, 75), as
well as its opposite (21, 24, 56,
58,) are causes of aggravations.
The first indicates the conges¬
tive character of the affection.
The open air seems to aggra¬
vate the pains, but it is not de¬
cidedly made out, whether it is
the movement or the open air
which does so. That touch in¬
creases the pain indicates its
inflammatory nature. The prac¬
tical inference from these symp¬
toms is that Bryonia will be of
use in certain forms of
1. Inflammation of the brain.
2. Congestive headache.
3. Nervous affections, neu¬
ralgia, &c.
4 Rheumatic headaches.
5. Inflammation of the brain
and its membranes, especially
where nervous symptoms or
those which indicate effusion
are present.
6. Acute hydrocephalus.
7. The sympathetic and se¬
condary affections of the head,
which appear in typhus fever
and gastric derangement, will
be afterwards noted.
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182
Review.
I. Symptoms, a .
b Pains.
II. Locality.
III. Conditions.
Headache.
Headache (41).
Dull pain
(40) . -
throbbing
(41) .
raging,
aching
(42) .
Pressing
(42).
Aching
pain (43)
Pressure
from
within
outwards
posterior¬
ly 40).
forehead
(41).*
forehead
(42).
to fore¬
head,
in fore¬
head
over eye-
browjinto
left eye
(44).
compelling him to lie down.
relieved by bending and walking test,
much fatigued by a walk (42).
so that he can scarcely bend.
One-sided headache.
(44, 62,
63, 67,
69).
aclung
(46).
After a rush of blood
there followed
Sensation of
Heaviness of bead.
Violent headache with
great heaviness.
Dull com¬
pressive
(46) .
compres¬
sive pain
(47)
compres¬
sive pain
(48, 49,
60)
Compres¬
sive pain
( 49 )
Compres¬
sive and
throb¬
bing (60)
compres¬
sive and
shooting
(51, 67,
67,70).
aching
outwards
(62).
Pressure
outwards
in eye of
same side
(44).
in brow.
temples.
from both
ears.
on both
sides of
head,
in brain.
could not open the eyes from pain, and
after stooping could not regain the
erect posture.
brain(62). desire to lie down,
forehead, on walking, and after dinner.
Sensation as if every¬
thing would fall out
(64, 65).
Giddy weight (66).
(63, 57)
forehead.
head,
on stooping.
on sitting and reading, going off on
standing up (66, 68).
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Dr* HirscheV8 plan of Study .
133
i.
Symptoms, a.
» Pains.
II. Locality.
III. Conditions.
Pressing . in temples
outwards in skull.
Headache.
Headache, one sided
(62).
Sense of turning
round (70).
Headache with heat
of face (71).
Throbbing (74).
Chirping (76).
Gurgling (74).
Pain as if pulled by
the hair.
(67, 68,
60)
like a sore
racing
aching
Tearing
(62, 65)
Jerking
and draw¬
ing, (63,
64)
Tewing
( 66 , 66 )
Shooting
(67)
Shooting
(68,69,
70)
Jerking
tL-ofibing
pain (72,
73, 75)
from back
of head to
shoulder,
on small
spot of
nght side
in bones of
upperand
lower jaw
face bones
in connection with a painful gland.
worse on pressure.
in left side
of head,
over the
brow to
the mus¬
cles of
neck and
right arm
( 66 ).
temples
.(«()• .
m head,
brow and
occiput.
right side
(70).
on walking in open air (67).
superiorly
felt externally, worse on motion.
both tem¬
ples.
one of the
temples.
Oar design in presenting this small specimen to our readers is
not that we expect that it shall be received as a model, bat rather
as a suggestion; and if a careful examination of this were to in-
' dace some of our young practitioners to undertake similar studies
of particular medicines, who can tell the benefit that would accrue
to our science by an accumulation of accurate materials ready for
use, and to themselves by the culture gained in the task ? Truly
the harvest is great, alas, that the labourers should be so few!
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134
CLINICAL RECORD.
Two Cases illustrative of the difficulty of selecting the
appropriate remedy, by Dr. Dudgeon.*
Evert day’s experience of the homoeopathic practitioner affords to
him evidence of the curative power of the more ordinary remedies in
the common ailments, as Belladonna in sore throat, Nux vomica in
constipation, Arsenic in diarrhoea, Aconite in inflammatory fever, &c.,
&c. A repetition of such cases would possess no interest—would, in
fact, prove wearisome to an assembly of experienced homoeopathists.
I believe, however, that besides such cases, others occasionally occur
in the practice of each of us, which illustrate the action of some of the
rarer medicines in some of the more unusual diseases. By the mutual
intercommunication of such cases we shall ultimately succeed in
rendering the treatment of the more uncommon forms of disease as
plain and certain as that of the more frequent ailments.
However convinced we may be of the theoretical truth of the
homoeopathic law, its practical application is by no means always
easy. The pathogeneses of the materia medica sometimes afford but
the vaguest hints for our selection of a drug, sometimes many medi¬
cines will appear to offer a closer correspondence to the case before
us, than the one which ultimately proves to be the suitable one.
Again, the disease may be of such a sort that there cannot be any¬
thing like an analogue to it in. our repertory of medicinal diseases, for
our provings cannot be carried to the production of serious maladies.
In such cases as these a good deal of the vaunted mathematical
certainty of homoeopathy is but guess-work, and as such is very apt
to be unsuccessful. Clinical experience, the usus in morbis, which
Hahnemann denounced but availed himself of extensively, is what we
must look to, to enable us to prescribe with certainty in almost every
case, but especially in such cases as I have alluded to.
Without further comment I shall proceed to lay before you the
details of two cases which have lately fallen under my observation.
In selecting these cases I have been influenced by the desire to bring
before you diseases, about the diagnosis of which no difficulty existed,
.but which should be at the same time of rare occurrence, and in
which the action of the remedies was well marked and decisive. In
* This short paper was prepared for the late Congress, hut was not read
owing to abundance of more interesting subjects for discussion.
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Two Gases, by Dr. Dudgeon.
135
both cases my first selection of medicines was unsuccessful, in the
first most particularly so.
Inflammation of lachrymal sac.
Mrs. M-aged 40. Some years ago I treated her for an affec¬
tion of the eyes, characterised by weakness of vision, but having no
resemblance to the present affection. She now consulted me again
for her eyes on the 26th of March. For some days she has been
attacked every day, about one o’clock, with severe burning pains in
the right eye and flow of tears over the cheek, which feel scalding.
These symptoms last for several hours. The conjunctiva of the right
eye is injected, and there is pain on pressure in the right lachrymal
sac, which feels somewhat, though slightly, swelled. In the morn¬
ing there is some mucous secretion in the eye. Believing it to be a
catarrhal affection of the conjunctiva and mucous lining of the lachry¬
mal sac, I prescribed Merc. 6, a dose every six hours.
27th.—The pain and lachrymation returned to-day as usual at one
o’clock, if anything more severely than ever. The sac is very
tender and more swelled. I ordered fomentations to the eye, and in
consideration of the periodicity of the symptoms, prescribed Arsen. 3,
a dose every six hours.
28th.—The patient lost the medicine I prescribed yesterday, and
took arsen. 12, out of her own box. She is rather worse than she
was yesterday. I again gave arsen. 3. and made her continue the
fomentations.
29th—Worse. The swelling of the lachrymal sac is decidedly
greater, and forms a little lump at the comer of the eye. It is exqui¬
sitely painful to the touch ; is the seat of throbbing pains, and the
skin over it is red. The tears that run over the cheek are very hot.
The inflammation was so violent that I had recourse to our antiphlo¬
gistic, Aconite 3, every six hours, and ordered the fomentations to be
continued.
30th.—All last evening the pain was most excruciating. It has as
usual somewhat remitted this morning, but the tumour formed by the
sac is large, exceedingly tender, and the skin over it is very red and
shining. The nasal duct is quite obstructed. Suppuration and
fistula lachrymalis seemed inevitable. I gave Silica 6, one drop in
a wine-glassful of water, a tea-spoonful every three hours, without
hope of being able to prevent the serious catastrophe.
31st.—My patient informed me that in a quarter of an hour after
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Clinical Record.
taking the first dose of the Silica, the pain and tenderness of die
sac had quite subsided; the relief was complete. The tears no
longer overflowed on the cheek, and the swelling gradually declined.
This morning no swelling or discolouration is perceptible, and the
eye is perfectly normal in every respect. The cure wap complete ;
and up to the end of July, when I last saw her, she had not had the
slightest return of this painful malady.
This case illustrates the difficulty of selecting the appropriate
remedy. Mercurius, which was first prescribed, certainly seemed to
be the most homoeopathic to the case, as it has amongst its symptoms
“ Inflammatory swelling in the region of the lachrymal bones,” and
it is also well known to exercise a powerful inflammatory action
on the mucous membrane, which was involved in this case. In the
selection of the Arsenicum on the failure of the Merc., I was influ¬
enced by its well marked action on the conjunctiva, and its corres¬
pondence with the scalding tears which formed so marked a feature
in this case. The periodicity also with which the pains recurred
was an additional motive for its selection. On the failure of this,
and the increase of the inflammatory action, I had recourse to Aco¬
nite, the selection of which, I confess, was based on general patholo¬
gical grounds. The utter failure of this sent me once more in
despair to the materia medica. Two remedies preferred nearly equal
claims to my attention— Natrum carbonicum, which has in its patho¬
genesis “ Violent inflammation of the inner canthus, and purulent
swelling of the lachrymal sac, bursting in four days,” and Silica,
which has “ Swelling in the region of the right lachrymal gland and
sac.” The correspondence of the Natrum symptom was undoubt¬
edly the most marked, but I could not divest myself of doubts as to its
genuineness. Its very completeness and severity throw suspicion on
its reality—and this suspicion is confirmed by the fact that Hahne¬
mann, in his prefatory remarks, makes no allusion to it in reference
to inflammation or suppuration of the lachrymal sac. Silica, on the
other hand, though its symptom was but the vaguest hint of an
analogy to my case, is especially mentioned by Hahnemann as being
useful in fistula lachrymalis. This determined me to give it in pre¬
ference to the Natrum, not without misgivings I must allow. The
result you have been made aware of—and henceforward to my mind
Silica will always be suggested as a remedy for inflammation of the
lachrymal sac.
The next case is of a very different character altogether, but
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Two Cases, by Dr. Dudgeon.
137
resembles that I have just detailed in the difficulty of the selection of
the suitable remedy from the records of the materia medica.
Disease of the Spermatic Chord and Epididymis.
Mr. J—, aged 35, consulted me on the 19th January, 1853. He
states that in August, 1851, after a hard day’s work at duck shooting
in which he got wet to the skin, and subsequently sat for a long time
in his wet clothes, he was exposed to great sexual excitement without
relief. The effect of this was great pain and swelling of the sper¬
matic apparatus of the right side. The testicle was swollen, and so
was the epididymis and chord. A chirurgical knight whom he sum¬
moned to his aid attacked the swollen testicle with iodine; this failed
to reduce the disease. The patient was ordered to lie in bed, to
which he was confined for near three weeks, and during that time
the testicle was alternately leeched and tightly bandaged. Some
medicine was also given him which reduced him to a state of great
weakness. An abscess formed at the lower part of the scrotum,
which was opened. A sinus formed; this, too, was opened. The
medicinal treatment now consisted of cod-liver oil taken internally,
and rubbed on the testicle. Steel and iodine were also administered
internally.
In January 1852, he consulted Sir Benj. Brodie and Mr. Cutler
in London, who advised him to allow the sinus to heal up. It
remained open after this for several months, when at length it closed
up. The epididymis continued during this time to get smaller. In
October, 1852, he went to Hamburg, where he caught cold, got a
severe sore throat and enlarged cervical glands. The spermatic chord
at the same time commenced to 6well and got knotty, the epididymis
also grew much larger; and has remained so up to the present time.
Sinuses have formed about the scrotum, and small abscesses, which
have discharged their contents repeatedly.
On examination, the right epididymis is felt enlarged and hardened,
equal to a small walnut in size, about three times the size of the tes¬
ticle it is attached to. The chord also is thickened and hard. A
fistulous opening exists, apparently in connexion with the lower part
of the epididymis, and discharges a little thick whitish matter. The
scrotum altogether presents an irregular and discoloured appearance
owing to the presence of the sinus, and the cicatrisations of former
abscesses and sinuses. The water is always thick. There is but little
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138
Clinical Record.
pain in the diseased gland. There is a total want of sexual desire; the
testicles on both sides feel soft and are small. The patient is'nervous
and desponding; he imagines he has lost all sexual power, and this
distresses him the more as he is engaged to be married. He is also
apprehensive that his disease may have a fatal termination, as a
brother of his died of disease of the testicle.
I prescribed aurum 2, a dose every night and morning. In addition
to the circumstances-that seemed to point to this remedy, it has the
symptom of swelling of the right testicle.
28th January.—Worse. The epididymis is larger, and there is a
greater discharge of matter from the fistulous opening, of a creamy
consistence and yellow colour. I now prescribed a medicine which
seemed to have symptoms more accurately corresponding to those of
the patient, viz., sulphur 12, a dose night and morning. In the patho¬
genesis of this medicine is to be found the following symptom:—
“ Thickening and swelling of the epididymis.”
7th February.—He is much the same as he was when he first con¬
sulted me. The swelling has subsided to its former dimensions; the
discharge is watery. I now prescribed spongia 1, a dose night and
morning. Besides other symptoms relating to the testicle, Spongia
has swelling of the testicles and of the spermatic chord in its
pathogenesis.
13th.—The swelling of the epididymis feels more irregular, cer¬
tainly not larger. A small abscess has formed and broken at the
inferior part of the scrotum, it is connected with a sinus. Continue
the spongia.
4th March.—The report is, that during the last ten days there has
been great diminution of the swelling. Cont. med.
23rd.—Improvement still goes on. Cont. med.
3rd April.—The hard lump of epididymis seems almost gone,
nothing remains but some indurated cellular substance around it.
The chord is quite free and of natural size. The water is still thick,
and has a pinkish sediment. Spirits greatly improved. He asks me
if he may now marry. I give it as my opinion that I see nothing to
prevent him. He says he has had little or no sexual desire for a
long time. I promise him that will not fail when opportunity offers,
and when he can get over the idea that he is impotent. He has had
occasional seminal emissions at night, with pleasureable feeling, and
without pain. To continue the Spongia for some time.
He married shortly afterwards, and I saw him again in June, when
his testicle and chord were quite normal. He found himself quite
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Headache cured by Glonoine, by Dr. Black.
139
equal to his marital duties. I heard from him again in March last.
He say^he is stout and well, and the epididymis of the affected side,
is in size and consistency like a freshly-made pill, which is little
different from the normal state of things.
Headache Cured by Glonoine, by Dr. Black.
T. W., of a lymphatic temperament, began to suffer from headaches
in the spring of 1849; he was aged 13. These headaches were
cured for a time by the use of Spigelia. For nearly the next two
years he suffered from enlarged tonsils and relaxed sore throat.
These disappeared under the use of Hepax, Baryta, and Lachesis.
Belladonna repeatedly caused increase of throat symptoms and
headache, and this tendency to be thus acted on by Bell, still exists.
When the throat got well, severe headaches, with great irritability of
the heart, shewed themselves. The symptoms were generally a dull
pain in the forehead, more especially over the eyes, increased by
reading, drawing, or anything that required much use of the eyes, or
mental exertion. When walking fast, or riding, or running a few
steps the headache changed to a throbbing pain, felt both at the
front and back of the head. The action of the heart very easily
excited; no abnormal physical signs.
No cause could be discovered for the above symptoms. Various
remedies were tried, and his studies almost entirely suspended, but
with no benefit. With the view of strengthening the muscular
system, and thus adding to the tone of the heart, I recommended
a short stay at Malvern, in order to pursue a better water treatment,
combined with kinesipathy. About five weeks of such treatment
benefited the general health, but the headaches and state of heart
were unchanged. A few medicines were occasionally given, but
without avail; treatment was thus altogether suspended until the
summer of 1853, when, struck with the marked resemblance of the
pathogenesis of Glonoine to this case, I again advised a renewal of
treatment. Glonoine was taken for a period of six months in the
3rd, 2nd, and 1st dilutions, with intervals of from a week to a fort¬
night without medicine. From the time this remedy was given the
improvement commenced, and steadily increased; the headaches
diminishing, and the heart ceasing to be irritable. He has been
able throughout the spring and summer of 1854 to take long walks,
to ride, &c., and can study five to six hours a day with ease, and
without exciting headache.
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140
Clinical Record.
Driven out or Driven in ?
%
The following case is related by Dr. Bahr of Hanover, and as it
appears to us highly instructive we offer it for the reader’s considera¬
tion. It is from Hirschel’s Zeitschrift /Hr Horn. Klinik, vol. iii, 12.
Miss S—, presented herself for treatment in April 1842. Her
state was as follows: The right side of the dorsum of the nose from
the origin of the eyebrow downwards for the length of an inch, and
in breadth from the centre of the dorsum of the nose to the internal
canthus of the eye (about five lines) was occupied by an ulcer with
irregular flattened borders, uneven surface, and greyish-white colour.
At the upper and lower part of this ulcer were two small warts,
round and shining, and at their apices shewing a ramification of
vessels. The deepest part of the ulcer was its centre, yet the bone
was not exposed, and close beside this excavated part there lay a
spongy elevated mass. The lower punctum lachrymale was im¬
bedded in a similar mass. The whole bled easily on the slightest
touch, especially the spongy parts, whereupon a brown scab often
appeared, which was soon thrown off again. The purulent discharge
was not considerable, the surrounding skin was normal, only there
were upon the forehead and cheeks three warts similar to those
above described, but not injected.
The history of the case was this: Some twelve or fourteen years
previously, there appeared a wart near the internal canthus, where
the ulcer is now deepest. This wart was precisely similar to those
at the edge of the ulcer. It fell off and left behind it an ulcer of the
size of a pea, which increased pretty rapidly. It was burnt with
caustic several times, and that so severely that ophthalmia came on,
the effects of which remain in several specks on the cornea. The
ulcer was each time healed up, but in a short time was as bad as
ever. Internally there were given at the same time, purgatives, mer¬
cury, iodide of potassium, in enormous doses, and tincture of iodine
outwardly. All was in vain, so that at last the patient left off all
medicine, and only dressed the ulcer with some mild salve. The
history and symptoms clearly indicated the cancerous nature of the
malady. The homoeopathic treatment consisted of arsenic 8, six
drops every two days for internal use, and for external use an
ointment made with about two grains of the 1st decimal trituration
of Arsenic, and a sufficient quantity of fresh lard. This was spread
on a piece of lint, and fastened on the ulcer with sticking plaster.
This dressing was at first renewed twice a day, afterwards more
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Driven out or Driven in ?
141
irregularly. After it had been applied for a few days, the warts
reddened, became gradually reddish-brown, and in the course of
about ten days they as well as the ulcer formed a very hard brown
scab, when the eyelids, forehead, and one cheek became slightly
inflamed and (edematous. The scab was softened and detached by
means of water compresses in a few days, when the oedema disap¬
peared, and the raw surface of the ulcer was treated as before.
The oedema never returned again much. In a short time the greater
part of the ulcer became dean, the suspicious looking spots were
further cauterized with the Arsenic, the trituration of which was
applied either dry or moistened. The healthy looking parts were
not touched. They healed rapidly.
In six weeks a cicatrix was produced, which had a glazed ap¬
pearance, and was only half the size of the original ulcer, at the
lower punctum only there still remained a suspicious looking spot.
This it was resolved to cauterize with the Arsenic, but the patient
was obliged to go away before it could be done.
She returned in February 1853 in consequence of the spot at the
lachrymal point having enlarged, and a small ulcerated point having
begun in the centre of the cicatrix. The former treatment was
commenced, and with such success that by the beginning of
May the place was entirely healed up. The cicatrix was quite
consolidated, the only thing that remained was the contraction it
occasioned, whereby the eyelid was somewhat distorted, and the
tears ran over the cheek owing to the destruction of the lachrymal
point.
No general symptoms of importance shewed themselves during
the treatment. Besides the oedema above mentioned, there occurred
only occasional sleeplessness, anxiety, and oppression, stomach-ache,
flying heat, increased thirst. About half a drachm of the trituration
in all was used.
About Christmas she began to be troubled with pains in the
stomach, which occurred frequently, but were not very severe.
Suddenly, however, vomiting occurred. It followed the ingestion
of the least food, whether solid or fluid, and became so violent that
after thirty-six hours of agony the patient died. The attending
physician was of opinion that she died of cancer of the stomach.
A post mortem examination was not made.
The history of this case seems to us to justify the name bestowed
of old on such malignant ulcers of the face, noli me tangere.
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142
OBITUARY.
Dr. F. L. Schron.
The following obituary notice of Dr. Schron, so well known to all
conversant with homoeopathic literature, will be read with interest by
our colleagues. It is taken from an allopathic journal, the Aerztl.
Intelligenz-blatt fur Baiem , No. 13, and may consequently be con¬
sidered as the testimony of the allopathic school to the worth and
science of a homoeopathist.
“ Dr. Carl Herrich, who died at the commencement of January of
the present year, has been followed into eternity at the commence¬
ment of February by a dear friend and fellow-student, who, like him,
was energetic and faithful in his calling as a physician, and as a man
gained the esteem of all, and the warmest love and respect of many.
His memory will long survive him in a wide circle of affectionate
friends.
“ We allude to Dr. Frederick Ludwig Schron, royal criminal phy¬
sician of Hof, who was born there on the 28th April, 1804, and
died on the 4th of February, 1854.
“ The writer of this short memoir of our late excellent colleague
has to regret that his occupations, being very different from those of
the deceased, he had seldom an opportunity of coming much in per¬
sonal contact with Dr. Schron, and hence he can scarcely succeed in
giving his portrait-sketch with that justness and fidelity with which
it must be impressed on the remembrance of those who had the good
fortune to* enjoy a longer and closer intercourse with our Schron.
“ Schron was the youngest son of a justiciary commissioner, esta¬
blished in Hof. Until the year 1820, he attended the educational
seminaries of his native town. Whilst a student at the gymnasium
of that town, he occupied himself much with the natural sciences,
especially mineralogy and botany. Sent to the University of Erlan¬
gen, he devoted himself with zeal to the study of medicine. At that
time a fresh and living spirit animated the young hearts of the stu¬
dents, and the sciences, especially those bearing on medicine, had
received a new impulse. In physiology, the writings of Johannes
Muller, which opened a new path, had just appeared, and Schonlein’s
doctrines infused fresh life into the natural historical method of treat¬
ing pathology. An unusual number of highly-gifted young men were
at that period congregated in our Universities. Many of our most
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remarkable men, who are now distinguished for their services to
science, church or state, were prosecuting their academical studies
about the year 1820. Schron entered on his scientific career
with the greatest zeal. Remarkable for a great gift of eloquence, for
genial bumour, and pungent wit, he was among the foremost ranks
of the most distinguished students; and all his university friends
still retain a lively recollection of their former fellow-student.' Schron
quitted Erlangen to follow Schonlein to Wurzburg, whose course of
instructions he attended with a real enthusiasm. Afterwards he went
to Munich, where he took his doctor’s degree after defending his
inaugural dissertation, * De digital* purpurea? on the 14th July, 1829.
For this thesis he had availed himself of a series of observations
respecting the action of foxglove made upon himself. At that time,
as he expressly Stated, he had no thoughts of practising that system
of medicine which he afterwards adopted, and which was then
beginning to be spoken about. But the experiments he at that time
instituted on himself, seemed to have led his mind towards specific
medicine. He used to ascribe to these provings of the ‘ heart-
disease curing’ digitalis, the origin of a disease of the heart, with
which he had to contend for years, and which, as will be presently
seen, ultimately killed him.
“ After gaining his doctor’s degree with 6clat, Schron went for
some time to Vienna; and on his return to the narrower sphere of
his native town he was employed as quarantine doctor on the occasion
of the threatened invasion of the cholera. In 1838, he became a
practitioner in Hof, and was soon in the enjoyment of an extensive
practice. As a practical physician he early directed his attention to
homoeopathy; and to this, it should be remarked, he was not impelled
by external circumstances or by love of gain, but by a pure scientific
conviction. He studied earnestly and thoroughly the literature
bearing on this method of treatment, and soon contributed by his
own labours to its advancement. Therein he did not shew himself to
be-a blind follower of Hahnemann’s doctrines; on the contrary, he
rejected most of Hahnemann’s dogmas, particularly his posological
rules; he only acknowledged the therapeutic principle similia similibus,
and contended for the idea of a local-specific action of drugs. This
is not the place to consider the justification and the importance of
this therapeutic tendency—but we must distinctly declare that with
all the reproaches that have been with more or less justice cast upon
homoeopathists, none are applicable to our Schron. His whole nature
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Obituary.
was entirely free from anything like quackery; he was thoroughly
grounded in all branches of medical knowledge, and the ancient and
modem medical literature; he was a skilful physiologist, and well
acquainted with all the auxiliaries to diagnostic knowledge; he did
not reject the well-founded experience of any method of treatment,
though he remained more particularly faithful to the specific method.
His work published in 1839, entitled ‘ The Natural Curative Processes,
and the Methods of Treatment,’ shews us how well he understood his
therapeutic position. Hence Rudolph Wagner is quite right when,
in his Encyclopaedia, and Methodology of the Medical Sciences , he
mentions Schron as one of the writers who have ‘ given a better
direction ’ to homoeopathy. And thus it happened that Schron enjoyed
the highest consideration among both allopaths and homoeopaths.
As proof of this we may point to his election as member of the
Physico-medical Society of Erlangen, and of the Medico-chirurgical
Society of Bruges on the one hand, and on the other, to his election
as corresponding member of the homoeopathic Union of Baden, and
as honorary member of the Hahnemann Medical Society of London,
“ But it was not only as a physician and a master of natural
sciences, more especially of mineralogy and entomology, that Schron
enjoyed unbounded confidence and general recognition. The accu¬
racy and acumen he exhibited in the observation and comprehension
of the works of nature did not fail him in his estimation and appre¬
ciation of the imitative works of art. He was considered in the circle
of his friends to be a competent judge of all works of painting and
statuary, and even artists attached great value to his taste and
judgment. Inspiriting and entertaining to a high degree in society,
gifted with a fresh natural wit, precise and accurate in his mode of
expressing himself, he was much sought after as an entertaining
companion; he was an upright and true friend, and in his endeavour
to he of use to his poorer and richer fellow-creatures, he was most
unselfish and indefatigable. As a proof of his active benevolence,
we may point to the Institution founded and conducted by him in
Hof for affording assistance to poor married pregnant women, which
still continues to flourish.
“ After acting for fifteen years as assistant to the royal criminal
physician of Hof, he obtained last year the appointment to that office
after the death of his former principal. Of his efficiency as a forensic
physician we have testimony in the utmost respect he invariably
received for the reports and judgments he gave to the jury. Within
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Dr. C. Hummel. — Mr. Henry Smith Searle.
145
a few days of his death, he had to lay before the jury the results
of his investigations on the bodies of three persons who had been at
various times poisoned by arsenic, and on this, as on other occasions,
he shewed himself completely master of his subject. He was carried
out of court to his own house very ill, and there he died suddenly,
£ the death which he had long anticipated. An examination of his
body, shewed ossification of the cardiac valves, and a true aneurism
of the heart which had burst.
“ Schron leaves behind him a widow, previously a Miss Palm, of
Erlangen, whom he married in 1833, and four children.
“ Of his writings the most remarkable is that we have already
alluded to— Die Naturheilprocesse and die Heilmethoden , published
in 1837 ; another is entitled Die Hauptsatze der Hahnemannschen
Lehre, &c., published in 1834. Schron began his literary career in
1833, with an essay in vol. 3 of the Aflg. Horn. Ztg., on the size of
homoeopathic doses and their repetition. He afterwards presented
frequent contributions to the same journal, then to the Hygea, and
latterly to the Vierteljahrschrift, conducted by Drs. C. Muller and
V. Meyer.”
Dr. C. Hummel , of Magdeburg.
This distinguished homoeopathic physician died of typhus fever on
the 10th of October, the first anniversary of the day on which his
friend and co-editor, Dr. Hartmann, died. In our next No. we hope
to be able to present our readers with a more extended biography of
one who so long filled a prominent place in connexion with homoeo¬
pathic literature, and who was so universally esteemed by the geniality
and kindliness of his disposition, and by his zeal for the promotion
of our common cause.
Mr. Henry Smith Searle.
We regret to have to record the death of this gentleman, which
took place at his residence at Kennington Green, in January last, in
the 56th year of his age. Mr. Searle was a Member of the Royal
College of Surgeons of England, and was one of the first batch of
Fellows of that College. He practised as an allopathic surgeon for
many years at Kennington, and was the author of several works
(vide Horn. Directory), and of some papers in the Lancet and Medical
Gazette, pointing out the fatal tendency of the antiphlogistic treat¬
ment of inflammation and other diseases. He was a disciple of
Brown, and wrote in defence of the mode of treating diseases recom-
VOL. XIII, NO. LI.—JANUARY, 1855 . L
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Obituary.
mended by that distinguished but unhappy author. He was a
very well-informed and intelligent practitioner. About four years
before his death he became a convert to the homoeopathic system,
and practised it with conscientiousness and ability. A year before
his death he was elected to the medical staff of the London Homoeo¬
pathic Hospital, and did duty at the branch Institution in Aldersgate
Street with great punctuality and care. He had a respectable
but not very extensive private practice.
During his last long and painful illness with cancer in the stomach,
he was chiefly under the medical care of his brother-in-law, Mr.
Kiernan; and owing to this circumstance he could not indulge unin¬
terruptedly his own predilection for homoeopathic treatment, but from
time to time his sufferings were much mitigated by the use of nux ,
arsenicum , and phosphorus. It is somewhat remarkable that whilst
to others his symptoms appeared unmistakeably indicative of cancer
of the stomach, his learned relative remained to the last in doubt as
to the precise nature of the disease. A post mortem examination
removed all doubt on the subject. It has often been remarked that
long-continued mental anxiety is one of the most common causes of
cancer of the stomach. It is more than probable it was so in this
instance. Mr. Searle changed his religious as well as his medical
faith. Previously a Protestant, he embraced, a year or two before his
death, the creed of his wife, and died a member of the Church of
Rome. He has left a widow and four children to deplore his loss.
Dr. Emanuel Nusser
On the 30th of August Dr. Emanuel Nusser, of Augsburg, while
devoting himself to the treatment of cases of cholera which had broken
out in the town where he resided, fell a victim to the fatal pestilence.
He had been particularly successful in the treatment of this formid¬
able malady among his fellow-townsmen, but was unable to with¬
stand its attack himself. He was 43 years of age at the time of his
decease. Dr. Nusser is known to the homoeopathic world by several
useful suggestions relating to practice; and he at one time edited a
homoeopathic journal in conjunction with Dr. Buchner, of Munich.
Hof rath Wolff\ of Darmstadt.
The Darmstadt local journal of September the 4th, gives the fol¬
lowing obituary notice of this gentleman :—“ Yesterday (Sept. 3),
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at half-past 6, p. m., the pensioned grand-ducal court-counsellor,
Wolff, died, after a long and painful illness, in the 64th year of hia
age. He was an honourable and worthy man in the true meaning of
the term, as is proved by his active life in the military as well as in
the civil service—a brave, determined, and loyal soldier, a well-
informed and able officer, highly esteemed by his comrades and his
superiors. After the termination of the great war, during which he
had received many honourable wounds, especially in the Spanish and
French campaigns, which bore testimony to his qualities, he quitted
the military profession and devoted himself with equal zeal to the
civil service of his country. Of his zeal he gave many proofs; first,
as clerk of the exchequer in various districts of the country; after¬
wards as superintendent of the lunatic asylum of Hofheim; and
also for many years as member of the second chamber of representa¬
tives. All who came into contact with him can testify to his un¬
wearied efforts to promote objects of general utility, his successful
efforts for the benefit of his fellow-creatures, his benevolence, and
they knew that he was more bent on serving others than himself.
Whatever Wolff undertook, he entered on it with all his soul and
energy. This is shewn, among other things, by his labours to pro¬
mote homoeopathy, in which art he is considered quite an authority,
as is shewn by many writings he published.—In a word, he was a
man in the true sense of the word, and his numerous friends will
receive the tidings of his death with deep sorrow. All that art could
do was done to prolong his life, which was threatened by an organic
disease of the heart. His sufferings commenced in February, so that
he was altogether seven months ill. May the ashes of this brave
man rest in peace ! ”
HOMOEOPATHIC INTELLIGENCE.
Hahnemann's Correspondence.
In Dr. Romani’s “ Elogio Storico di Samuello Anemanno," we find
among other letters of Hahnemann, the following, which are interes¬
ting, as they give us an insight into the mode of practice adopted by
him in the last ten years of his life.
The first is a letter addressed by Hahnemann to a Russian
General residing in Naples. It refers to a child of the latter, a boy
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of 10 years of age, who had a serious affection of the eyes (probably
scrofulous ophthalmia, though Dr. Romani does not inform us what
its nature was).
“Your Excellency, “ Koethen, 31st August, 1833.
“ However well I might treat your son medicinally, it will be
impossible to cure him unless his mode of living be completely
altered, and that immediately. It is evident that the mode of treat¬
ment hitherto adopted for his case, has been very erroneous, if not
highly prejudicial.
“ His whole constitution, physical and moral, is not at all estab¬
lished,' but on the contrary, very undecided. If an effort be not
made to procure for him a more robust physical frame, and a more
active moral energy, the best medicines will be without effect upon
him. His affected eyes will never recover if their vitality, as at
present, shall continue to shew such a weak reactive power. The
cure of every disease chiefly depends on the active reaction of the
vital forces, stimulated by suitable medicines. It seems that your
former physicians were not alive to this truth. They talk of putting
off the treatment of the patient until next year. Then it will be
too late to obtain his cure. In order not to lose such precious time,
I forward seven small globules. The patient is to take one of them
every seven days, in the morning on an empty stomach. The
globules are to be dissolved in a spoonful of water. When taking
the globule marked No. 1, the patient is to smell at the same time
with both the nostrils at the tube marked S. He must smell at the
tube C. when he takes globule No. 3, and smell at the tube H. S.
when he takes globule No. 5. Each time, I should remark, he
should only make one olfaction.
“ At the same time he must avoid all other internal and external
medicines, all those things called domestic remedies, perfumes, den¬
tifrices, baths, spices of all sorts in his victuals, and acids; he must
not even smell them. He should drink wine and water: a sixth
part of his accustomed quantity of wine, with five-sixth parts of
water. He must abstain from tea, coffee, punch, and all other
alcoholic beverages.
“ I advise him to walk every day in the open air for two hours.
“ Every week his state of health should be noted in a journal.
“ I have the honor to be, &c.,
“SAMUEL HAHNEMANN.”
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149
From what we know of Hahnemann’s practice at the period when
the above letter tons written, we have little difficulty in guessing
what was his exact treatment of this case of strumous ophthalmia.
In 1833, as we learn from the last edition of the Organon , he was
addicted to the administration of medicines by olfaction; so much
so that he says ( Org: § cclxxxviii, note) that in this manner they
act most surely and most powerfully. It is then probable that the
globules directed in this case to be taken by the mouth were
unmedicated, and that, the medicine was contained in the tubes,
which were apparently Sulphur, Calcarea, and Hepar sulphuris.
These medicines were thus administered at intervals of a fortnight.
At that period Hahnemann seldom gave a medicine in a chronic
case oftener than once a fortnight or month. Latterly, as is well
known, when he adopted the plan of giving medicines in solution,
he advised the repetition of the dose every 24 or 48 hours in chronic
diseases. ( Chron. Dis. iii, Preface.)
The letters that follow give us some information respecting his
practice during the last years of bis life.
“Sir, “Paris, 5th June, 1841.
“ I have directed to you one of my dear patients, Mile. D’
Argout, who intends passing some days at Naples with her father.
“ If during her residence there she should require your care, you
■will have to exercise the greatest caution in treating her, in conse¬
quence of her excessive susceptibility. One globule of medicine
in fifteen spoonfuls of water, of which a teaspoonful is mixed with a
large bottle of water, and well shaken, will suffice for her. Of this
she should not take more than one or more teaspoonfuls in case of
an acute attack.
I hope you have received my letters, and the little portraits of
me which Madame Hahnemann forwarded to you. We wish you
every success, and offer you our affectionate compliments,
“SAMUEL HAHNEMANN.”
The two next letters relate to a patient affected with cancer of the
tongue. It was a hopeless case, and Dr. Romani being at a loss
what treatment to pursue, applied to Hahnemann for assistance.
“Paris, 4th January, 1843.
“ I have read with all the attention it deserves, the consultation of
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Mr. N. N., and hasten to send my advice to Dr. Romani, to whom
I present my sincere regards.
“ The disease is of the gravest nature, and has been aggravated
by the bad treatment of which the patient has been the victim.
In order to be cured, he will require to follow strictly and for a long
space of time the homoeopathic mode of treatment. If we are asked
to perform a miracle, it is hut fair to allow us time to perform
it in.
“ The patient must take very little salt, and must abstain gene¬
rally from all irritating things. He should live principally on animal
food, especially beef-tea; and if he take meat, it should be well
cooked and finely minced, and a little beef-tea added to it so as to
make it into a kind of puree.
0 “ Large pieces of food should not be put into the mouth, because,
as mastication is painful, it will be prejudicial to the cure of the
tongue. I would advise the patient to abstain entirely from wine :
I consider this a most important point to attend to. I also advise
him to speak as little as possible, or even not to speak at all. He
may write on paper what he wishes to say to those about him.
It is scarcely necessary to say that coffee, tea, vinegar, lemon and
spices are prohibited/ He should not drink much soon after eating.
Too great a quantity of liquid taken during the process of digestion
is injurious to that function. The patient should go out every day
and walk in the open air, but not so as to fatigue himself.
“ The medicinal powder enclosed is to be put in a smooth bottle
with fifteen spoonfuls of water and one of alcohol or rum. The
bottle is to be strongly shaken ten or twelve times. Then a table¬
spoonful of this medicine is to be ’ put in a tumbler containing ten
spoonfuls of water. The mixture in the tumbler is to be stirred for
half a minute with a small spoon. The first and second days the
patient is to take a teaspoonful of the liquid ; the third and fourth
days he is to take two teaspoonfuls; the fifth and sixth days he is to
take three teaspoonfuls of the fluid in the tumbler; and thus he is to
go on adding a teaspoonful more every two days. But if any aggra¬
vation of the pain in the tongue should ensue, he is immediately to
diminish by one the number of teaspoonfuls; and if the aggravation
does not cease he must diminish gradually the number of tea¬
spoonfuls.
“ The tumblerful of water should be prepared afresh every day
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and what remains should be thrown away, in case any mistake
should occur.
“ Every day the state of the patient should be carefully recorded
in writing; so that an exact account of his condition may be
obtained: the present will thus serve for the future. Moreoever the
appearance of the disease should he accurately examined and re¬
corded every day.
“ The medicine in the bottle should be shaken ten or twelve
times every morning, before making the mixture in the tumbler:
this is of the greatest importance.
“ The medicine I enclose is acidum muriaticum. On account of
the gravity and complications of the disease, I cannot at present
suggest any others. I shall be able to do so after the present
medicine has been consumed if you will consult me.
“ The disease is by no means a mere local one, notwithstanding
that its visible sign is confined to one spot. It is the product of a
psoric disease, and above all, of the monstrous treatment to which
the patient has been subjected. I beg to know the name of the
patient, as it is not my habit to prescribe for anonymous individuals.
“SAMUEL HAHNEMANN.”
Dr. Romani having written to give an account of his patient after
the above prescription, received in reply the following letter:—
“Paris, 25th February, 1843.
“ Doctor arid Friend,
“ I have received your letter of the 9th of February, con¬
taining a particular account of the health of Mr. N. N., during and
after the use of the acidum muriaticum, which was one globule of
the 30th attenuation.
“ I now enclose you thuja, two globules of a very highly perfected
dynamization, which will be fully described in the forthcoming
sixth edition of my Organon.
“ The powder is to be put in a new bottle with eighteen spoonfuls
of water and one of alcohol or rum: the bottle is to be vigorously
shaken, and one spoonful of the mixture is to be put in a tumblerful
of water—the tumbler should contain ten or twelve spoonfuls of
water—and this well stirred with a spoon. The patient will take a
teaspoonful of this mixture early in the morning fasting, and every
subsequent morning he will increase the quantity taken by one
teaspoonful. The tumblerful of medicine must be prepared afresh
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every morning, with the spoonful of medicine out of the bottle,
which latter should be shaken strongly twelve times every morning.
In order to avoid mistakes, what remains in the tumbler should be
thrown away whenever the dose has been taken.
“ If while thus increasing every morning the dose by one tea¬
spoonful, the patient should suffer more in the tongue, or rather if
his pains should become aggravated, or the tongue should shew
externally some aggravation, then he must cease to increase the
quantity of medicine he takes by one spoonful every day, and he
must only take a single spoonful every morning. He should not
neglect to pass some portion of every day in the open air, except
those days when it rains violently; in that case he must stop at
home, or take a drive in a carriage.
“ I am deeply sensible of all your marks of friendship, my dear
doctor, and am happy to be loved so cordially. I hope you may
remain happy, and in the enjoyment of good heatth, and I pray God
to bless you.
“SAMUEL HAHNEMANN.”
Dr. Romani does not tell us the result of the treatment of this
case. Doubtless the disease terminated in the usual way, either
under Romani’s care, or that of some other physician, for it is rare
that a patient, affected with such an incurable disease, remains
constant to one physician.
These letters shew in a striking manner the vast difference in
Hahnemann’s mode of administering remedies between 1833 and
1843. At the former date one single dose of a remedy was to be
given, its action allowed to continue uninterrupted for a week, a
fortnight, or even a month, and on no account was another dose of
the same medicine to be given without the interposition of some
other medicine, which also was allowed to exhaust its full term of
action. In 1837, as we learn from the last edition of the Chronic
Diseases , his views on the subject of the repetition of the dose
altered very materially. He then advised that in chronic maladies
the medicine should be repeated not seldomer than every forty-
eight, but more usually every twenty-four hours. During his last
years, as we learn from the above and other documents, his practice
was not only to give the medicine every day, but to give it in
increased doses until aggravation supervened.
He alludes in one of the foregoing letters to the discoveries rela-
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Homoeopathic Treatment of the Insane. 153
tive to the preparation and dose of remedies to be revealed in the
sixth edition of the Organon. The publication of this work has, as
is well known, been withheld by his wife, and we are not sure that
it would add much to its author’s fame, for we scarcely think the
art of medicine could have derived much advantage from the specu¬
lations of an irritable octogenarian, who banished from his presence
all who ventured to differ from him in the slightest particulars.
Homoeopathic Treatment of the Insane.
Ik our laBt vol. p. 484, we mentioned that Dr. Kallenbach had
promised to give us some more details respecting Dr. Wittfeld’s
treatment of the patients in his lunatic asylum. We find that he
has fulfilled his promise as well as he could; but the mode in
which Dr. Wittfeld kept his books does not seem to have been very
perfect, consequently Dr. Kallenbach is only able to present us
with very scanty information on the subject. Such as it is we offer
it to our readers, as it appears in a recent No. of the Allg. Horn.
Ztg. ■ • ,
“ It is (says Dr. Kallenbach) remarkable that Wittfeld seldom or
never used those homoeopathic remedies which are known to be
useful in mental diseases, and which have been recommended by
Hahnemann himself, such as verat. and helleb.; that on the other
hand he very frequently used others which are usually looked upon
as nearly inert, such as viola odor ala and teucrium.
“ He very seldom stuck long to one medicine, he generally pre¬
scribed a series of medicines to be taken one after the other, often a
dose every day, more frequently every two or three days.
“ Patients who were brought into the institution in a state of
mania, always got bellad., cicut., and sir am., either one of these
or two or three of them in the above order. The maniacal state
\
generally went off after from two to eight days, so that there can be
no doubt of the action of those remedies. I am unable to find the
special indications for the employment of these medicines in his
journals.
“ The following remedies were frequently given for the states
mentioned in connexion with them, and appear by Dr. Wittfeld’s
account to have acted successfully. Arnica in mania, where the
patient is in possession of his senses. Digitalis in intermitting
mania, melancholia alternating with great irresolution, great debility
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after the attacks, always accompanied by marked disorders of the
digestion. Phosphorus (very often prescribed) efficacious in mania
with predominant happy disposition. Ignatia in melancholia after
disappointment in love (here also staphisag .), when there were at
the same time symptoms of spinal affection. Secale in great excite¬
ment, when the patients became completely furious, and threatened
to commit acts of incendiarism; it was generally used for women,
probably in consequence of derangements of the uterine system.
Ambra in melancholia, where the patients would sit the whole day
long quite silent and often wept (frequently in alternation with
pulsat.), usually accompanied by great prostration of the strength,
pain in the small of the back, and constipation. Selenium in great
obtuseness of the senses, complete insensibility and indifference to
external impressions. Opium in visions, especially in patients who
had been too much addicted to the bottle. Viola odorata in distrac¬
tion, childish behaviour, disobedience, refusal to take food, at the
same time very low voice: often alternated with acid. phos.
Oleander often did good in melancholic states with obstinate con¬
stipation. Besides these, sepia, conium, staphisagria and iodine,
were frequently given when the symptoms pointed to them.”
Coroner’s Inquest at Brooklyn , New York.
Another of those violent efforts to undermine the confidence of the
public in homoeopathy, which are from time to time put forth by oar pro¬
fessional opponents, has lately been made at Brooklyn, New York;
terminating, as has invariably happened in similar instances, in the signal
defeat of our allopathic assailants.
The inquest referred to appears to have excited considerable interest on
the other side of the Atlantic, the investigation having extended over
seven days, and the report occupying upwards of eight closely-printed
columns of the New York Evening Post. The history of the matter is
simply as follows:—Dr. Wells, a homoeopathic physician at Brooklyn,
lost a patient; the parents of the child were induced to allow a post
mortem examination to be made by the allopaths; after which the
coroner of the city called a jury to ascertain whether the deceased had
come to her death in consequence of mal-practice on the part of her
medical attendant. The coroner, it is important to remark, is an allo¬
pathic practitioner,—and, as is very clear from the animus with which he
seems to have conducted the enquiry, has anything but a friendly feeling
towards his homoeopathic brethren, or the system of therapeutics they
practise. Indeed, as far at least as homoeopathy is concerned, he evinces
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a strong resemblance to a certain notorious coroner, who holds his courts
in and around the metropolis of this country.
The first witness summoned was Dr. Wells, whose statement was to the
effect, that when first he was called to see the deceased, a girl of twelve
years of age, she was suffering from meningitis, which was recovered from
in about ten days ; on this followed intermittent fever, at first of a tertian,
but subsequently of a quotidian type. The fever lasted for nearly eight
weeks; the paroxysms during the last four gradually becoming but little
more than noticeable. At the end of this time the mother, who was in
constant attendance on her sick child, had an attack of mumps, was pre¬
scribed for by Dr. Wells, and recovered. The deceased now complained
of symptoms about the neck, which appeared to indicate that she was
going to be similarly affected. Two days afterwards severe headache set
in, convulsions supervened, a large quantity of dark blood was vomited,
and in a few hours she was dead. Dr. Wells having given in detail the
above report, the Evening Post says—
“ The coroner then questioned him as to the treatment, which was the
usual homcepathic treatment of meningitis and intermittent fever. Three
hours were spent in cross-questionings and endeavours to entrap Dr.Wells,
during which the whole theory and practice of homoeopathy were unfolded
and explained, the evident object of the coroner being to cast discredit
upon this system of medical practice.”
Dr. Wells was now examined as to his opinion of the nature of the dis¬
ease, and the cause of death. The latter he believed to be a “ metastasis
of the mumps to the brain.”
In reference to the treatment pursued in this case, the following exami¬
nation was instituted by the coroner:—
“ Q. Is not quinine a specific remedy for ague and fever?
“ A. No. It is a specific remedy for some forms of ague and fever: for
those forms which are similar to the symptoms which quinine produces on
the healthy subject, and for no others. I do not often use quinine, because
the form of ague and fever which it cures is not very common in this part
of the country. It oftener suppresses ague than cures it. I have given
it in a few cases, and cured one. I gave it in the first and third cen¬
tesimal triturations.
“ Q. Is there enough force in these small doses ?
u A. That depends on the similarity of the diseased condition to the
disease which the drug is capable of inducing in the healthy person; the
greater similarity, the smaller the dose required to effect a cure. The
reason why homoeopathists succeed in curing with such small doses is be¬
cause they select their remedies in accordance with this similarity.”
The paper then goes on to say—
u Dr. Wells’s examination lasted six and a half hours, and was chiefly
on topics wholly irrelevant to the case, which is an inquest into the cause
of the death of the child.”
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On the following day Dr. Dunham, who had seen the patient in con¬
sultation with Dr. Wells, was examined. His report of the case and
opinion as to the cause of death coincided in every particular with Dr.
Wells’s.
Dr. Hall, a homoeopathic physician, who likewise saw the patient in
consultation with Drs. Wells and Dunham during the last few hours of
her life, was now called and agreed with the other medical men both as to
the cause of death, and in the propriety of the treatment which had been
pursued.
Dr. Wellard Parker, the professor of surgery in the New York College
of Physicians and Surgeons, who, with Drs. Gilman and Wood had
made the post mortem examination, stated that he had found the arach¬
noid thickened and opaque, the pia mater congested and thickened ; the
lungs highly congested throughout; the spleen congested, and four
times its normal size; and the kidneys were the seat of Bright’s disease.
From these appearances he says that—
44 Had the history of the case not been related to me, I should have
said the deceased had had intermittent fever. That is a common disease
in this region ; the treatment is well understood by every physician. The
cause of the disease is supposed to be a poison, the character of which is
not known, and the great antidote was bark and is now quinine. Arsenic
holds a high rank as a remedy, and so does ducking head over heels in
cold water. Quinine is the great remedy .”
The coroner then proceeded to enquire into the witness’s knowledge of
homoeopathy, and was answered:—
44 Years ago I went thoroughly into the study and practice of it. I
found the high dilutions invariably inefficient. With the low dilutions of
aconite, arsenic, nux vomica, corrosive sublimate and belladonna I got
good effects. These are remedies we use with great caution, and make
them our dernier ressort.
“ Q. (Coroner.) Have you witnessed or heard of any ill effects from
these low dilutions ?
44 A. Yes, from phosphorus and nux vomica. I have seen rhus produce
its peculiar eruption.”
Dr. Parker, it appears, has 44 got good effects ” from low dilutions of
medicines administered homceopathically—he does not draw any compari¬
son between his results so obtained, and those which have followed his
allopathic practice; neither does he state any good or sufficient reason for
not always using homoeopathically selected low dilutions. He is the first
physician we ever heard of who, having gone 44 thoroughly into the study
and practice” of homceopathy, returned to the vague and uncertain
theories of allopathy. We are curious to know his reasons for having
done so; and what he understands by going thoroughly into the study
and practice of a system of medicine.
The next witness, Dr. Gilman, who assisted at the post mortem 7 gave
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an account of it in all respects similar to that of Dr. Parker. He denied
the existence of mumps; and consequently, that death resulted from a
metastasis of that disease to the brain. He attributed the congestions of
the internal organs, and the fatal event, to the intermittent fever; for the
occurrence of the convulsions he advanced the following original theory :
he says,—
“ I suppose the convulsions originated from the paroxysms of fever and
ague, which produce, os is admitted on all hands, congestions of internal or¬
gans and, among them, of the brain. The hemorrhage came from the lungs.
I suppose the blood rushed to and fro in the body of the child, until she
could stand it no longer, and then the vessels gave way. It was an effort
on the part of nature to cure the disease, (!) and the remedy was worse
than the disease, and destroyed life.”
Of course Dr. G. denies in toto the efficiency of the remedies employed ;
but, unlike Dr. Parker, does not appear to have tried them in any case.
A Dr. Dudley was then called, and in the course of his examination
makes the following observations:—
“ I think the child died of hemorrhage. I attended the post mortem
examination. We could discover no traces of any drugs or poisons. If
the organs had been affected by the medicines given, we should have dis¬
covered it; the small quantities given could not have produced any effect.
I have experimented and know that the high dilutions have no effect; I
have obtained good effects from homoeopathic remedies in large doses.
“ Q. (Juror.) State particularly what remedies you have tried in your
experiments, and for how long a time your experiments lasted ?
“ A. (In some confusion.) I have tried aconite and nux vomica several
times—got no effects from high dilutions—never tried them on healthy
persons. I do not, from my own knowledge, think that mumps ever
seriously affects the brain.”
The coroner here wished to close the enquiry, and proposed to the jury
that they should retire to consider their verdict—but from the evident malus
animus of the coroner towards homoeopathy, they stated through their fore¬
man, €s that as the case seemed to have been pushed beyond the usual limits
of an inquest, and to have been made a question between two medical
systems, and as they had heard evidence on only one side on this point,
they would like to have further evidence, and would give the coroner the
names of some homoeopathic physicians whom they wished him to summon
as witnesses, viz.: Drs. E. Bayard, B. F. Joslin, B. F. Bowers, and
J. F. Gray, of New York. * Very well, gentlemen, said the coroner,
warmly, 4 if you wish to prolong the matter, I am willing; but if you
hear two or three homoeopathic, and three or four more allopathic wit¬
nesses, you will have enough to do/ Adjourned to Friday next, 2 p. m.”
Accordingly, the following day was occupied in the examination of
Drs. Wood, Smith, and Clark, all allopaths, and the two latter professors
in the New York College of Physicians and Surgeons. The first-named,
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having assisted at the post mortem examination, detailed the appearances
observed ; to which we have previously referred. He then entered into
an account of the pathology of mumps, and intermittent fever; stating,
that the latter is “ not a dangerous disease,” and that he “ never knew a
patient die from it.” He expressed his “ theoretical opinion,” that the
patient had not mumps, but “ could not say whether she had the inception
of them or not.” The convulsions he believed to arise from the pulmonary
congestion. In reply to some questions by a juror, Dr. W. made the fol¬
lowing extraordinary remarks:—
iC From the symptoms read by the coroner, I should not in this case
have departed from the established line of treatment. The treatment of
homoeopathists in this disease is the same pursued by allopathists. (!)
Hahnemann held that the principle, 4 similia similibus curanturj was fully
established in the treatment of this disease. There is no getting rid of the
disease without using the anti-periodics.”
The next witness endeavours to explain to the jury the pathology of
intermittent fever; and being, as he says, “ practically unacquainted with
most of the remedies given,” he declines giving any opinion as to the effi¬
cacy of the treatment. How favourably does such an honest avowal of
incompetency contrast with the hasty, and too often wilfully, false state¬
ments of the value of homoeopathic medicine hazarded by our brethren of
the old school! Dr. Clark, having heard the report of the post mortem
examination, attributed death, not to the lesion of the brain, which he
stated to be of old standing, but to congestion of the several organs of the
body, produced by intermittent fever. He considered that a metastasis of
mumps could not occur without the disease having been first fairly de¬
veloped in the parotid glands. The coroner then asked the following
question:—
“ What is the modus operandi of medicines in general ?
“A. The question is too big for me. We don’t in general know.
We only know they act. The use of medicines is all the result of ob¬
servation.”
The witness further says—that he has no experience in the homoeo¬
pathic treatment of disease, and therefore cannot give an opinion upon it*
Another instance of a degree of candour it would be well for some of our
opponents to imitate.
At the next meeting of the jury Dr. Gray, a homoeopathic physician,
well known in New York, was called: we give the report of his examina¬
tion and cross-examination in full—
“ Dr. John F. Gray, of New York, a homoeopathist—I have seen con¬
gestion occur in intermittent fever. My treatment is with anti-periodics.
The chief used by me are quinine, arsenic, ipecac., and tartar emetic.
During the paroxysm I sometimes give opium, if congestions occur during
the cold stage, and aconite and belladonna during the fever. In the choice
of remedies I aiu governed by the homoeopathic law; as to doses I follow
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ray own experience. The main maxim of this law is similia similibus
curantur. This does not apply to doses—these are a pure matter of expe¬
rience. Perhaps in a majority of cases I use quinine. It is but right to
add that in this respect I differ from a great majority of my colleagues*
If the case is not complicated, I generally find the third or fourth pa¬
roxysm to terminate the disease. The cases in which I use quinine are
those in which the chill and fever are followed by a copious sweat.
“ Q. From the testimony given by Dr. Wells, what do you think of
this case ? *
“ A. I can’t answer in full. She appears to have had inflammation of
the brain and then intermittent fever. (Then follow irrelevant inquiries
into Dr. Gray’s mode of practice, &c.)
“ Q. In my opinion mumps belong to the natural family of erysipelas.
They consist of inflammation of the parotid, and are, properly, divided
into two stages—the incipient and developed. The former lasts from six
to forty-eight hours, sometimes even longer; is marked by loss of appetite
and great loss of strength, nausea, headache, bad taste and peculiar pain
in centre of forehead. Sometimes in this stage, there is a decided chilly
followed by fever—this is almost the rule in this country.
“ Not unfrequently this stage of mumps is attended with convulsions,
especially in children w ho have not reached the age of puberty. There is
often, too, a state verging closely on coma] and I have often been agree¬
ably surprised to find cases of this kind after several hours fairly develop
themselves into mumps. I wish to remark to the jury that mumps is a
disease almost entirely unknown in some parts of Europe, and hence in
European medical works it is scarcely mentioned; and therefore in its
treatment here every physician has to depend upon his own experience,
&c. The second stage is when inflammation of the parotid gland has
begun to appear.
u Q. In which stage do you consider the danger the greatest?
" A. In the incipient stage, in which metastasis is more liable to take
place.
“ Q. At what period may convulsions be expected to occur ?
u A. They occur generally before the inflammation of the parotid gland
occurs.
€t QT. How do you treat the incipient stage ?
u A. Belladonna and mercury, &c.
“ Q. {Juror .')—Suppose you had a case of inflammation of the brain
immediately followed by intermittent fever, would you then make use of
quinine ?
“ A. As an abstract case—if the inflammation of the brain were all
gone—I should then use quinine, if indicated by the form of the fever.
“ Q. (Juror .)—Would there be any hazard attending such practice ?
“ A. Yes, if there had been such a previous inflammation as to leave
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lymph deposits on the membranes of the brain ; but only the physician in
attendance would be able, I think, to decide this question.
“ Q. (Coroner.) —If no symptom of brain disturbance had existed for
five days, what should you do ?
“ A. I should treat it as an uncomplicated case.
“ Q. (Juror.) —Are convulsions usual or necessary results of con¬
gestion ?
“ A. I cannot say ; I see no connection between them.
ts Q. (Juror.) —How are convulsions produced?
“ A. They may be produced by fear, fright, shocks, poisons, &c. They
often occur to young children in intermittent fever, very much oftener
than to adults.
u Q. (Juror.) —When do they generally occur in intermittent fever?
iC A. Whenever they occur it is always in'h chill. I never knew them
to occur after the chill had lasted over one hour; never after it had lasted
over fifteen minutes. The same may be said of mumps; they always occur
in the incipient stage.
“ I consider my patients free of danger when they have been sick an
hour or two hours.
“ I do not remember ever hearing of a case of mumps arising during
intermittent fever. I do not say it may not be.
“ Q. You are aquainted with this case—in your opinion, would con¬
vulsions be likely to occur in it.
“ A. I should not think them likely to occur with simple stiff neck or
tenderness of one side of the neck. (The coroner read to Dr. Gray only
the specific symptoms described by Dr. Wells, not the signs of general
constitutional disturbance.) But on the other hand, the presence of con¬
vulsions in such a case would lead me to suspect that the child was labour¬
ing under some very unusual, new and dangerous irritation, not connected
with the intermittent fever. The testimony read, showing that mumps
existed in the house, would lead me to think that the irritation in this case
might have arisen from mumps, inasmuch as the convulsions occurred so
long after the chill had passed.
(t Q. (Coroner.') —Suppose no mumps had been in the house, with such
symptoms as have been described, would you be led to suspect it was
mumps ?
u A. I should suspect it was one of three things, viz.: Some eruptive
fever, the presence of poison, or mumps.
“ Q. Why should you suppose so ?
u A. Because of the case being so entirely out of the usual course of
intermittent fever.
€t Q* When does inflammation of the brain occur in a case of mumps ?
“A. I think in a majority of cases it occurs before the inflammation of
the parotid gland commences.
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c< Q. Have you heard of or seen a case of inflammation of the brain
occurring in a case of mumps ?
“‘A. I have heard of cases of metastasis to the brain, but never saw
one.
“ Q. ( Juror .)—Have you any experience with the 30th centesimal
preparations ?
“ A. I ceased to use them 22 years ago, having previously used them.
I thought I cured intermittent fever with them then. I am now satisfied
with my present mode of practice. At that time I never lost t\, case
of intermittent fever. Have since lost two cases under desperate cir¬
cumstances.
“ Q. {Juror.) —The practice adopted in this case was that which would
have been adopted by almost every homoeopathic member of the profession
throughout the world. I may, perhaps, say it was not in accordance with
what I, myself, would have done. I generally use stronger doses, but I
should have adopted the same law. The majority of homoeopathists would
go with Dr. Wells.
“ Q. In what stage does the translation of mumps occur ?
“ A. In the incipient stage. Inflammation of the brain is very apt to
occur in a case of mumps.
“ Q. When might metastasis be expected to occur?
“ A. Metastasis could not take place until after the second stage had
begun, although mumps would, of course, attack the brain, primarily, in
/the incipient stage. There might have been inflammation of the sexual
glands, but this never takes place before the age of puberty.
“ Q. {Juror.) —I have never had a case of intermittent fever last many
weeks. Perspiration does not always occur in the paroxysms. In many
cases the fever is not followed by sweat. These would not be quinine cases.
“ Q. (Juror.)—From what I have heard and know of this case, I think
that mumps were present.”
At this stage of the enquiry the bias of the coroner was exhibited in a
very marked manner. The jury, at a previous session, had requested that
Drs. Joslin, Bayard, and Bowers should be summoned for examination as
to the power of homoeopathic'medicines; on their names being called, they
were found absent; and the coroner having been asked if he had sum¬
moned them, and replied in the affirmative, evidence to the contrary was
immediately produced—no subpoena having been served on either of these
gentlemen up to the hour of the meeting! On this the New York
Evening Post remarks—
“ Thus it appears the coroner had no intention of allowing the jury to
hear testimony on the side of homoeopathy, although he had made the
question at issue one between the two systems.”
Dr. Bowers, however, happening to be present, was sworn, and ex¬
pressed himself as follows:—
•< j think the case began as meningitis, which was followed by a mala-
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nous remittent. This became intermittent, and was terminated by a fatal
convulsion induced by the specific irritation of mumps. I suppose the
case was complicated throughout. My impresssion is the brain was never
restored to absolute soundness throughout the whole case.
“ Q. How far should you agree with the treatment pursued in this
case?
“ A. I should, in a similar case, be guided'by the same principles.
“ Q. In the cases of intermittent you have seen, where has the conges¬
tion, when present, been ?
“ A. I hate seen it in brain and lungs, indicated in the former by coma
and in the latter by labored respiration. (Then followed a multitude of
abstract questions about homoeopathic treatment, wholljr irrelevant and
very impertinent).”
The subsequent examination of Dr. Bowers related to the pathology of
intermittent fever,—congestion,—and convulsions.
Dr. Watson, (allopath), surgeon to the New York Hospital was next
examined. His opinion coincided with that of the other medical men
called, as to the primary nature of the disease; in reference to the imme¬
diate cause of death, he thought it quite possible that a metastasis of
mumps to the brain had occurred. The treatment he adopted in cases
of ague was the administration of quinine in large doses. He was generally
successful; but, unlike the other allopaths who had been examined, he ac¬
knowledged that cases occasionally resisted treatment for many months.
On the fifth day of the inquest, the proceedings commenced by Dr.
Dunham entering into some explanations as to his connection with the
management of the case, gave his opinion as to its nature, and the path¬
ology and treatment of intermittent fever. Some anxiety appears to have
been manifested by the parents to obtain further professional advice for
their child, and in answer to a question by a juror on this point Dr.
Dunham says—
“ I don’t rempmber Mr. Lottimer ever mentioning to me his desire to
have additional medical attendance. Mr. Edey met me and said he was
going up for Dr. Gray; I think I asked, is that Mr. Lottimer’s wish ? I
remember distinctly saying that if Mr. Lottimer wished to have the opinion
of Dr. Gray, or even of any allopathic physician, he ought to have it, by
which I meant I had no objection ; but that if his object was to intimate
to us that we might feel free to call for additional advice, if we felt we
needed it, then I did not think it at this time necessary, and I did not think
if we did select, we should select Dr. Gray.”
From a subsequent part of the examination this refusal to meet Dr. Gray
(for, as we shall presently see, Dr. Dunham’s observation amounted to this)
appears to have arisen from his generally using low dilutions, Dr. D. and
Dr. Wells, on the other hand, being in the habit of prescribing the higher
attenuations. Declining to meet a brother-practitioner on such trivial
grounds, we cannot but consider reprehensible, and more particularly
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when the physician proposed to be consulted is a man of the age, expe¬
rience, and position of Dr. Gray.
The father of the child was then examined, and stated the general pro¬
gress of the illness from its commencement to its termination. He seems
to have desired Dr. Gray to be consulted very much, and in reference to
this wish, as he says frequently expressed, he remarks,—
“ Had I not been prevented from the fact that Dr. Gray was somewhat
different in practice, and my respect to the medical profession, I should
have had him called in that night.”
The nurse was then examined, but without adducing any evidence of
importance.
Dr. Joslin was now called, and testified to the success of homoeopathic
treatment, and of the efficiency of the high dilutions in intermittent fever.
He also explained to the jury wbat was understood by the term Homoeo¬
pathy, and gave a slight sketch of the history of the system. Dr. Joslin’s
examination being concluded,—
“ Dr. Wells asked permission, since there seemed difficulty in getting
testimony on certain points in this case, to introduce as evidence state¬
ments made and sworn to before a commissioner by Drs. C. Hering,
C. Neidhard and A. Lippe, homoeopathic physicians, of great eminence
and experience in Philadelphia.
“ On request of the jury, Dr. Wells stated that the points testified to by
these gentlemen were the following:—
“ 1. Congestions and convulsions caused by intermittent fever occur
during the chill, and never during the interval.
“ 2. From the history of the progress of this case they would not have
been likely to occur in it; but that the favorable issue of this case seemed
from the history to be certain.
“ 3. Mumps and intermittent fever have been known by these gentle¬
men to co-exist actively.
“ 4. Mumps and intermittent fever have been known to attack the
brain without first producing swelling of the parotid gland; and in such
cases congestion and fatal convulsions have followed.
“ 5. The 30th centesimal preparations have been used successfully by
these gentlemen in treating intermittent and other diseases, during an ex¬
perience respectively of twenty-six, twenty, and sixteen years of large
practice.
“ The coroner refused to admit these affidavits as evidence.”
On the following day the mother of the deceased was examined*. She
appears to have been very anxious about her child for some time before its
death. But beyond this, and her statement that Drs. Wells and Dunham
told her when ill about a week before her child’s death that she was
suffering from mumps, no further evidence as to the nature of the case,
cause of death, or character of the treatment, was advanced.
Dr. Rosman was afterwards called, and the following is his evidence: —
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44 Am a homoeopathic physician at Brooklyn ; the homoeopathic law is
similia similibus curantur , that is the whole of it; the sizes of the doses
of medicine have nothing to do with it; I profess to practise according to
to that law, and use my medicine in doses which, I think, will cure my
patients.
“ I treat intermittent fever with ipecac ., belladonna , arsenic , nux
vomicaj Peruvian bark and quinine ; use the mother tinctures, some five
or six drops in half a tumbler of water ; the doses are a spoonful; might
use a table or teaspoonful, or double the quantity ; of nux, sometimes the
first and sometimes a centesimal dilution; I vary the doses of quinine;
sometimes give half a grain ; use it when necessary.
44 To a Juror .—I have heard a portion of this case; independent of the
reputation of Dr. Wells, I am satisfied of his treatment; I should, perhaps,
have used stronger doses than Dr. Wells ; it is a matter of opinion in our
profession which is the proper mode of administering tinctures; I often
treat intermittent fever; the disease varies, but I have arrested the
paroxysms in three days, and sometimes it required as many weeks.
14 1 do not generally use quinine in intermittent fever; the action of
quinine is dangerous in inflammation of the brain; think I have heard
sufficient of the case to form an opinion that the child had the mumps, and
that they were translated to the brain ; think so from her having soreness
at the end of her jaw and convulsions.
44 The testimony which I have seen has led me to the opinion that the
child had mumps, and that the translation to the brain was the cause of
the convulsions.
44 If I had not heard that the mother had the mumps, the convulsions
would not have led me to believe that the child had the mumps.
44 I have never had in my practice a case of translation of mumps to
the brain; think I have not known of any such case except of the one
spoken of.”
The only other witness called was Dr. Chelton, a scientific chemist, who
stated that he had examined the stomach of the deceased, but without
finding poison of any kind.
The evidence was here concluded, but the inquest was again adjourned
to allow the coroner and the foreman of the jury to compare their notes of
the proceedings, in order that errors, should there be any, should be
corrected.
When the jury again met, the coroner called on Dr. Dudley to read a
report of the post mortem examination made by him on the body of another
child of the same parents, who had died about a month previously in con¬
vulsions. But as it has no bearing on the present case, we need not
further allude to it.
The coroner having read an extract from the law relating to inquests,
proceeded to deliver his charge, commencing as follows:—
“ Gentlemen of the Jury: This case comes under the head of sudden
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death, insomuch as the patient, according to the statement of the attending
physician, was in no danger, slowly progressing to recovery, when she is
suddenly taken with unexpected convulsions and dies in the course of a
few hours.
“ This case, gentlemen, is one of a peculiarly delicate nature, involving,
as it does, inquiry on your part into the mode of practice and conduct of
the medical attendant. It becomes you, therefore, to divest your minds of
all prejudice and to be governed in your verdict solely by the testimony
before you. You are to decide, so far as you can from the evidence, in ,
conjunction with the post mortem appearances, of what disease Agnes
E. Lottimer died, and all the circumstances attending such death.”
He then points out what he conceives to be the evidence of the nature
of the disease. The existence of intermittent fever is admitted; on the
probability of mumps having been present either in the mother or her
deceased child, he endeavours to throw as much doubt as possible;—and
in so doing, ignores entirely the opinion of Drs. Wells, Dunham, Hull and
Gray—treats it as though it had never been expressed! In reference to
the treatment pursued the coroner remarks,—
“ And now, gentlemen, I come to the last and to me by far the most
delicate part to discuss—to you the most difficult to decide upon—I allude
to the conduct and treatment of this case.
u Patients sometimes die from too active treatment; at others, from
misapplied remedies, arising from a mistaken view of the case; again,
from inefficient treatment, whereby the disease is allowed to kill. In
either case a physician is responsible.”
Having mentioned the several salient points in the course of the case,
and remarked, that both the homoeopathic and allopathic practitioners
examined bad stated, that intermittent fever generally yielded very easily
to remedies, he submits to the jury the following question :—
“ How far was he (the attendant physician) justified in pursuing his
own course, relying upon his own judgment, and discouraging the em¬
ployment of additional counsel, who might have discovered some cause for
the slowness of the recovery, and suggested some improvement in the treat¬
ment which might have escaped the notice of the medical attendant, and
tbus have secured a different result? This view of the case I feel in duty
bound to present for your notice. Of all professional men, there are none
in whom more blind and implicit confidence is placed than in physicians.
Patients are completely at their mercy. Their accountability cannot be
too strict. No class of men should be more distrustful of a their own judg¬
ment if there is the least shadow of doubt on their minds, or bear with
more humility the responsibility imposed upon them by the Almighty
when they selected the profession of medicine as their path of usefulness
through life. ‘ All that a man hath will he give for his life.* When we
reflect that physicians hold the fearful balance between life and death,
and by their judgment is the scale made to preponderate, we cannot but
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Homoeopathic Intelligence.
acknowledge that the responsibility is too grave, the consequences to those
entrusted to their care too important, to be lightly assumed or rashly
exercised.”
After this comes, so jesuitically insinuated, what he wishes to make
the point for the consideration of the jury; it amounts to this:—“how
far is any man justified in treating a patient bomoeopathically ?” Here,
however, are the coroner’s own words—
“ One other suggestion, and I have done. How far was the physician
justified in totally neglecting an established mode of practice, in this disease
of intermittent fever, by bark and remedies of a like nature—which has
been pursued by physicians for some two hundred and fifty years—and
by quinine, a preparation of bark, for some fifty years, with sufficient
success to continue its use unto the present day in all cases, and this, too,
before the varieties of the disease that are made by the homoeopathists; and
pursuing another course of later date, when he saw that these remedies did
not prevent the continuance of the disease for so great a lapse of time
beyond the usual period for arresting it P
“ As to the comparative efficiency of high and low dilutions, if you con¬
sider it necessary to make that a part of your enquiry, you have the testi¬
mony of physicians using both to guide you.
“ With these remarks, gentlemen, I leave the case in your hands.”
After two hours’ consideration, the following verdict was recorded by
the jury
The jury, on view of the body of Agnes E. Lottimer, and after hear¬
ing the testimony in the case, find and certify that she died on the 7th day
of October, 1854, at the house of her father in Union-street, in the city of
Brooklyn, from hemorrhage of the lungs, the result either of nnusnal
congestion of that organ, or of convulsions arising from a generally dis¬
eased condition of her system consequent upon an unusually protracted
intermittent fever.
“ That the treatment of her disease by her physicians was homoeopathic,
and the remedies used were what are commonly known as high dilutions;
but whether those remedies were efficient or not, the jury are unable to
determine.
“ November 4, 1854.”
Shortly after the above remarkable inquest, as we learn from an Ame¬
rican correspondent, the election for coroner of Brooklyn came off, and
Dr. Ball, who had held the office for six successive terms, polled only six
votes, among a population of 130,000 souls, so great was the feeling ex¬
cited against him by his conduct on this occasion. The successful candi¬
date is not a medical man.
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MISCELLANEOUS.
Flint Soup.
Most of our readers are, no doubt, familiar with the celebrated receipt
for flint soup, but for those who are not, we may subjoin it. Take a large
flint stone, put it into a pot of water, add a few pounds of beef, a sufficient
number of vegetables, salt and pepper d, discretion , and boil the whole to¬
gether the usual number of hours. In the following new cure for cholera
we conceive that the sugar plays precisely the same part in the prescrip¬
tion as the flint does in the soup; for, as the ingredients of the latter have
been found very nutritious without the addition of the stone, so the cam¬
phor of the former has often proved very efficacious without the added
sugar, and we have about the same amount of evidence to prove that a
hungry man could be nourished by flints, as we have to show that a
cholera patient could be cured by sugar.
Dr. Mackintosh, [of the St. Olave’s Infirmary, Southwark, observes on
this subject:—“ I am not aware that sugar lias ever been tried as a remedy
for cholera; but that its administration in several cases under my care hag
been attended with such favourable results as to merit the attention of the
profession, the mortality of only four in thirteen cases of deep collapse, in
which it was tried, sufficiently shows. I have been induced to try the
effects of sugar for the following reasons : that it is a powerful antiseptic,
both of animal and vegetable substances, preserving them unchanged for
any length of time; that its solubility in water, and the facility with
which it acts by endosmosis, point it out as a substance eminently adapted
to pass into the circulation, and in this manner, it may be, exercise a con¬
servative influence on the blood until the choleric poison is extracted from
the system by the excretions, &c. It may be objected that sugar cannot
enter the circulation as such, that it is changed by the digestive process in
the stomach and alimentary canal; but however true this may be in a
state of health, it cannot hold good in cholera, in which the vital processes
have received a check; that it contains the elements of water, in large
proportion, and is therefore a likely substance to restore, to a certain ex¬
tent, that portion of the blood which has been lost by the wmtery evacua¬
tions ; and lastly, that it is a very nutritious substance wdten given along
with other nutritious substances. It is very probable also that sugar is a
powerful diuretic [not the slightest doubt of it, when given along with gin
and water], if grape sugar may be considered as having any part in pro¬
ducing the large secretion of urine in diabetes [sic/] Its antiseptic powers
are generally known; that it contains a large proportion of the elements
of water, that it acts with facility by endo-exosraosis, and that it is very
nutritious when given with other nutritious substances, are also undoubted
facts. But, whatever may be the true modus operandi , the result of its
administration in thirteen cases of collapse affords a hope that it may
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Miscellaneous.
prove, on more extensive trial, to exercise a beneficent influence in arrest¬
ing the tendency of that disease to a fatal termination. I shall not tres¬
pass on your valuable space by detailing the cases which were subjected
to this particular mode of treatment, suffice it to say, that they were cases
which presented the usual features observed in cases of deep collapse. In
all the thirteen cases the pulse was scarcely perceptible; the extremities
cold, blue, and shrivelled, the features sunken, and the breath cold, un¬
quenchable thirst, vomiting, husky voice, and restlessness, rice-water
purging and suppression of urine. The phenomena observed during the
administration of the sugar were as follows: a few hours after the first
dose, a slight change became perceptible in the pulse; this change con¬
sisted in a short interval of reaction, which again subsided into the original
state in which it was at the commencement; and this oscillation of the
pulse betwixt extreme depression and slight elevation continued up to the
full period of reaction, which generally took place in from twenty-four to
forty-eight hours. The purging generally ceased within one or two hours
at furthest after the first dose. The vomiting also ceased after a short
time, but this, I apprehend, was due more to the large draughts of water
being prohibited, which the patient constantly craved after. Urine was
made in large quantities several hours after reaction. Some of the patients,
after several hours, vomited large quantities of dark green, bilious matter,
of the consistence of gruel. Although the'mixture was taken very well at
first, yet after its administration for some time, it became so loathsome to
the taste of all, that it required much persuasion to cause it to be taken.
The coldness and lividity of the extremities persisted until the period of
full reaction, and the shrunken features generally remained for a week or
ten days after. In all, mild typhoid fever supervened, with delirium only
in two. In several cases of rice-water purging, before the supervention
of collapse, in which sugar was administered, the purging ceased in a very
short time, and the patients, with the assistance of wine and beef-tea
afterwards, invariably recovered very rapidly. I should mention, that of
the four fatal cases, one was the subject of organic disease of the heart,
for which he had been, antecedent to the attack of cholera, repeatedly
under my care for dropsy and other concomitant affections. Another had
been in the habit of frequently getting drunk, and had returned home on
the night previous to the attack in a state of deep inebriation. The sugar
was administered in the form of mixture. Two ounces of refined sugar
dissolved in six ounces of camphor mixture, with a few drops of rectified
spirit [the beef and vegetables of Dr. Mackintosh’s flint soup]. One
table spoonful was given every ten minutes. Wine was also given in frequent
quantities, and beef-tea. It must be observed, that visible improvement
up to the period of reaction was not very encouraging, and such, I appre¬
hend, must always be the case in deep collapse from remedies intended to
operate through the alimentary canal. I should have mentioned that the
first case treated with sugar occurred November 1, 1853, and the last on
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the 14th December, a period corresponding with the subsidence of the
epidemic in this locality. It is very possible, from what is known of the
amenability of cholera to treatment during its decline, that other modes of
treatment might have proved equally successful." ( Lancet , April 8,
1854.)
Next to the assumption that the sugar was the sole cause of cure in Dr.
Mackintosh's cases, the best part of the joke is the physiological Explana¬
tion of its remedial process. The original author of the receipt for flint
soup does not, as far as we remember, attempt to explain physiologically
the nutritious action of the flint. Dr. Mackintosh, we are convinced,
could supply this omission. He would remind his readers of the nutritious
properties of silica “ when given along with other nutritious substances/'
as is familiar to us all when calf's-foot jelly is given to a patient in a glass*
He would call attention to the fact that the siliceous mineral contains two
elements, oxygen and silicon, that enter into the composition of some of
our tissues; and, in short, he would find fifty other reasons for giving
flints as an article of diet, all quite as ingenious and as plausible as those
he has stated in explanation of the remedial power of sugar in cholera*
The beef and vegetables would have played as small a part in his explana¬
tion of the nutritious powers of the soup as the camphor does in that of the
curative powers of his wonderful mixture, though assuredly the nutritious
properties of the other ingredients of the soup are scarcely more familiar
to the generality of mankind, than are the remedial powers of camphor in
cholera to homceopatliists. But seriously, the cool assumptions in the
above narrative, with respect to the medicinal virtues of that most inno¬
cuous substance, sugar, while the really powerful agent in the mixture is
altogether lost sight of, is a sad burlesque on the practice of allopathic
physicians, who give in one prescription a vast number of heterogeneous
substances, and then arbitrarily ascribe the result to one particular in¬
gredient of the mess. It is 4 worth while to quote here Hahnemann's bitter
ridicule of such unwarrantable assumptions: —
u Is it not foolish," he exclaims, “ to estimate the effect of one force,
while other forces of another kind were in action, which often contributed
mainly, though in common with the rest, to produce the result? It
would not be more absurd if some one were to try to persuade us that he
had discovered a good article of nutriment in kitchen salt; that he had
ordered it to a half-starved man, and that he had no sooner eat en of it
than he was invigorated, satiated, and strengthened, as if by miracle; that
the ounce of common salt was the basis and chief ingredient of the receipt
prescribed by him, which he had caused to be dissolved, lege artis , in
quantum satis of boiling water, as the excipient and vehicle ; then he had
added, as a corrective, a good lump of butter, and, as an adjuvant, a pound
of finely-cut rye-bread. This mixture, after being properly stirred, he
caused to be taken at once by the famished patient, and by it his hunger
was completely appeased. All the latter ingredients were merely accessaries
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Miscellaneous .
in tbe prescription, the chief ingredient was the ounce of salt. This was pre¬
scribed by him as the basis of the whole receipt; and see, in his hands, it had,
when prepared accurately according to these directions, always exhibited
the most beneficial results. If, in the kitchen Materia Medica, tbe virtues
of saturans , analepticum , restaurans , reficiens , nutrient should, from these
circumstances, be ascribed to the article, sal culinare , it would not be
more childish and absurd than the conduct of the physician who should
arbitrarily ordain one substance to be the basis of the diuretic, than add
two, three, or four other powerful medicinal substances (with the sage
object, forsooth, of serving as corrigens , dirigenSy adjuvant, excipient ),
and order the patient to walk up and down the room, while taking the
mixture, drinking in the meantime largely of warm sack-whey, made of
Rhenish wine well sweetened with sugar, and then publish triumphantly
the extraordinary success of the basis he had prescribed: i the patient
has passed more urine than usual.’ In his eyes the added substances and
the regimen are mere unimportant accessaries, and innocent of the result,
in order that he may be able to ascribe the sole honour of the effects
produced to the substance which he has constituted the chief ingredient
in the recipe, in which (he knows not why) he takes the deepest interest,
and whose fame he wishes to extend. This is the natural course of
things, when, by such arbitrary and capricious praise of a medicine which
some one has taken a fancy to, and to which he was determined to attri¬
bute some definite curative property, the undeserved and surreptitious
attributes of diuretic, emmenagogue, resolvent, sudorific, expectorant,
antispasmodic, are inscribed in the facile Materia Medica, where they
afterwards figure as truths, deluding those that trust to it.” ( Lesser
Writings, p. 750.)
Degenerated Homoeopathy .
In an account of the cholera that raged in Russia during 1852 and
1853, by Dr. Everard, (quoted in the Jour . de la Soc. Gallicane), we
have a description of a new method of treatment pursued by Dr. Mandt,
physician to the Czar, which he terms the “ atomistic method” on
account of the smallness of the doses he gives. The whole system of this
imperial doctor is such a barefaced theft from the homoeopathic method,
that we are overwhelmed at once with amazement and indignation*
Amazement, that a man in Dr. Mandt’s position could have the unblush¬
ing effrontery to put forward this miserable plagiarism as something
original and good; indignation, that the pure practice of homoeopathy
should be so adulterated and mutilated. However, we shall allow our
readers to judge for themselves the character of the precious discovery.
The great principle of the treatment (if such an unprincipled robbery can
have any principle) is, that the remedies administered should be triturated
for two hours at least, and given in doses of only a fiftieth part of a grain.
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Dr. Mandt’s remedies for cholera are veratrum album, phosphoric acid,
camphor, musk, arsenic, and nux vomica. These remedies are, it will be
seeD, taken from the homoeopathic materia medica; but Dr. Mandt
improves (as he supposes) on the homoeopathic treatment, in the indica¬
tions for these medicines, and in generally mixing a couple of them in
one prescription. Whatever be the form or stage of the cholera, if the
pulse is still perceptible, and the coldness of the skin not universal, the
invariable treatment is the internal administration of a powder containing
y M th of a grain of nux vomica, y^th of a grain of phosphoric add, and
5 grains of sugar of milk. This dose is repeated every five, fifteen, or
thirty minutes, according to the violence of the vomiting and purging.
In addition to this, the patient is wrapped in a sheet previously dipped in
cold salt water. If, however, after some hours, no improvement is
observed, the above powder is alternated with another, having y^th of a
grain of veratrum album, in place of the Phos-ac. If, notwithstanding,
the heat is not re-established, the cold wet sheet is again applied, and
also a poultice composed of linseed and the seeds of the carduus marianus*
If however, notwithstanding these energetic means, the disease progresses,
the oppression increases, the pulse disappears, and the skin becomes quite
cold and blue, the patient is rubbed with ice and salt, then again en¬
veloped in the wet sheet, put to bed, and covered with blankets. Then
alternately with the first powder there is given another composed of
mush, y M th of a grain, nux vom., y M th of a grain, sach. Iact. 5 grains.
A powder is given every five, ten, fifteen, or twenty-five minutes. If
after the lapse of some hours, warmth is not restored, the frictions are
repeated.
If the cholera is dry, extremely rapid, apoplectic, with or without
paralysis, the same external treatment is had recourse to, and there is
administered alternately a powder containing Musk and Nux vomica as
above, and another containing '/^th of a grain of camphor. When the
cold stage is past, and the reaction commenced, nux vomica always is
given, alternated occasionally with the 50th of a grain of aconite or
bryonia. In addition to these remedies, bellad. is given for certain
cerebral symptoms, rhus tox. for great feebleness.
No further details concerning Dr. Mandt’s treatment are required to
shew that he has merely copied homoeopathy, and spoiled it in the copying.
It seems that the Czar put at Dr. Mandt’s disposal two large hospitals, in
order to give his system a trial, and it is stated that the best results were
obtained. One of these hospitals only was devoted to the reception of
cholera patients, the other was a general hospital, and it seems that
Dr. Mandt practised his pseudo-homoeopathic system in all diseases, gene¬
rally stealing his indications for the use of his y^th grain doses from the
works of homoeopathists, but very often having recourse to the unhomoeo-
pathic method of giving two medicines in a prescription.
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Miscellaneous .
Dr. Borminghausen 9 $ last.
Dr. Bonninghausen’s name is already familiar to our readers in connec¬
tion with several extravagant propositions bearing on homoeopathic practice.
It is well known that, though not a doctor by virtue of a university degree,
he has obtained a license to practise physic de par le roi ; and that he is
generally looked up to by the partisans of the Jenichen preparations as
the great champion of high-potencies. He has recently favoured the
readers of the Allg. Horn. Ztg. with a series of cases of typhus fever and
contusions which he treated from the reports of friends with perfect
success by means of globules of the 200th dilution. The last novelty he
has offered us, is a series of questions and answers relating to vaccination
drawn up by him in the French language, so as to gain thereby the uni¬
versal ear, and read at the meeting of the Rhenish and Westphalian
homoaopathists in July last. For these questions he seems actually to
have obtained the sanction of the meeting, if we may judge from the way
in which the document is worded. It runs as follows:—
“ Advice of the Rhenish] and Westphalian Homoeopathic Society con¬
cerning questions relating to vaccination.
u 1st Question. Is vaccination a boon or an evil to humanity ?
u Answer. We look upon vaccination as it is practised among us, em¬
ploying the vaccine virus of children, and not that of cows, as an evil to
humanity. We are persuaded, that this virus can no longer be pure, nor,
consequently, the true homoeopathic remedy for small-pox; that, there¬
fore, it has no longer the force and the power to act as a sure preventive
against this disease, and that it only serves to propagate many kinds of
chronic diseases, which have increased in a frightful manner during the
last lustra.
“ 2nd Question . Do the governments act rightly in enforcing vacci¬
nation ?
“ Answer. Certainly not! — unless those governments shall be in a posi¬
tion to provide all vaccinators with a quantity of virus taken direct from
the cow sufficient for all who present themselves for vaccination.
“ 3rd Question. Has homoeopathy the means of rendering it efficacious
and of restoring its virtues P
“ Answer. Not yet—at least we have not a sufficient number of incon¬
testable proofs that the vaccine virus prepared and administered according
to the rules and maxims of homoeopathy can be employed in a perfectly
sure manner against the small pox. It is, however, probable that it may,
because the homoeopathic remedies have proved, in many other diseases,
both acute and chronic, their power to extinguish completely the whole
disposition to receive various kinds of infections, and to act as infallible
preventives.
“ 4th Question. Can we find a real substitute for vaccination, supposing
it should be prohibited ?
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“ Answer . Yes!—One of our own colleagues [Dr. Bonninghausen, to
wit, though he is too modest to say so] has had the happiness to discover
in the thuja occidentalis the true specific for small-pox, and since this
happy discovery, which was immediately published in the homoeopathic
journals [the happy discoverer scorning to take out a patent for it], several
physicians have had the opportunity to put it to the proof and to confirm
its truth. A remedy of sufficient power to cure this disease without incon¬
venience and without the least danger in less than eight days, without
leaving the least disfigurement or mark upon the skin, and without intro¬
ducing into the human body the seeds of another disease, often worse than
the small-pox itself, seems to us to be preferable to any kind of vaccination,
even to that where the virus has been taken immediately from the cow.
“ By the authority and in the name of the Rhenish and
Westphalian Homoeopathic Society,
“ C. de Bonninghausen.
“ Cologne, 27th July, 1854.”
Had this precious document appeared on the sole responsibility of Dr.
Bonninghausen, we should have passed it over without notice, as it had
not then appeared to us inconsistent with that learned gentleman's previous
exploits in the department of practical medicine. But coming before us as it
does with the sanction and by the authority of a Homoeopathic Society, it
has a claim upon our attention. We find from the reports of the proceedings
of the meeting whence this document issued that it consisted of six medical
men besides the Bonninghausens, senior and junior, consequently, double
the number of the “ people of England ” assembled in Tooley-street on a
memorable occasion. The only names among these six known to us
through homoeopathic literature are those of Dr. Gauwerky, who is
rather transcendental on the subject of high potencies, Dr. Stens, of Bonn,
who is an elegant speaker and facile writer, but also exclusive on the
subject of the high potencies, and Dr. Kallenbach, late of Frankfort,
whom we should have scarcely expected to indorse such an absurdity as
the above. Let us examine for a moment the assertions contained in this
emanation from the collective wisdom of the Rhenish and Westphalian
Homoeopathic Society.
In the first place it is asserted the number of chronic diseases has
frightfully increased of late years. Now we have no hesitation in saying
that this statement is frightfully at variance with the fact; for it is well
known to the actuaries of our life-assurance companies that human longe¬
vity has increased considerably during the last thirty years, which could
not have occurred had the number of chronic diseases increased, but is a
palpable proof of the decrease of diseases generally, seeing that the average
duration of life is increased in the inverse ratio of the unhealthiness of the
community. It has frequently been asserted that disease has been propa¬
gated by vaccination, but no satisfactory proof of the fact has been offered,
nor does Dr. Bonninghausen furnish anything of the kind. Doubtless it
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Miscellaneous.
frequently happens that children become affected with inveterate erup¬
tions, glandular swellings, and other chronic diseases after vaccination,
but the post hoc in these cases is often not the propter hoc ; and even could
it be proved that the chronic malady was excited by the vaccine disease,
we could not wonder at the circumstance, for it is a matter of common
observation that the germs of latent chronic disease are frequently roused
to action by any febrile exanthematous affection, such as measles and
scarlatina, so that we can easily understand how a similar exanthematous
malady, as vaccinia is, might have the same effect on an infant with heredi¬
tary predisposition to scrofula or cutaneous disease. If moderate care be
taken to procure vaccine virus from healthy children, we believe there is
no danger whatever in communicating the cow-pox to any infant. At all
events, the good wrought by the protection vaccination affords against
small-pox, infinitely outweighs the problematical evil dreaded by Dr.
Bonninghausen and his Rhenish-Westphalian confederates.
It is undoubtedly true that vaccination has of late years been found to
be less of a permanent preservative against small-pox than it was when
first introduced, that cases of small-pox occurring after vaccination are
observed to be of more frequent occurrence than formerly, and it is alleged
that vaccination does not take so readily as it did some years back ; but
it may well be that this partial failure is owing to a greater feebleness in
the virus, occasioned by its repeated transmission from body to body, and
the proper remedy for this seems to be to procure the virus anew from the
cow, as is being done by several medical men in France and Germany,
and by numbers in this country, among whom we may particularize
Mr. Badcock of Brighton, who has for many years devoted himself to
the labour of obtaining fresh vaccine from the cow, by inoculating that
animal with the matter of human small pox, as advised by Mr. Ceely.
In our last No. we described a new method of procuring vaccine virus by
the commingling of variolous virus and cow’s milk, which had been found
to answer by some French physicians. Such efforts to improve the
strength of the virus for inoculation are extremely praiseworthy; but to
abandon vaccination altogether, for the reasons, or rather no-reasons
given in this document, would be the height of folly, unless some efficient
substitute were offered in its stead. But Dr. Bonninghausen will assert
that he does offer a substitute—or at least he offers a remedy which shall
infallibly cure the small-pox in less than eight days, without leaving a
mark on the skin. This remedy is thuja occidentalis. We remember
perfectly the announcement some years ago, by Dr. Bonninghausen, of
the mode in which he was led to select thuja as a remedy in small-pox.
For a person so particular about insisting on the complete harmony of the
medicine with the complex of the symptoms of a disease as Dr. Bonning-
hausen is, it struck us at the time, that his selection of thuja for small¬
pox was made on very insufficient grounds. He was guided to it by the
symptom marked 202 in those observed by Hahnemann : “ Pustules on
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the knee, like true variola in appearance; they suppurate, do not itch,
and disappear entirely in eighteen hours.” Their disappearance in
eighteen hours would seem conclusive evidence against the resemblance
of these pustules, in pathological character, to the pustules of variola,
notwithstanding their superficial likeness; but on this slender foundation
did Dr. Bbnninghausen build up his grand scheme for the suppression
of vaccination, and all its imaginary concomitant evils. We remember
also the cases of small-pox cited by Dr, Bbnninghausen as having been
cared by him with thuja in the 200th dilution. It appeared to us at the
time, that those cases owed their mildness, not to the curative power of
the very un-homceopathic thuja given, but rather to the protective influ¬
ence of that very vaccination in their youth which Dr. Bbnninghausen
would seek to suppress. It augurs a mighty strong faith in the superla¬
tive potency of his boasted discovery, to propose the abrogation of the
well tested and universally acknowledged protection afforded by vaccina ¬
tion, in the belief that a disease so terrific in its unmodified invasion would
be immediately reduced to the mildness of an ephemeral febricula, by the
administration of a globule of the 200th dilution of thuja. We have
little fear that Dr. Bbnninghausen will induce many of his colleagues to
drop the substantial advantages of vaccination, in order to grasp at the
feeble shadow of a hope, that thuja 200 will cure infallibly every case
of natural small-pox.
REPLY TO A CORRESPONDENT.
Percentage on Prescriptions.
We have received a long letter from the practitioner to whom allusion
was made in the Proceedings of the British Homoeopathic Society (re¬
ported in our last volume, p. 523), in reference to his arrangement with a
chemist to receive a percentage on the prescriptions he sent to be made up
at that chemist’s shop. The practitioner alluded to considers himself
aggrieved by the editorial remarks appended to that report, wherein w r e
joined with the Society in reprobating a trading connexion between a
medical practitioner and a chemist, and quoted a rule of the College of
Physicians of London, which formally condemned that practice. We at
the same time stated that we had been informed that the chemist, on dis¬
covering that such an arrangement was discountenanced by the most
respectable practitioners, endeavoured to put an end to it. Our corre¬
spondent admits that he had for years such a trading connexion with the
chemist in question, but denies that the latter ever made any proposition
for its termination until after a quarrel between the two. Moreover, he
endeavours to justify the practice by asserting that it is by no means an
unusual one in the profession; and he submits documentary evidence to
prove that the chemist who now asserts that he is convinced of the im¬
propriety of the arrangement, is still in the habit of allowing a similar
percentage to other practitioners.
We wUlnot deny that there may be instances of such an alliance be¬
tween a medical practitioner and chemist, as there are also examples of
doctors who advertise, or do uther unprofessional acts, but the circum¬
stance of some others perpetrating these unprofessional acts does not render
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Miscellaneous.
them less reprehensible; and, as we have before shown, this particular
act which our correspondent acknowledges he committed, is formally de¬
nounced, and visited with the penalty ot expulsion by the chief college of
the faculty in England.
As regards the other point alluded to by our correspondent, viz., the
granting of a similar percentage by the same chemist, to other medical men,
though we cannot see how this charge, if proved, would exculpate our cor¬
respondent, we are willing to admit that it would show the chemist to have
been actuated by other motives than the impropriety of the act in wishing
to terminate the trading connexion with our correspondent. But our cor¬
respondent's assertions and documents only go to show that the chemist had
allowed to a medical man a commission on medicine-chests bought by pa¬
tients recommended by him, and that to others who sent their prescriptions
habitually to his shop, he supplied the medicines they required for their
own use free of charge* [We should remark that the documents in ques¬
tion were examined by a committee of our colleagues, appointed for that
purpose, who certify that they corroborate the facts alleged by our
correspondent, relative to the chemist allowing a commission to medical
men on medicine-chests bought by their patients, and giving gratuitously
their medicines to his medical customers.]
Now, although we cannot look upon it as a very dignified procedure on
the part of a medical man to take a commission on the medicine-chests
furnished to his patients, this is quite a different thin* in principle from
receiving a percentage on prescriptions. The latter is, beyond all com¬
parison, the more reprehensible practice, as it gives the practitioner a
direct interest in the quantity of medicine he prescribes for his patients,
and holds out a temptation to give more prescriptions than are needful.
As for the other accusation that the chemist gives to those practitioners
who patronize him the medicines they require for their own use, without
charging for them, we can see nothing to condemn in this practice, but
must regard it as a proof of the chemist's liberality aud gratitude.
Our correspondent enters on other subjects winch have nothing to do
with the question of the propriety of the trading union between a chemist
and a practitioner, we shall not, therefore, allude to them.
We forbear publishing our correspondent's letter, partly because we do
not see that its publication would do him any good, or in any way
strengthen his point, and partly because, besides the irrelevant matter just
alluded to, it contains personal attacks on individuals, who in justice
would require of us to admit their replies, and in this way our journal
would become the field of personal disputes, altogether at variance with
the principles on which it has hitherto been conducted.
BOOKS RECEIVED.
Philadelphia Journal of Homoeopathy.
Journal de la Society Gallicane.
Metcalf 9 s Homoecpathic Provings.
Small 9 $ Domestic Homoeopathy .
Gollmann 9 s Diseases of the Urinary and Sexual Organs.
Peters on the Eye.
Buckert on Mental Derangement and Nervous Disorders.
The British and Foreign Homoeopathic Directory for 1855, by
Da. Atkin.
W. Davy & Son, Printers, 8 Gilbert-street, Oxford-street, London.
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THE
BRITISH JOURNAL
or
HOMCEOPATHY.
INTRODUCTORY LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE
LONDON HOMOEOPATHIC HOSPITAL IN 1855.
Br T. R. Leadam, M.D., M.R.C.S.
Surgeon Accoucheur to the Hospital.
Gentlemen,—In commencing the delivery of a few lectures
on the subject of obstetrics and uterine diseases in connection
with homoeopathy, I shall have to crave your indulgence to a
considerable extent ;—in the Jirst place , on account of the
partial interest that may attach to the subjects on which I shall
have to discourse, much of them being necessarily very common
place to my hearers, and likewise for the lack of novelty, which
must appear to many, my seniors and superiors in medical
practice. This position, which is barely relieved by the presence
of students, (of whom we have unfortunately a deficiency)
will probably continue to exist so long as the Medical
Colleges preserve their silent, though not less hostile and ob¬
structive posture, against a fair and philosophical enquiry after
“ the truth ” in medicine; so long as they brand as medical
heretics, or object to as medical graduates all those who evince
a desire to enquire into homoeopathy, or aot upon their convio-
tions when investigation shall have proved to them that they
are based on reason, experiment and truth.
In the second place, I must crave your indulgence for the
absence of any new discoveries which might be supposed to
justify my occupying the position which I have consented to
take upon this occasion.
VOL. XIII, NO. LII.—APRIL, 1855. N
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Introductory Lecture ,
Therefore, gentlemen, if I am not so happy as to claim your
interest, or to rivet your attention by the exposition of ingenious
novelties in the department to which I am more especially
attached, I will at least endeavour to focus some rays from other
more gifted sources, and thus to return you the only gratitude
in my power for your kind attendance here this day.
But my present observations will bear little on the special
subject to which my other lectures will refer, since I appear to¬
day as introducing the whole, rather than my own particular
lecture, and am happy to announce that Dr. Quin will bear me
in countenance by the delivery of a few lectures on those parts
of the Materia Medica which apply more particularly to the
treatment of cholera. After which, Dr. Hamilton will give some
lectures on clinical medicine, and Dr. Bussell will complete the
series with a few lectures on the subject of diet.
When entering upon a subject for the first time, in connection
with homoeopathy, or, as may be said in the present state of
medical science, having the homoeopathic doctrines as its basis,
it would hardly be just, and would be a very meagre evidence of
the value we set upon this great therapeutic discovery, if we
were to pass over in silence the character and labours of the
great founder, Hahnemann.
Hackneyed though the subject may be, and from that cir¬
cumstance, however stale and unprofitable it may be thought,
the character of a man like Hahnemann presents so many
varied phases, that, when contemplated by different individuals,
the mind of each may receive a distinctive impression, and
reflect into the future, points of fresh interest. It is not, there¬
fore, with the prospect of fatiguing your attention by the
repetition of an “ oft and well told tale,” that I would briefly do
homage to the genius and philanthropy of Hahnemann, in this
the London Homceopathic Hospital, which may figuratively be
considered as a sointillation of his genius—an offspring of his
labours.
I am one of those who think that the name of Hahnemann
and the distinctive title of Homoeopathy should never be lost
sight of, for have we not handed down to us for honour and
immortality—Hippocrates and his aphorisms,—Galen and his.
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179
critical writings,—Avicenna and his herbarium,—Ambrose Pard
and the Cesarian section,—John Hunter and his physiology,—
Linacre and the College of Physicians,—Jenner and vaccina¬
tion,—Harvey and the circulation of the blood,—and shall we
not perpetuate by adding to the list, Hahnemann and homoeo¬
pathy ? the most expansive discovery that any of them oan lay
claim to; limited to no era ; imprisoned within the language of
no country; not isolated in the indigenous herbarium of any
one Materia Medioa; nor lost by diffusion through the complex
preparations of any one pharmacopoeia; but applicable, appre¬
ciable, comprehensible, and remediable in every clime and by
every people. Is the light of Hahnemann to be hid under a
bushel, while every other great benefactor of the human race is
made 4o adorn the discoveries with which his name was asso¬
ciated, and is floated down the stream of time a beacon for his
generation ?
As then we have the example of the Royal College of Surgeons
in doing homage to the name of John Hunter by an annual
oration, in which his career and his labours for science are
repeated to an untiring audience, I believe we should be ful¬
filling a duty to tbe memory of a greater than John Hunter, as
well as to the rising generation of medical men, by annually
drawing forth to public hearing some of the varied treasures
bequeathed to us in the labours and works of Dr. Samuel
Hahnemann, the founder of homoeopathy. This will be more
strikingly appreciated if we survey the inroads now being
gradually made into the domains of homoeopathy, by the adop¬
tion of its remedies one by one by the allopathic branch of the
profession, and by their applying them to the more prominent
conditions of disease, in material doses, which oan only exert a
favourable action where the symptoms exhibit a certain amount
of intensity ; yet at the same time they repudiate homoeopathy
and all connected with it; it must be clear, however, that in
thus grafting the fruitful branch of homoeopathy into the old
tree of allopathy, the desired result (such as is witnessed in the
vegetable world) will not be accomplished, but a spurious fruit
will be the offshoot, and the benefit to mankind, in the same
proportion, limited. After this manner, belladonna has been
n 2
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Introductory Lecture,
appropriated by Dr. Gardner of London, as a new cure for
scarlatina; arnica has been recognized and used as a valuable
surgical auxiliary; aconite has been honoured by the patronage
of Dr. Fleming, in a volume in which he has confirmed its
powers as a valuable substitute for the lancet. Cannabis
sativa has become a fashionable sedative in nervous headaches,
for nervous coughs and other derangements of the nervous
system. Nux vomica has of late come into vogue as a remedy
for dyspepsia . and constipation ; and camphor, though not yet
adopted by the Board of Health, has received the encomiums of
the profession as a successful medicine for the incipient stages
of cholera. But the few cases in which these remedies can be
found useful when administered after this fashion, will leave
homoeopathy rich in resources beyond the reach of such un¬
acknowledged plagiarisms.
The branch of therapeutics as taught by the old schools,
must be entirely lopped off from the good tree of medical science
before they can hope to graft in with success the fruitful boughs
of homoeopathy.
The career of Hahnemann may be advantageously compared
with that of John Hunter; the one the father of British surgery,
the other the father of modem physic. Alike, in rescuing the
domains of surgery and medicine from the coarse and rude
details of the middle ages. Alike, in advancing,—the one—
physiological study; the other—the therapeutical doctrines,
until they were established upon a basis which should stand the
test of ages, and exhibited a series of fundamental truths which
have now been acknowledged as established laws. Alike, too,
in the persevering energy with which they battled against pre¬
judice and error, and alike in the difficulties and opposition they
encountered in diffusing the results of their researches; but, oh
how unlike is their characters as men : how simple, how pure-
minded, how philanthropic, how self-denying was Hahnemann ;
on the other hand—but let us say “ de mortuis nil nisi bonum.”
Hahnemann attempted to diffuse his discoveries by publicly
lecturing to the few he could collect to listen to him ; Hunter,
in London, could never obtain a class of twenty pupils to hear
his lectures on physiology and comparative anatomy, although
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at that time the subjects were new and surpassingly interesting.
Let us not, then, lose our patience or our industry, though in
endeavouring to diffuse a knowledge of the true therapeutical
doctrines as discovered by Hahnemann, we find ourselves com*
pelled to address a limited audience.
The character of Hahnemann, on some occasions approaches
the sublime ; indeed, but for a few passing clouds of occasional
puerilities and extorted recriminations, which resulted from
repeated persecutions, it was sublime. “To err is mortal."
We may glory in his discoveries in medicine and therapeutics,
but that which is above all this, was his single mindedness and
integrity. “ Incorrupta fide vir, ob id, Fama celebratior."
Take, for example, the following quotation from his Paper in
The Lesser Writings, called “ The Friend of Health!’ He is
discussing dietetics with his brother, and says : “ To retort iu
that way would be as if from the innumerable daily examples of
want of conscientiousness we should seek to prove that there
was no such thing as conscience. Oh, my brother! he who
has preserved this delicate, never deceptive feeling for the good
and the noble, in all its simplicity and innocence, and exercises
it with the readiness of an unsophisticated child, for his own
and his brother’s benefit, he asks not if there be human beings
so degenerate as to presume to demonstrate away the conscience
to a mere shadow, who assert kindness to be a necessary fashion,
and a Sybarite’s life to be a lawful recreation.”
Again, in his “ Yiew of professional liberality in the nineteenth
century,” when referring to the treatment he received on an¬
nouncing the discovery of Belladonna as a prophylaxis of scarlet
fever, he says : “ The furtherance of every means, be it ever so
small, that can save human life, that can bring health and
security (a God of love invented this blessed and most wondrous
of arts), should be a sacred object to the true physician; chance,
or the labour of a physician, has discovered this to me. Away,
then, with all grovelling passions at the altar of this sublime
Godhead, whose priests we are! We all strive after a common
holy object, but it is not easy to be obtained. It is only by
joining hand in hand, only by a brotherly union of our powers,
only by a mutual intercommunication and a common dispas-
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Introductory Lecture,
sionate development of all our knowledge, views, discoveries
and observations, that this high aim can he attained—the per¬
fecting of the medical art. Physicians of Germany, — he
brothers,—be fair,—be just.”
Once more he writes: “ I know fall well'that it requires
heroic courage in order to cure ourselves of prejudices grown
almost into mental infirmities, which have become sacred to us
on account of their hoary age, and that it demands a very
uncommon strength of mind to eradicate from our memory all
the absurdities that have been imprinted upon our youthful
susceptibilites as oracular deliverances, and to ezohange them
for new truths; but the oak-garland with which a consciousness
of acting right crowns us, rewards these victories over ourselves
a thousand-fold! ”
It may truly be said with the poet, “ he owned no common
soul.” Hahnemann passed through the usual phases of genius.
His early struggles with poverty, his successful scholarship, his
first professional efforts, ill succeeding and ill rewarded, his
despair at the imperfect state of the art of medicine, his recourse
to literary efforts, which led to his discovery of the power of
Bark to produce ague, and thence his glimpse of the true modus
medendi, from which (after a long painstaking investigation, the
object of which was to ascertain how far the reported cures by
speoific medicines confirmed the idea which had sprung up in
his mind) resulted his assertion of the law, “ Similia similibus
curantur.”
Then came his publio writings, his controversies, his efforts
to establish this great truth in medicine, his persecutions, his
discovery that Belladonna was a prophylactic against scarlet
fever, his indignation [at the unfair suspicions that were cast
upon him in his worldly endeavours to obtain a hearing for the
new fact, and his consequent magnanimous publication of it for
the good of mankind; perceiving that the world would not
oonsent to remunerate him for the information, he indignantly
yielded up his knowledge and turned aside the arrows which
malignity and ignorance had forged. Then oame hiB introduc¬
tion of the moral treatment of the insane, and who, of the pre¬
sent day, save his few devoted followers, ever dreams that Samuel
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Hahnemann was foremost in the application of this humane
treatment. After this, persecutions again waited on his path.
In consequence of his successful treatment of his patients at
Konigslutter, the jealousy of the apotheoaries seems to have
been aroused, and they succeeded in expelling him from that
town in 1799. from that time till 1810 his life was wearisome
and chequered ; still his untiring energy and dominant genius
kept the helm and guided him onward, whilst the results of his
studies and experience were given forth in those original works,
which laid the foundation of the homoeopathic doctrines, as
“ JEsculapius in the Balance" “ The Medicine of Experience"
and th a first “Sketch of a Materia Medica besides various
papers in Hufeland’s and other journals.
In 1810 the Organon appeared; which, as the concrete of
his literary labours, settled the foundation of his fame, and bore
him in triumph again to Leipsic. This great work is the
exponent of his views as to the mode in which disease ought to
be treated. Then came in 1611 the first volume of that elabo¬
rate work which points out the weapons with which sickness is
to be oombated,—their various powers and capacities of cure,—
the remedies for the treatment of disease. Again, obstructions
to hia practice and persecutions intervened; but nothing daunted
he laboured on in the experiments of proving the various drugs
upon the healthy, delivering lectures, and completing the other
volumes of his Materia Medica. Now, again, obliged to quit
Leipsic at a time when he seemed about to reap some reward
for his labours, the apothecaries having discovered that he was
accustomed to dispense his own medicines, which was oontrary
to the law that regulates the practice of physio in that city.
He went to Cothen in 1821, and here he is said to have worked
incessantly, and produced three editions of his “ Organon .” In
1827 his further discovery of the treatment of chronic diseases
was first mooted to his friends, and the next year the first
volnme of his great work on that subject appeared. In due
time these were completed; homoeopathy as a reformed medical
practice was disseminated far and wide, growing in the midst of
difficulties,—prospering, as the truth always does, by opposition,
and heralded by persecution. Then came the cholera in 1831,
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Introductory Lecture,
that new scourge of humanity, but to the penetrating gaze of
Hahnemann’s sagacious mind, armed as it now was with the
knowledge of remedies worthy of the name, it came not as a
bewildering novelty that struck dumb the oracle, but found the
philosopher prepared at once with a reply and a remedy. He
waited not for its arrival at his own door, but sent forth his
opinions and directions over the oountry, suggesting, from his
intimate acquaintance with the virtues of drugs, the mode of
treatment most likely to he successful, both for the cure of the
disease as well as for its prevention. His opinions proved
perfectly correct, and we can testify to this moment, and even
at the present juncture, to the invaluable efficacy of his mode of
treatment. There it is, just as he delivered it twenty years ago,
unaltered and unalterable , the most oertain and efficacious
whioh has yet been suggested. Can this be said of any other
of the various floating schemes which only tend to perplex the
public at the present day ?
Alas, no! There is despair in the medical councils, and
division in their ranks !
Hahnemann at last reached Paris, practised, and died there.
His was a master mind, doubtless; there was a mass of
brain which secured power to his conceptions, and force to his
resolves, which enabled him to work on unsubdued by difficul¬
ties, and heedless of persecution, hoping and believing that
some moment or other, the light would suddenly break in upon
him, and illumine all that was dark before, and so it was.
Nature always unfolds her treasures to him who diligently
seeks her, and follows on into her recesses with the lamp of
faith. He did not want—
“ The spar that the clear spirit doth ruse
(That last infirmity of noble minds)
To scorn delights, and live laborious days.”
To have lived in advance of the age has been said to be the
truest test of genius, and doubtless this was the case with
Hahnemann. His mind was cast in the Hippocratic mould,
and there is no physician since Hippocrates whose character
has exhibited so much originality and foresight.
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The lamp of medicine and therapeutics may be said to have
been lighted by Dr. Samuel Hahnemann. He was one of
those men who exist but once in a century, who have been
termed by Scaliger, ‘ homines centenarii'
But, Gentlemen, it is easy enough for us now to travel over
the career of a great man, and recount his triumphs, but who
can estimate the self-sacrifice,—the self-denials which they
cost him? Years of toil and anxious thoughts, are not to be
weighed with the accuracy of merchandise. The testimony
borne by Hufeland, Sigmond, Forbes, Mott, Uwins, and others,
to the high character attained by Hahnemann as a scientific
and accomplished physician, are on record, and cannot be
withdrawn; they are the honorable acknowledgments of his
opponents, and not the enthusiastic plaudits of his admirers.
Their value, then, is without alloy, and we may preserve them
among the archives of the homoeopathic treasury.
Having glanced at his character as a genius and as a physi¬
cian, let us for a moment regard him as a philanthropist. His
whole career was encircled with a halo— the desire of benefitting
humanity. The love of his profession and of science was the
delight he felt, that in proportion as he advanced them, he
enlarged and extended the blessings of mankind. In his
preface to “ The Friend of Health,” after inculcating a popular
knowledge of the laws of life and health, (Hygiene), he writes
as follows—“Oh! that in the following pages I were so for¬
tunate as to be able to contribute something to the happiness of
mankind, if they would listen to the voice of a warm friend of
his fellow creatures, as if it were the voice of a friend! In a
few years, nay, days, and we have reached the termination of
our earthly life; would that I could now and then prolong it
but for a few hours, would that I could improve it only in
trivial things! ”
Such sentiments as these could only emanate from a heart
deeply imbued with the love of mankind. It has been often
urged by those who delight in evincing upon all occasions their
oontempt for homoeopathy, and are ever on the alert for an
argument, ad captandum, in the absence of the only argument
that ought to weigh with philosophical minds, namely, the
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Introductory Lecture,
having put the doctrines to the test,—-that Hahnemann, and
consequently his followers, have repudiated the value of phy¬
siology and pathology; the one, the operation of the natural
laws of the economy in health; the other, the operation and
results of morbid action as witnessed in disease. This is
one of the fallacies with which the world is cajoled by the
enemies of homoeopathy.
While we are conscious that the medical world has been led
astray by the too ardent votaries of science, from the habit of
simple, close observation of disease, as respects the individuality
of the oase, and have thus been led by nosologists to treat
rather the name of a disease, as an abstract entity, than the
real morbid state as detailed by accurately collected symptoms;
a practice which has stimulated the minds of those who are called
nosological writers to attempt an infinitesimal division of disease,
(however much they may abjure an infinitesimal division of
drugs) with a nomenclature proportionately extensive, and I
need scarcely add confusing, we are, nevertheless, aware, that
the connection and true value of symptoms cannot be fully
appreciated without a knowledge of physiology; or their pos¬
sible and probable results anticipated without a reference to
pathology. So, likewise, as regards the application of thera¬
peutics in the treatment of disease, it has been the fashion to
take the sensible properties of drugs, and to form a guess as to the
probable effects they might have upon the tissues and organs
of the human body; or, from some accidental or experimental
effect upon the lower animals, to draw an inference as to their
properties and powers, and the part of the system upon which
their poisonous qualities were most exploded, and hence to
start at once upon an experimental excursion in some human
body under the influence of disease. But, is this fair and
scientific experiment? Is it not rather a crude operation,
beginning in ignorance and ending in confusion; a mere hap¬
hazard attempt, without induction, and without result, with
the merest shadow of a physiological connection, and the
dimmest outline of a therapeutic action. What wonder then
if the materia medica of allopathy is found in perpetual
change, with nothing stable—nothing definite! What marvel
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need there be, that remedy after remedy has appeared upon the
stage, with vaunted powers for the cure of diseases, has run
the gauntlet of fashion, and ere long dropped neglected, repu¬
diated, and despised, like the beauty of a season who has
disappointed the hopes of her admirers.
But suoh has been the ever recurring process of therapeutical
researches ; such the fate of the majority of the remedies for
disease. So, again, as regards pathology, and its bearing upon
the treatment of disease. Physicians have been ever striving
to combat an imaginary entity, a supposed morbid state, which
could only be guessed at, and must therefore always be open to
donbt, by means of an equally imaginary antithesis, or thera¬
peutic operation in the animal economy; which, of necessity
must as often fail as succeed. For, in summing up the virtue
of drugs, they habitually resolve them into classes, distin¬
guished by the various active processes or effects which they are
found at times to induce; such as, sudorifics, diuretics, deriva¬
tives, purgatives, expectorants, &c.; and in prescribing any
drug with the view to produce some or all of these operations
in the system, they do so with the belief that they are counter¬
acting, antipathically, a morbid condition, whioh, with them,
has a distinct nosological character, but which, nevertheless,
may not exist at all, since we daily find the most experienced
physicians deceived upon the pathology of a case. This mode
of procedure is, therefore, simply a forcing process, operating
upon different parts of the economy, without any real patholo¬
gical or physiological connection whatever. It was reserved
for Hahnemann to trace out and bring to perfection the only
true and scientific mode of determining the virtues and qualities
of drugs, and of applying them to the cure of disease.
His was, indeed a method of pure experimentation, and the
propriety and correctness of the principle, of proving drugs
upon the healthy human body, is fully borne out by the success
which has attended the application of the law “sintilia similibus
curantur,” which sprung up and dawned upon the mind of
Hahnemann, while he was testing the virtues of Cinchona
Bark.
Here then, was a physiological and pathological basis—
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Introductory Lecture,
a certain drug was taken in order to note its effects upon a
healthy body; it was found to disturb certain functions; to
induoe definite symptoms; to create a morbid state: the
similarity of this state to one which had been cured by the
same drug in a smaller quantity led to the inquiry—“ Possibly
this very similarity may be the reason it was cured by it?
and if so, the same result may attach to similar experiments
with other drugs ? ” Patient and long continued investigations
confirmed the expectation, and, as you are all aware, consum¬
mated the triumph of Hahnemann’s sagacity. I say, then, the
assertion that homoeopathy necessarily sets aside the valuable
aid of physiology and pathology, is an invention of the enemy,
and as baseless as the majority of the arguments whioh have
been brought against Hahnemann and his followers. In proof
of this, I would only refer you to a perusal of his Lesser
Writings ; and will here only make a single quotation from his
popular treatise on Dietetics. He says—“ I saw a lying-in
woman, who after a difficult labour suffered from intolerable
after pains, and a great loss of blood. She cried for coffee,
although when she was well she could scarcely endure it.* * *
Her haemorrhage resulted from atony of the womb, and this
from diminished irritability of its fibres, and the specific remedy
for this was coffee. A few cups of very strong coffee were
given to her, and haemorrhage and pains ceased suddenly.
Opium would have had no effect in such a case.”
This mode of reasoning does not indicate, a contempt for
physiology or pathology certainly. On the contrary, it is
evidence of a mind taking a comprehensive and philosophical
view of a simple case, and shows how he at once reasoned
through the physiological bearings of the symptoms, until he
arrived instinctively, as it were, at the pathological basis to
which his remedy applied. But this discourse on dietetics, as
it exists in his Lesser Writings, is full of similar examples of
correct reasoning, and consummate knowledge.
The further development of pathology, is a study of the
oonsequences,—the sequelee of disease,—and gives us no distinct
information of the morbid process as it is going on during life.
While, therefore, it is highly necessary that it should he
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189
cultivated as a branch of medical study, and bears the same
relation to the study of disease, that chemistry and botany do to
the study of therapeutics, and, without a knowledge of which
the medical education would be very incomplete, it still only un¬
ravels to us the terminations of the morbid process, together with
the often abortive efforts of nature in her attempts to preserve
the integrity and freedom of the organic functions, or, to
remove the impediments which the morbid process has left in
her way, or, to compensate, in some way or other, for struc¬
tural alterations. But this is all effected by the operations of
the vital force, that internal instinctive energy which is resident
in the organic nerves, which, with a force, in proportion to the
amount of organic vigour, either inherent in the individual
originally, or still preserved in a partially impaired organ, ever
continues to act towards the accomplishment of the organic
function in any given organ of the body, and in so doing effects
those compensating changes or partial reparations, which
enable the organ to continue as an integral part of the body,
performing its functions, often feebly and very partially, yet
sufficiently to respond to the necessities of organic life.
These changes, then, inform us of the direct and collateral
results of morbid action, and of the extent to which the struggle
of the vital force has failed to relieve the organs; but, as it is
the organic vital force which presides over the functions, that
we have to direct, to stimulate, and to controul, and which, if
preserved in its integrity would certainly prevent disease, (as
we cannot operate upon the inorganic results of morbid action)
the extent to which a knowledge of pathology is competent to
aid us in the cure of disease, is tolerably well defined, and
certainly limited. For example, our pathological studies may
enable us in a given simple case, to determine the region
within which active disease is proceeding; or, possibly, by the
help of some extrinsic evidence of functional aberration, such
as an examination of the secretions and excretions, by ocular,
chemical, or microscopical investigation, may direct us to the
organ which is principally or primarily affected; but, beyond
this, when extension of disease has taken place into neighbour¬
ing tissues, and other organs have become involved in the
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Introductory Lecture,
complex web of chronio disease, the efforts of the wisest are too
often unavailing to unravel the catenation of morbid action,
and trace to their source the confused mass of symptoms,
which overlay and obscure the fons et origo malts. And,
even, if we could arrive by these means at the desired object
of research, and expose with unerring faithfulness the original
point of departure from health, how little would it, in many of
the complicated cases of chronio disease which come daily
before our eyes, assist us in arriving at a means of cure, sinoe
by the lapse of time, in some instances, and in others, by
the abortive efforts of the vital force to preserve the functional
and organic integrity, the morbid actions have passed to other
organs, and induced a development of phenomena whose pre¬
dominance demands an equal if not prominent consideration.
This process is, in the langauge of the schools, called the
* Vis medicatrix natures ,’ * The Recuperative powers of nature
* The restorative power;’ brought about by what John Hun¬
ter calls * The stimulus of necessity ,' ‘ The organic instinctive
power ,’ or in other words, * The vital force ‘ Well may we
say here ‘what's in a name!’ Nevertheless it is in the due
appreciation of this vital force, as exhibited in the physiological
actions of the different organs, and of their compensating and
subservient relations to each other, that the success of treat¬
ment will often depend; and by the regulation of the juvantia
and laedentia of hygienic management, which are the true
auxiliaries to all treatment, we shall best carry out the whole¬
some maxim of Bacon, and be the ‘ servant and interpreter of
Nature.'
But in spite of the belief which exists, that this instinctive
power of nature is really a vis medicatrix , I think it can be
easily shown that the contrary is the oase, and that the lan¬
guage so constantly held out to students about ‘ trusting to
Nature ,' and ‘ aiding the efforts of Nature’ is simply a con¬
fession of ignorance, and a refuge from the more dangerous
practices in vogue for the suppression or correction of morbid
action. For example. A copious or superabundant secretion
of bile takes place in the liver, it passes off by the bowels as a
diarrhoea. To assist nature, a purgative is administered, but
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191
this only increases the diarrhoea, and perhaps stimulates
the liver to a fresh formation of bile, instead of modifying the
organic vital force, and so diminishing the functional activity.
Is this to assist nature? It is much the same as if a horse
were driven at increased speed over a barricaded street, instead
of being checked, and so enabled to overcome the difficulties of
the route.
So again, with an active hsemorrhage, whether of the lungs,
nose, or stomach. This is often taken as a natural indication
for treatment, and more blood is drawn from the arm, as a
safer place; but is that to assist nature to a cure ? Is that
natural indication to be relied on? Certainly not. The
hsemorrhage has resulted from an obstruction of the circulation
in one of the internal organs, caused probably by diminished
vital power, or failure of innervation at the part, and conse¬
quently a torpid and dilated state of the circulatory vessels.
The stream has overflowed its banks, as a result of some
impediment having occurred in its usual course, but this, or an
increase of this, does nothing towards remedying the evil.
Nature has been unable in these instances to restore the
* status quo ante,’ and failing this, has forced a way in some other
part of the economy, and so allowed an exit, without which, the
more important organ would, probably, have been sacrificed.
But still there has been no vis medicatrix natures in action,
and the part originally impaired must have the equilibrium of
its vital power restored, before a recurrence of the danger can
be prevented.
Homoeopathy supplies the means whereby it can be accom¬
plished, and in this way aids nature where she is herself
incompetent
Again, let us take another example of the imperfect manner
in which the vis medicatrix natures aots, and how entirely its
operations are confined to the supplying a compensation for
the morbid action, instead of, as is erroneously asserted by the
teachers of allopathic medicines, removing disease. Two men
shall have an attack of pleurisy, and in one individual there
shall be au effusion of lymph, with consequent adhesions to
the walls of the chest.; in the other, effusion of serum into the
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Introductory Lecture,
cavity of the pleura, and no adhesions. In the latter instance,
it is said, ex-cathedrd, that the effusion of serum is a provision
of nature, an effort of the vis medicatrix natures, to preserve
the respiratory organ from the dangerous effects of the former
condition.
In either case, under ordinary care, the effusion relieves the
inflammatory process, as though it had expended its force thus
and then subsided; but the real explanation is this, namely,
that the result of the inflammatory action is modified in the
individuals by the constitutional peculiarities of each, and, by
the intensity of the inflammation, and that instead of its being
a vis medicatrix, it is a morbid result which the vis medicatrix
has not been able to avert.
The same thing happens in peritonitis, or inflammation of the
peritoneum covering the bowels, and the dropsy sometimes con¬
sequent thereon. Here we may have precisely the same conditions
oceuring in different individuals, but to say that either the serous
effusion in the one case is an operation of the vis medicatrix
naturae to prevent the more serious complications of the other,
is a straining of the case to meet an argument, and is not
worthy of the name of a theory. On the contrary, it is well
known to all present that these morbid results must themselves
be submitted to medical treatment, and the vis medicatrix naturae
be relieved of the imperfect attempts to restore the healthy state
of the system.
Homoeopathy enables us in all these cases to preserve and to
restore the vital force, and to remove the morbid consequences
of its abnormal efforts, and to bring about a healthy state of an
organ without being dependent upon the vis medicatrix naturae,
which means nothing more than the instinctive organic vital,
force in a state of equilibrium. The only difference to be
noticed here is that in the case of pneumonia, resulting in
exudation into the air cells and producing hepatization; the
pressure of the exuded matter, as shown by Professor Henderson,
exerts a mechanical obstruction on the capillary circulation in
the cells, and so, as it were, puts out the fire and terminates the
inflammatory process; but such is not the case in peritoneal
inflammation. Therefore, it cannot be considered as an in-
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stincdve preservative process, but as an accidental mechanical
result.
I have said thus muoh about the vis medicatrix nature
because it has repeatedly been asserted by those, who are un-
'willing to acknowledge that infinitesimal doses can possess any,
much less a curative, action, that the beneficial results which
could not be gainsaid, were nothing more than the tendency of
nature, by its own instinctive and preservative energy, to recover
from disease. But if more were wanted to convince those who
favour the convenient theory of a vis medicatrix naturae, I
would refer them to that able exposition of the results of the
four modes of managing acute disease, namely, by venesection , by
Tartar emetic , by homoeopathy, and by the powers of nature ,
which has been given to the world by Professor Henderson of
Edinburgh, in his unanswerable reply to Professor Simpson, in
“Homoeopathy fairly represented!' In comparing the results
of pneumonia (inflammation of the lungs) as published by Dietl,
the average duration of the cases treated by venesection were
found to be 35 days; of those treated by Tartar emetic, 28.9
days; and of those treated by the expectant method, 28 days;
whilst the average duration of the disease in 43 cases treated by
homoeopathy was only 11 */» days. “ This very remarkable
result,” he says, “ places beyond all rational doubt the claim of
homoeopathy to a high degree of active curative power in pneu¬
monia. The cases under the expectant treatment lasted, on an
average, 16 days longer than the homoeopathic cases.”
But, it is.to the collective aggregate of the symptoms that we
must at last be referred for the only sure basis of the therapeutic
application. Hahnemann has taught us that these are the true
expression of the disease, and as these one by one recede, so we
have a right to oonclude that by degrees the disease itself is
subdued ; subdued, I say, not obscured or suppressed merely, as
is often the practice under the old system of treatment, but
withdrawn from the strongholds of the economy, by the cessa¬
tion of the morbid actions.
But there has been much unnecessary discussion about the
application of the therapeutic law and the necessity of an irk-
VOL. XIII, NO. LII.—APRIL, 1855. O
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Introductory Lecture ,
some comparison of the detail of the symptoms with the patho*
genesis of the remedy.
I fear that in many instances a minute detail of the symptoms
as practised by observers is not always a correct exponent of the
disease; on the other hand, I believe, that a clear physiological
view of an individual case, with an accurate grouping of the
symptoms, will easily lead us to the right remedy, and save a
vast deal of needless and pedantio labour. I do not wish to
undervalue the painstaking research which in many instances of
chronic disease is absolutely necessary, hut in a vast number of
cases we find that groups of symptoms are offsets, as it were,
from some peculiar and morbid feature in the constitution of the
patient, which, to the practised medical eye leads at once to the
remedy,—but without which the fullest catalogue of aohes and
pains, sensations and expulsions, phenomena and epipheno*
mena, is incomplete and of little value.
For example, I witness a yellow pustular eruption in a child
whose excretions indicate an unhealthy action of the liver, with
a cachectic aspect, pallid cheek, and impoverished condition;—
some external morbid influence has so impaired the organic
power of the liver as to interfere with its function of depurating
the blood, consequently it is loaded with carbon, instead of
having that element properly eliminated; unhealthy bile of a
dark colour is formed, the roseate hue of health is gone, and the
cutaneous follicles become inflamed and pustular, in places
where the obstruction to the transpiration is the greatest. Here
is recognized an instance of porrigo favosa, and is any one to
be called a routinist because he does not deliberately sit down
and recount the symptoms, and compare the pathogenesis of
half a dozen remedies, before he ventures to prescribe—aye
even a course of medicine, for this oft recurring group of
symptoms ? If there be any special symptom peculiar to the
individual in addition to the more common phenomena, the
practised eye should surely at once discern it, and give it its due
proportion of consideration before applying the remedy.
Again, two cases of amenorrhcea shall present themselves;
the one a lively, plethoric girl, with flushings of the face;
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irregular nervous action; cold extremities; pain in the back;
palpitation; and headache—indications of a functional derange*
ment from too great excitability of the nervous system, and
excess of vital action; to her we may administer aconite, perhaps
followed by pulaatilla, unless the Aconite, as often happens,
effectually establishes the equilibrium of funotion: while the
other is a pale and delieate girl, with cold extremities ; short¬
ness of breath, and palpitation of the heart; feeble pulse, and
languid temperament; together with a strumous diathesis;
here there is evidence of a deficiency of organic vital power in
the ovaries. To her we may administer sulphur, followed most
probably by pulsatilla, if the former has not been sufficient to
arouse the organio force and so produce the desired result.
In both cases success attends or follows the exhibition of the
remedies.
Is any one a routinist because from a repeated observation of
such cases, he knows and acts upon the knowledge that similar
treatment will be successful in the like cases ?
I cannot assent to such a book-worm constraint as some would
exercise upon the reasoning faculties, and so give license to our
opponents to taunt us with a repudiation of pathology and phy¬
siology, and to a blind adherence to a confused heap of symp¬
toms which require a vast deal of weeding before they can
become intelligible to an adherent of the old system.'
Nevertheless we are guided by the aggregate of symptoms,
but we must take care that we include the whole of the morbid
picture, and thus every individual case will stand upon its own
foundation. I see a man with a wound upon his leg—deep,
excavated, irregular, and sloughy. Tortuous veins reach it from
above, and a red or dusky areola is observed around it; the
circumference is likewise* indurated; there has been inflam¬
matory exudation into the cellular tissue surrounding some
veins; ulcerative absorption has taken place, and an ulcer is the
result. Perhaps the neighbouring veins are bunchy and tender;
the liver is occasionally the seat of pain; constipation exists,
- and the digestive function is faulty. If we were to proceed to
attempt the cure of the ulcer jupon this collection of symptoms,
the probability is that we should fail; but there is a sallow
* o 2
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196 Introductory Lecture,
complexion and psorio taint to be gathered either from the
appearance of the individual or from his history, some other local
irritation may attract our notice, and then ire may find that the
most prominent symptom of the case, namely, the ulcer, is the
most insignificant feature after all. The deep seated psora must
he attacked; the internal disease must be treated; and then
probably the ulcer, the most prominent external symptom, will
yield with the rest, and a healthy cicatrising wound be estab¬
lished.
In the recent afflictive epidemic too, we have had the oppor¬
tunity, through the beneficent means afforded by this Hospital,
of comparing, with the most satisfactory results, the treatment
of cholera by the homoeopathic remedies with the returns of
cholera from the other London Hospitals, and without making
any more observations than are necessary to show the great
superiority of our treatment even in this fatal disease, I will
merely state that from the report published in the Medical
Times and Gazette, in the month of September, it appears that
the lowest average of the old school treatment exhibits a loss of
10 out of 25, or 40 per cent.; and the highest, a loss of 76 out
of 130, or about 59 per cent.; while the average loss under
homoeopathic treatment at the same period was 7 out of 85, or
20 per cent. With respect to the castor oil treatment, which
has been so lauded by some and decried by others, I can only
believe that where it has succeeded, it was in consequence of its
homoeopathicity; or else, that by virtue of its oleaginous
quality, it has acted like oil poured upon the waves of the sea,
or by so blocking up the exhalent vessels of the stomach and
intestines, (its irritating property being abnegated by the insen¬
sible torpor of the collapsed mucous membrane) as to cause an
arrest of the current of the fluids to the surface of the stomach
and bowels. But the very fact that attacks of cholera have been
induced, during the prevalence of the epidemical atmosphere, by
doses of castor oil and other purgatives, must make it a very
doubtful remedy, and the hypothesis put forth by Dr. Johnson,
(its great advocate) is so unsound and untenable, that it can
give no encouragement to the supposition that it is a specific
for cholera. Dr. Johnson argues that the purging is good, that
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it is the vis medicatrix nature* —an effort of nature to get rid
of the poison, and in the old style of assisting nature, a purga¬
tive is the best indicated remedy; so that by increasing the loss
to the system, we may hope to eliminate the morbid agent —
the poison of cholera!
But who ever proved that the poison of cholera was a material
ponderable molecule ? or, if it were, how could it he expelled
from the blood until the whole mass, the grosser as well as the
finer parts of it, were forced out of the vessels ? And how does
he explain die arrest of the cholera, if combated in its premoni¬
tory symptoms, by the arrest of the diarrhoea ? So much for
the theory; hut the practioe is one of those chance things with
which the history of cholera abounds, and which is found suc¬
cessful in a few cases, and therefore supposed to he useful in all,
and ultimately fall into disuetude from having no scientific basis
to rest upon.
But, gentlemen, it is not so chance a thing, as we all know,
in homoeopathy. Our remedies vary to a certain extent when
applied to different individuals, hut are always regulated by the
same principle, that of “ Similia similibus curantur,” and are
thus apportioned to the exigences of every case, whether there
be the deadly collapse, or the attendant vomitings or purgings,
or both. So that our patients may really be said to he treated
scientifically and judiciously, and not by haphazard, speculative
specifics, alike doubtful in their origin and their result.
The comparison is before you, and we need not bo ashamed
of it
It is then to Samuel Hahnemann that we are indebted for
the most successful means at present existing with which we can
meet this terrible scourge, and as our remedies have not changed
for twenty-two yens, namely, from their application in the
epidemio of 1831-32, to that of 1858-54, but hold the same
possession of our confidence; we have no reason to doubt that
they will continue to he our staff and stay whenever a similar
visitation shall recur, and the name of Hahnemann must, there¬
fore, be recorded with perpetual praise, for the time will surely
come when it shall possess the citadel of fame, and be revered
among physicians far above the names of Mead, and Sydenham,
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198 Case of Acute Pericarditis,
of Huxham, Baillie, and the Hunters. In the language of
Taeitus:
“ Quidquid ex Agricold amavimus, quidquid mirati sutnus, manet;
mansurumque est in animis hominum, in seternitate temporum, fama
rerum.” •
THE HISTORY OF A CASE OF ACUTE (RHEUMATIC)
PERICARDITIS LEADING TO HYPERTROPHY,
WITH DILATATION OF THE HEART,
By Joseph Kidd, M.D.
Late in the evening of Nov. 24, 1850,1 was hastily summoned
to see Master N., aged 10 years. I found him, propped up in
bed by a number of pillows, panting and struggling for breath,
and complaining of sharp rending pains along the sternum
and into left shoulder: pulse rapid, weak and fluttering; re¬
spiration rapid and short; extreme anxiety of countenance,
and distressing restlessness and sleeplessness for forty-eight
hours; tongue covered with a yellow fur; no appetite; intense
thirst; hot dry skin.
I was told that the child—from birth weakly and delicate—
was a patient of Dr. Chapman’s, and for upwards of a fortnight
under his care for a severe attack of rheumatic fever, to slight
attacks of which he had been subject occasionally for four
years, and to which he was hereditarily predisposed, as his
father and grandfather were the subjects of rheumatic gout.
Examining into the cause of this urgent dyspnoea, I found
the left supra-mammary region dull on percussion, up to about
the lower edge of the third costal cartilage; the heart’s action
was muffled, indistinct, and very weak; no friction sound, but
a very soft bruit de soufflet was heard accompanying the first
sound of the heart. It evidently appeared that extensive effu¬
sion had resulted from acute pericarditis, and also that the
endocardium was slightly affected. Dr. Chapman saw the case
the day before, and prescribed Phosphorus and Arsenicum alter¬
nately, which had been taken for about twenty-four hours. As
* Taoitns, Agricola.
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199
the case had evidently altered much since his visit, I laid those
medicines aside, and gave two drops of Colchicum 0 every half-
hour for four or five doses, and then every two or three hours
afterwards.
The effect was most immediate and beneficial: gradually the
pain was lessened, the dyspnoea became less urgent, and by
midnight he could take some light food, and afterwards had
refreshing sleep. The next day I sent for Dr. Chapman, who
found all progressing favourably, and the effusion into the
pericardium still very extensive, but lessening. (He also re¬
minded the parents of a reserve medicine he had left, to be
given if the pains or difficulty of breathing increased, and which
was Colchicum, 1st dec. dilution.) The Colchicum 0 was con¬
tinued at longer intervals for some days, and the improvement
continued without interruption, so that in about a week he
could walk about the room, and gained flesh and strength.
In order to prevent over-exertion or over-excitement, I ex¬
plained to the parents, that in all probability adhesion of the
pericardium to the heart had occurred, and some obstruction in
one set of valves. For two years after this attack the boy's
general health remained much as it had been for four or five
years previously. Constant succession of small illnesses, as
slight rheumatic attacks, treated by Rhus or Dulcamara; irrita¬
tion of the mucous membrane, with foul yellow tongue, and
want of appetite, treated by Merourius and China; attacks of
dyspnoea and palpitation, treated by Ignatia or Spigelia.
On December 18,1852, about two years after the first attack,
a violent attack of rheumatic fever again occurred, treated by
Rhus 0 in the beginning, and as the heart became implicated,
by Colchicum again, but now with little or no result. About
the 16th day it seemed as if he were about to die, through the
extreme anguish and pain in the heart, for which I then pre¬
scribed Acid, hydrocianio., 3 drops every hour for two or three
doses, with the most marked relief and rapid recovery. Dr.
Quin now saw him, and examined the heart carefully: its
action was tumultuous, heaving up over the greater part of the
left side with a muffled diffused sound; a very slight bruit de
soufflet still audible over the mitral valve.
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200
Case of Acute Pericarditis ,
After his recovery from this attack, I saw clearly that no
permanent or decided improvement in constitutional health had
resulted from the treatment (symptomatic and general) of Dr.
Chapman for several years before I saw Master N., nor from
my own during the previous two years. • Careful regulation of
diet, gentle open air exercise, a favourable change of climate
(from Liverpool to Greenwich, and from thenoe to Blackheath)
had also failed to make any radical change. He still looked
pale, chlorotic, and feeble, and his nervous system was as
excitable as in hysteria.
Searching into the cause of this, it seemed to depend upon
the lactic acid dyscrasia, with deterioration and diminution of
the red corpuscles of the blood.
I then prescribed Lemon juice for six weeks, two ounces
about one hour after dinner and breakfast. This improved the
digestion, and lessened the tendency to rheumatism. I then
prescribed Ferri sulphas, the first decimal dilution (in distilled
water), one drop, gradually increased to three, about a quarter
of an hour after meals, three times a day, in a wine glass of
cold boiled water, also the use of a vapour bath once a fort'
night, and carefully regulated nutritious diet.
This course was continued for eighteen months, and a great
change came over the constitutional health : the pale chlorotic
look gave way to the ruddy glow of health; the heart became
capable of enduring the most active exertion without distress ;
the appetite, strength, and flesh increased amazingly; the rheu¬
matic attacks became less severe and less frequent.
From a variety of causes the Ferri sulph. was much inter¬
rupted or discontinued from May to December 1854, and rapid
growth (as he approached fourteen years of age) weakened the
nervous and muscular systems. With more intelligence, the
poor boy became most keenly sensitive to the organic imperfec¬
tions and impediments in the heart preventing his taking the
active exercise of other boys, and unfitting him for the ordinary
occupations of life.
He frequently spoke of being a dead weight in the family;
and although surrounded by all the love and kindness that
could endear this life to him, his mind seemed to dwell upon
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the feeling of an early removal to another, where pain and
sorrowing cease.
In this state of mind, with much physical depression, he
was suddenly and violently seized, December 18th, 1854, by an
attack of rheumatic fever, with painful swelling of the wrists,
legs, and ankles; tongue coated with yellow fur; bowels con*
stipated; urine deep brown, coloured from bile, coagulating
on being boiled, but restored quite clear by Nitric acid (showing
excess of phosphates); no appetite; intense thirst; dry hot
skin; restlessness and sleeplessness, with anxiety of counte*
nance and urgent dyspnoea. Aconite 1 d. and Bryonia 0 were
freely given for two days, and tbe bowels emptied. As the
pains became aggravated by the rest and warmth of bed, Bbus 0
two drops every two hours, was given. Afterwards, as the
joints improved, and the pains about the heart became more
troublesome, Colchicum was given followed by Arsenicum. To*
wards the end the heart sufferings became quite different from
the former attacks; he complained of choking constriction in
the heart, with a deep internal sinking as if a large hole existed
in the heart, requiring pressure to support the left side. China
was now given frequently, and moderate quantities of wine
when faintness or exhaustion came on.
On the 20th he got out of bed and walked a few steps, when
all pain oeased for a minute or two, but only to return with
greater violence; emboldened by this momentary relief, he
attempted the same about 9 p.m., but with excruciating agony:
fronting, he screamed out “press it,” pointing to the region
of the heart; this was done, and a glass of Fort wine hurriedly
swallowed, but without avail, as the paroxysms of faintness and
sinking exhaustion gradually increased, and he died placidly
in a few hours.
On tipost mortem examination, forty-eight hours after death
(Mr. Mackem also present), I found the pericardium externally
adherent by numerous fibrous bands to the sternum and ribs ;
internally the pericardium was universally adherent to and con-
tinuous with the muscular fibres of the heart, so as to admit of
no separation except by the knife. The heart was enormously
hypertrophied and dilated; it covered and filled up the greater
part of the left side of chest, and weighed, with the vessels
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203 Cate of Acute Pericarditis, by Joseph Kidd, M.D.
cat short, sad all fluids well squeezed out, twenty-seven ounces /
The muscular fibres were thin, pale, and friable; the walls of
the ventricles thin'and expanded; the ventrioles vary large and
nearly empty, with the chordae tendinese thin and white, nearly
three inches long, stretched aoross the chambers; the antral
valve slightly thickened; the aortic valves healthy.
Remarks. —This case skews how closely the heart requires
watching in rheumatic fever. Within thirty-six, or at farthest
forty-eight hours, it had advanoed to most extensive effusion
to which the anemic condition of blood predisposed the child’s
constitution. The action of the Oolchicum was the most strik¬
ingly efficient that I ever witnessed in any disease from any
medicine. In rheumatic pericarditis with serous effusion, the
aotion of Colchicum is most homoeopathic and most effectual.
Probably for many years before the first attack of rheumatic
pericarditis, the child’s heart was feeble and dilated.
The influence on nutrition and on the blood set up by the
Ferri sulph. was more like that of highly suitable food than
of medicine. It truly fed the red corpuscles, and, through the
blood, the muscular and nervous systems. The necessity for
Iron Dr. Chapman had also seen, and given at Liverpool for
the child’s constitutional health, but without muoh result, as he
gave ferri carb. the first centesimal trituration, which was not
sufficiently potent to influence the nutrition of the blood cor¬
puscles.
In all diseases of the heart characterized by dilatation, or
by degeneration of muscular tissue, I have for many years acted
upon the principle, that the chief indication of treatment should
be to promote the development and energy of the muscular
tissue by all physiological means in our power—as animaHzed
food, careful regulation of muscular exercise, bracing air, free¬
dom from anxiety, iron, best of all when it can be used as in
the natural chalybeate waters. As long as its influence in this
case was regularly kept up, the boy’s muscular power and the
aotion of the heart continued vigorous; but when, daring the
last six months of his life, it was omitted or nearly so (owing to
a variety of trifling circumstances), both seemed to flag, and
then more dyspnoea and more palpitation occurred.
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sm
ON THE SWEDISH GYMNASTICS,
By Dr. Roth.
(Continued from page 61.)
Flexion and extension of the arms.
The external side of the arms, when freely hanging down,
is the stretching side, and the internal the bending side.
Arm flexion and extension (in the shoulder joints onlyJ.
The arms are kept perfectly stiff, and are moved from
the " rack” into the “ yard position," from “ speak position ” to
“forwards, and upwards," to “outwards, and upwards,” and
slightly to “ backwards, and outwards." Only the first of
these movements is a real arm extension, and in the opposite
direction, an arm flexion, while all the others are called guiding ,
and are described under that head.
The arm flexion and extension are done first, only with one
arm, three times in succession, and then as often with the
other, or first with one arm and then with the other, and so
alternately, which is called, alternate arm flexion and extension,
or with both arms at the same time, called, double arm flexion
and extension; the movement done with one specified arm, is
denoted by the words “right” or “left,” or by the name of the
position in which the movement is to he done, for instance:
right-rack-standing, arm extension; right-yard or half-yard-
standing, right arm flexion. In these instances, the commencing
position indicates that the right arm only is moved.
The rack half-lying, double arm extension (G. R.), and the
yard half-lying arm flexion (P. R.), with resistance of one
gymnast, has been described, page 71; left rack standing
arm extension (G. R.), and left yard standing, arm flexion
(P. R.) are described, page 72. When two gymnasts resist,
they stand behind and sideways of the patient, one places the
hand next the patient on his shoulder, and the other on the
external side of the wrist. The position of the rest of the body
in which the arm flexion and extension may he executed, are
the standing, sitting, kneeling, lying, and hanging positions;
in the last only with one arm. The trunk and legs may he in
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
fall, inclined, twist, walk, stride, curtsey, squat, kick, and other
positions.
Instances: 1. Yard walk standing, double arm flexion (P.R.)
and extension (G. R.). Two gymnasts stand, one on each side
of the patient, whose arms are in yard position, and the legs in
walk position, and place one of their hands on his hip or on
his shoulders, and the other, during the arm extension (G. R.)
or flexion (P. R.), on the outside of the wrist joint. During
the arm extension (P. R.) or flexion (G. R.) the second hand
is placed inside of this joint.
2. Rack right walk standing, arm
extension (P. R.) and (G. R.), fig. 121.
If the patient is strong enough, one
gymnast stands in pass position be¬
fore him, and places the back of his
hands on the in¬
side of the patient’s
stretched hands.
Fig. 122 illustrates
this position much
clearer; the palm
(lgl) of the gymnast’s < m >
left hand and the back of the patient’s left hand are seen, the
first on the inside of the patient’s right hand, and the second on
the back of the gymnast’s right hand; when the strength of the
hand is deficient, the resistance is given on the wrist joints.
Fig. 123 illustrates one of the inter¬
mediate positions of this movement,
which finishes with the arms of the
patient being in yard position. Fig.
124 shows how the
gymnast places his
hands on those of
the patient in rack^
arm extension (G.
R.), the patient’s
>hands in the hori¬
zontal position, are covered outside
(iM)
by those of the gymnast.
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3. Yard Standing, double arm-flexion (P. R.). and extension
(G. R.), differs from the first instance by the feet of the patient
being placed apart.
4. Rack pass standing, double arm extension (G. R.) and
flexion (P. R.), one of the feet is placed about two or three dis¬
tances forwards from the fundamental position, in which the
feet are placed heel on heel at a right angle.*
6. Right rack left walk standing, arm extension (G. R.) and
flexion (P. R.). The arm extension (G. R.), precedes the flexion
(P. R), because the arms are bent at the shoulder joints in the
commencing position—the left leg and right arm are specified
by the name of the commencing position; the left leg might be
placed into walk-position, while the right arm only is moved.
6. Rack chine lean, close-standing double arm-extension
(P. R.). The patient leans with his chine against a horizontal
bar, one gymnast places one foot transversely before the toes of
the patient in close position, to prevent them from slipping,
and •with his hands he fixes the patient’s hips; two other
gymnasts stand behind the patient on the other side of the bar,
place one hand on the shoulder the other on the back of the
stretched hand, and execute the movement while the patient
resists; the arms are brought into the rack position actively,
that is, by the patient alone. The active flexion and half-active
extension are alternately done three times.
7. Rack chine lean fall close standing, double arm extension
(G. R.). This differs from the previous by the patient's body
being in fall position.
8. Yard thigh opposite inclined-standing, double arm-
flexion (P. R.). The patient leans with the anterior side of
his thighs against a padded horizontal bar, while his body is
inclined forwards, and the arms kept horizontally outwards.
9. Rack chine lean reclined-standing, double arm-extension
(P, R.). The commencing position is similar to No. 5, only
the body is reclined.
10. Yard abdomen opposite crooked standing, double arm-
flexion (P. R.). The body, which is bent forwards, leans with
the abdomen against a horizontal bar.
* The more detailed description of the pass position, with the engravings
may be seen at pages 127 and 144 of my hook, “ The Core and Prevention of
Diseases by Movements.”
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200
On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
11. Yard abdomen opposite deep crooked standing, doable
arm flexion (P. R.). The bending of the body is more consi*
derable than in the previous movement.
12. Half rack twist standing, arm extension (G. R.). Either
arm may be stretched forwards, and the body twisted on either
side, because neither the arm nor the side is specified, conse¬
quently the body may be in twist position to the right, and the
left arm in rack position; or the contrary may take place, and
the arm of the side to which the body is twisted may be in rack
position. When a definite arm and side are to be used, this is
especially expressed, as in the following instances; half raok,
twist standing (right rack, left twist), arm extension (G. R.),
which means that the movement is done successively with both
arms; but when the right arm is used, the body is twisted to
the left, and when the left arm is to be moved, the twist is to
the right; the words “ right rack twist ” indicate that the right
arm is used, and the body twisted first on one side and then on
the other side in succession; “ alternate twist ” means that the
movement is done while the body is twisted alternately to one
and the other side; " right rack, right twist,” in a parenthesis,
denote that the arm of the side to which the body is twisted is used.
18. Yard span standing, arm flexion (P. R.). One arm is
in yard, the other in span position, and when the movement
is done three times, the position of the arms is changed, and
the movement repeated three times.
14. Rack stride high kneeling, double arm extension (G. R.)
The patient's knees are placed apart on an elevated level.
15. Yard inclined standing, double arm flexion (G. R.). The
resisting gymnast places one hand on the shoulder, and the
other on the inside of the patient’s wrist joint.
16. Rack stride fall sitting, double arm extension (G. R.).
The patient’s knees are fixed by a third gymnast.
17. Rack oblique high sitting, double arm extension (G. R.)
The patient’s hips are fixed by a third gymnast, while the body
is bent on one side.
18. Wing yard twist high stride sitting, arm flexion (P.R.)
One gymnast executes the movements, a second stands behind
the patient, and while fixing the hips, places one of his hands
on the patient’s hand in wing position.
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207
19. Bight yard left stretch left oblique high stride sitting,
arm flexion (F. R). One gymnast fixes the knees, a second
the hips, while the third executes the movement.
20. Bight rack left angle leg-forwards-lying, arm extension
(G. B.). The legs are fixed by a gymnast sitting upon them.
21. Half yard twist forward-leg-lying, arm flexion (P. B.).
22. Back leg-lying, double arm extension (G. B.). One
gymnast fixes the legs, two others, while resisting the move¬
ment, Support the patient’s body.
23. Wing rack twist forwards-leg-lying, arm extension
(P. B.); may be done in four different ways, by changing the
arms and the side to which the body is twisted.
24. Yard stem lying, arm flexion (P. E). The patient is
supported at the abdomen by one or two gymnasts, who at the
same time prevent him from bending the knees, while the third
gymnast executes the movement.
25. Yard swim hanging, arm flexion (P. B.). The feet and
abdomen are supported by gymnasts.
26. Back hanging, arm extension (G. B.). The patient’s
body is prevented from twisting by a gymnast fixing the hips,
but when he becomes stronger this assistance is unnecessary.
# Upper and forearm flexion
Is a flexion of the arms at the shoulder and elbow joints at the
same time.
The arms of the patient in stretch-position are slowly drawn
down into the heave-position, and this action is continued till
the upper arms are in their whole length at the side of the
trunk while the forearms are bent back on the upper arms, the
gymnast resisting during the whole movement; when the
resistance is made by the patient, the movement is also called
arm-down-pressure. In this case it is advisable that the
patient should slightly bend his arms in the commencing posi¬
tion, and special care should be taken that the shoulders of
the patient should be raised as little as possible during the
movement.
When the upper and forearm extension (P.B.) is done, and
the arms are brought from the position, close to the trunk into
the stretch position, the movement is called guiding; by the
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208
On the Swedish Gymnastics,
same name is also designated the upper and forearm flexion,
when done from the stretch position to flight position. The
movement may be done with one or with both arms in a variety
of commencing positions as regards the rest of the body.
Instances.—1. Stretch stride sitting, double upper and
forearm flexion (G.R.) and extension (P. R.) See page 83,
figs. 113, 114.
2. Right stretch right walk standing, upper-and- forearm
flexion (G.R.), and extension (P.R.) See page 82, fig. 112.
3. Free standing, double upper and forearm extension (G.R.),
from the position forearms bent up. The gymnast in right-
walk position takes hold of the bent forearms at the wrist
joints, and resists while the patient stretches both arms upwards.
The dotted lines indicate the final position.
4. Stretch close standing, upper-
and forearm flexion (G.R.), (fig.
125).
5. Half stretch fall stride stand¬
ing, upper and fore arm flexion
(G.R.) The patient’s feet are placed
apart (stride), he reclines with the
whole body a little backwards (fall),
the right arm is stretched upwards
(half stretch), one gymnast stands
behind him on a chair and executes
the movement, while two other
gymnasts standing one at each side
of the patient, fix his hips, if he
is unable himself remain in the
stride position.
6. Half stretch reclined walk standing, upper and forearm
flexion (G.R.). This movement is done three times in suc¬
cession, with one arm and leg, after which the patient changes
his position, and the movement is done three times with the
other arm and foot. If no limb is specified, the arm and leg
on opposite sides are used.
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209
7. Half yard walk standing, double upper and forearm flexion
(active) and extension (G.R.). The arm in the horizontal
position is brought forward by the patient, until the tips of the
fingers touch the opposite shoulder. One gymnast fixes the
shoulder with one hand and resists on the wrist joint, while
the patient stretches his arm, two other gymnasts, one before
the other behind the patient, fix his hips during the extension
backwards, done in a horizontal line, and at the height of the
shoulders. The movement can only be executed with perfect
exactness by one arm at a time.
Forearm flexion and extension
Is a flexion and extension of the arms only at the elbow joints.
Instances.—1. Heave elbow support half lying, arm ex¬
tension (P. R.) and (G. R ) The patient sits on the flap, by
which name the low operating chair with a moveable back
is frequently distinguished. Two gymnasts stand one on each
side of the patient, with one foot on a chair, the patient puts
his elbow on their raised knees or thighs; the gymnasts fix the
upper arms, and take hold of the patient’s forearms, at the inner
side near the wrist joint, and extend the forearms, which
action the patient resists. When the forearm extension (G. R.)
is done, the gymnast resists by taking hold of the wrist joint
outside. The forearm flexion (G.R. and P.R.) is similar to
those described, pages 13 and 14, where the commencing
positions only are different.
Hand-flexion and extension
Is a flexion and extension of the hand at the wrist joint.
Instances.—1. Half-lying, double-hand flexion (P.R.), and
extension (G.R.) is described page 65, fig. 92.
2. Yard stride sitting, double hand flexion (G.R.), and exten¬
sion (P.R). The patient sits with his feet apart, while the knees
are fixed by a gymnast, two other gymnasts standing sideways
take hold of his arms, and resist while the patient moves the
hands at the wrist joints, the fingers being kept stiff (hand-
VOL. XIII, NO. LII.—APRIL, 1855. P
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
flexion G.R.) from this bent position the hands are extended
by the gymnast while the patient resists, and this is hand-
extension (P.R.).
3. Arm support stride fall sitting, double hand flexion and
extension (P.R.) and (G.R.)* The flexion as well as the exten¬
sion are done three times with resistance of the patient, and as
often with resistance of the gymnast.
Finger-flexion and extension .
Is a flexion and extension at the finger joints alone, and is also
called fist clenching and fist opening.
The finger-flexion and extension are frequently combined
with the same movements of the hands. In some cases, only
the thumb or one of the other fingers is acted upon. The
finger-flexion and extension are done at the metacarpal joints
only, or on any other of the finger joints; in all these cases,
the rest of the hand must be well fixed, and any action at the
wrist prevented by the gymnasts. The arms may be in yard,
rack, or other positions.
Leg flexion and extension .
Before entering into the description of these movements it is
necessary to mention the bending and stretching side of the
joints of the leg; while the body is upright the hip and ankle
joints are bent forwards and stretched backwards, the knee and
toe-joints are bent back and stretched forwards, consequently
the flexions and extension of the joints vary on the anterior
and posterior sides of the leg.
Flexion and extension of the hip joints alone, while the knee
and ankle joints are kept stiff, is called according to the different
positions in which these movements are performed, leg-raising,
leg-lifting, leg-guiding, leg-downwards-pressure, and will be
described under these heads.
The flexion in the hip and knee joints at the same time, in
the direction upwards, is also called knee-flexion or knee-up-
wards-pulling. The extension of the hip and knee joints at the
same time, in the direction downwards, is named knee-extension,
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211
and also knee-down-pressure. The knee-flexion and extension
are also done in different directions, as forwards, outwards, or in¬
wards, expressed in the prescription by the words “ in different
planes,” which words are enclosed in a parenthesis.
Instances.—1. Stretch grasp inclined reclined squat heel
lean standing, knee flexion (G.R.) and extension (G.R.) See
page 78, figs. 108, 109.
2. Yard squat half lying, double knee extension (P.R.), and
flexion (G.R.). Two gymnasts standing one on each side and
before the patient, fix with one hand the shoulders, while the
other is placed on the knees.
8. Wing squat half lying, double knee extension (G.R.) and
flexion (P.R.). Two gymnasts fix the hips with one hand,
and place the other hand on the lowest part of the posterior side
of the thigh near the knee joint.
4. Wing stride standing, double knee flexion (P.R.), and ex¬
tension (G.R.). The gymnast stands behind the patient on an
elevation, and reaching over him, places his hands on the hands
of the patient. He then presses the slightly resisting patient
down, till his knees are bent, and then the patient again, by
stretching his knees, raises himself while the gymnast resists.
When two gymnasts assist, they stand one on each side, and
behind the patient, and place their hands on the patient’s hands
in wing position; they cross one of their arms in such a manner
that the right hand of the gymnast standing on the left, is on
the patient’s right hip covered by the other gymnast’s left
hand; the contrary takes place on the other side, the two
gymnasts may also be placed one before the other behind the
patient, in which case they also mutually cover one of their
hands.
5. Opposite standing double knee flexion, (G.R.) and exten¬
sion (G.R.), with stomach and loin pressure. This is an in¬
stance of a half-active movement, combined with a passive, viz.,
the pressure in the stomach and loins, done by two gymnasts
standing one on each side of the patient. They cross one of
their hands on the stomach, and press the parts of the body
mentioned during the whole action.
p 2
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212
On the Swedish Gymnastics,
6. Speak grasp squat standing, knee extension (P.R.), with
stomach pressure. Two gymnasts fix the hips and make the
passive movement, while the third pushes the knee down.
7. Span grasp squat reclined standing, knee extension (P.R.)
8. Span grasp reclined half standing, knee flexion (G.R.).
Nos. 7 and 8 are frequently done alternately.
0. Stretch grasp squat hanging, knee extension (P.R.), in
different planes.
10 Stretch grasp hanging, knee flexion (G.R.), in different
planes. Nos. 9 and 10 tire also done alternately.
11. Span grasp lean squat standing, knee extension (G.R.)
and (P.R.), in various plans.
12. Span grasp lean half standing, knee flexion (G.R.).
Flexion and extension of the legs in the knee joints only.
Instances.—1. Air standing, knee extension (P. R.) and
(G.R.). The gymnast stands sideways near the leg in air
position, fixes the knee with one hand, and places the other
on the heel; when the extension is done by the patient,
he places his hands on the anterior side of the ankle joint
and resists.
2. Opposite half standing, knee flexion (G.R.). The gym¬
nast kneels sideways near the leg, which is to be bent, prevents
the knee from being pushed up and forwards, with one hand
and resists with the other placed on the back of the heel.
8. Forearm support reclined air forwards lying, knee exten¬
sion (P.R.). The hips and knees might be well fixed.
4. Half long sitting leg extension, and flexion (G.R.) The
legs in long position, resting on a second chair, and the
hips are fixed by two gymnasts, while a third executes the
movement.
5. Half lying, leg- extension and flexion (G.R.). These two
movements are also called calf spanning.
Foot flexion, and extension.
Is a flexion and extension of the legs at the foot joints
Instances.—1. High opposite standing, foot extension (P.R.)
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213
and foot-flexion (G.R.). This is also called instep spanning.
See description of the movement, page 76.
2. Half lying, foot flexion (G.R.) and (P.R.) and foot exten¬
sion (P.R.) and (G.R.). See description of this movement,
pages 67 and 68, figs. 94, 95, 96, 97.*
3. Instep support standing, knee-flexion (P.R.) and knee-
extension (G.R.) The patient stands on one foot while the in¬
step of the other leg which is bent at the knee, is on an elevated
level, as in fig. 37, while the rest of the body is upright.
4. Toe support toe-standing, knee flexion (P.R.) and knee
extension (G.R.)f For the two last instances the patient takes
hold with his hands of the high back of a chair placed in front
of him, two gymnasts stand one on each side of the patient,
and place each one hand on his shoulders; one gymnast
places the other hand on the heel of the patient, while the
second gymnast presses with his second hand on the loins.
The patient bends slowly the knee of the straight standing leg,
while the gymnasts press the whole body as much as the sup¬
ported foot; afterwards the patient, by extension of the pre¬
viously bent knee, raises himself while the gymnasts resist.
Toe flexion and extension
Being analogous to the finger flexion and extension, are usually
done in lying and half lying positions, but also in some kneeling
and standing positions; the patient’s leg and instep must be
perfectly fixed so as not to permit any movement except of the
toes; the shoes must be off, and care taken that the stockings
be not too short or tight, as is often the case, and which pre¬
vents the development of the moveability natural to the toes.
Instances.—1. Half-lying, toe flexion and extension (G.R.)
and (P.R.). The position of the gymnast is the same as in
* Pages 179 and 180 of my book, “ Prevention and Cure of Diseases by
Movements.”
f The commencing and final positions of the patient are engraved pp.
184 and 185 of my book, “ The Prevention and Cure of Diseases by Move¬
ments.”
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214
the half-lying foot flexion and extension; the movement should
be done only on one foot at a time, and the second gymnast
assists in fixing the foot.
2. Half stride kneeling, toe flexion (G.B.) and extension
(P.R.). The patient kneels with one leg, the other is standing
on the floor.
Head-flexion.
The movements of the head in which it is bent in any
direction are usually denoted by the word “flexion,” as, for
instance, forward-flexion, backwards-flexion, sideways-flexion,
and when the head is in turn-position, oblique-forwards-flexion,
oblique-backwards-flexion; or more definitely, right-oblique-
forwards-fl ixion, and left-oblique-backwards-flexion of the head,
&c. All these movements are generally executed by the patient
while the gymnast resists; the word “ extension,” to denote a
head movement in a direction opposite to a previous head
flexion, is less frequently used.
Head-hack flexion
Is a flexion of the head baekwards.
Instances.—1. Standing-head-back' flexion (G.R.). See
page 86, figs. 117, 118.
2. Twist sitting, head back flexion (G.R.). The flexion being
done in twist sitting position, the head is directed obliquely
backwards, therefore in right twist sitting position; the back
part of the head being turned to the left, the flexion is done
obliquely backwards towards the upper and posterior angle of
the left shoulder blade.
8. Swim hanging, head back flexion (G.R.). The patient
being nearly in a horizontal position the flexion is in fact in an
upwards direction, and the gymnast resists from above.
4. Stem lying, head back flexion (G.R.). is similar to the
preceding as regards the head movement.
5. Stretch inclined stride-standing, head-back flexion (G.R.)
Weak patients must be supported by a gymnast taking hold of
the stretched arm of the patient.
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6. Lying, head back flexion (G.R.). With the exception of
the head, the patient lies on a low couch, the head with the
chin down is bent forwards, and supported by both hands of a
gymnast, standing or sitting near the head ; a second gymnast
standing sideways, fixes the shoulders by pressing them on the
oouch, mid a third gymnast pulls the arms down which the
patient himself stretches down near his thighs.
Head forwards flexion
Is the bending of the head forwards, and may be executed in
positions similar to those in which the head back flexion is
done, and in many other commencing positions.
Head sideways flexion
Is the bending of the head to one side. This movement is
very difficult to execute without either a slight or strong turn of
the throat, so that often a head-turning is performed with it.
The movement executed alternately on both sides is “ alternate
head sideways flexion.” Head-sideways flexion means that the
movement is done first three times on one side, and then as
often on the other.
“ Head right sideways flexion ” is the movement to the right
side only. “ Left-head-sideways flexion ” is the movement to the
left only. If the head is turned to either side and then bent, the
movement is called “ head-oblique-backwards flexion, head-ob-
lique-forwards flexion,” and if more specified, “ head-oblique-left
(or right) back flexion.”
In right-turn-position of the head, the sideways flexion back¬
wards is called “ head right oblique back flexion,” and is done in
the following manner:—The gymnast places his hands on the
right side of the patient's head, and resists while the patient
bends the head, the forehead being turned towards the right, to
the upper and posterior angle of the right shoulder blade, in
such a way that the forehead and back parts of the head are
equally near to this point.
Head left oblique forwards flexion, is a flexion of the head to
the left and forwards, while the head turned to the right is
bent towards the left collar bone.
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Instances.—1. Standing, left head flexion (P.R.) is described
page 54.
2. Swim hanging, head alternate sideways flexion (G.R.).
The patient must be prevented by the gymnast from moving
the shoulders.
3. Stomach opposite right turn and twist deep crooked
standing, head right oblique hack flexion (G.R.). The body
and head being bent to the right, the head bends hack towards
the right shoulder.
4. Left turn and twist leg stride lying, head right oblique-
fore flexion (G.R.). The head is bent towards the right collar
bone.
5. Speak lying, head-sideways flexion (G.R.) and (P.R.).
The patient’s head is resting on one of the gymnast’s hands,
while the other hand executes the movement; the patient’s body
lies on a low couch, and two gymnasts fix the shoulders and
pull the arm down.
Trunk "Flexion .
The terminology of the trunk flexion is analogous to that of
the head flexion, the word “ extension” being seldom used for the
bending movements of the trunk, which are denoted by the
word “flexion”; trunk flexion is made in the directions for¬
wards, backwards, sideways, obliquely forwards, and backwards;
and is called forwards, backwards, sideways, alternate-sideways
flexion; right side, left side, oblique forwards, oblique back¬
wards, right oblique forwards, left oblique backwards flexion,
are the names of the various bending movements of the
trunk.
The oblique trunk flexions are sideways flexions, done in a
twist position; one shoulder is directed obliquely forwards or
backwards. The usual flexion forwards in twist position, in
which the trunk also bends obliquely forwards or backwards,
while the shoulders are moved equally forwards or backwards,
are called forwards and backwards flexions, or are also further
defined by the addition of the word “ straight.” In the trunk
flexion the patient usually executes the movement while the
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217
gymnast resists; but when the gymnast executes the trunk
flexion and bends his arms, the patient resists, it is called
pulling, and pressure or pushing when his arms are stretched.
Trunk back flexion, also called back flexion.
This movement is generally executed in sitting and in long
sitting positions, and combined with a raising up of the trunk into
the erect position, which raising is always either active or passive.
During the hack flexion the gymnasts resist, and stand in the
following twenty-eight instances before or behind the patient*
according to the nature of the commencing position. The
patient sits with his back near one of the short edges of the
flap, or of the high bench. One gymnast fixes the legs of the
patient as firm as possible, and two other gymnasts place one of
their hands on the back part of the head only ; but when the
patient is in the stretch or yard position, they place their other
hands on the arms of the patient, and resist. If the patient is
very weak, it is also necessary to give a support to the back, by
placing the fore arm on it. The patient must execute the
flexion so far that his trunk comes into the horizontal position,
and the head even lower.
Instances.—1. Sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
2. Stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
3. Twist-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
The patient bends obliquely backwards, and both his shoul¬
ders must be on a level. When one shoulder is lower than the
other, it becomes an oblique back flexion. To distinguish
between the flexions in twist position and the oblique backwards
flexion, the word straight is added to the first.
4. Twist stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
5. Jump-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
6. Twist jump-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
7. Stretch-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
8. Stretch stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
9. Stretch twist sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
10. Stretch twist stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
11. Stretch jump-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
12. Stretch jump twist sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
18. Yard-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
14. Yard stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R,.)
15. Yard twist-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
16. Yard jump-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
17. Long-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
18. Long stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
19. Long twist sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
20. Long twist stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
21. Stretch long-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
22. Stretch long stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
23. Stretch long twist-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
24. Stretch yard long-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
25. Half yard long-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
26. Yard long sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
27. Yard-long-twist-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
28. Yard long twist stride-sitting, back-flexion (G.R.)
In the following five instances (29, 80, 81, 82, 33) one gym¬
nast, standing or kneeling before the patient, fixes the hips;
two other gymnasts execute the movement.
29. Chine-lean stride-standing, back-flexion (G.R.)
30. Yard-stretch chine-lean walk-standing, baok-flexion (G.R.)
31. Stretch twist chine-lean close-standing, back-flexion (G.R.)
82. Left-stretch right-rest chine-lean oblique-standing, back-
flexion (G.R.)
33. Close-standing, back-flexion (G.R.) One gymnast in front
of the patient fixes the legs ; two others standing side¬
ways with one of their legs prevent the patient from
sliding backwards. They place one of their hands
covering each other, on the abdomen, while the others
are placed on the occiput.
Trunk Forwards Flexion, also called Fore Flexion.
The patient bends the body forwards, while the gymnast
resists, and raises the body actively into the original position.
Two or three gymnasts are necessary in these movements.
They stand at the side of the patient* and place their hands on
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219
his chine and the anterior surface of his shoulders ; or in
stretch or yard position, on the arms, and support the patient,
that he may be able to execute in the prescribed position the
forward flexions and the active raising up of the body, which
are to be done alternately three times. In the step standing
positions, a gymnast sits in a stride position on a chair, and
taking hold of the patient’s leg in step position, places the foot
between his thighs or knees on the chair, and fixes it in the step
standing position.
Instances.—1. Standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
2. Stride-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
3. Twist-standing, forwards flexion (G.R.)
In the twist position both shoulders remain at the same
level. If one were lower than the other, the movement would
be an oblique-forwards-flexion.
4. Yard-stretch walk-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
5. Stretch stride-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
6. Stretch twist-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
7. Yard-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
8. Yard twist-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
9. Walk-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
10. Stretch walk-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
11. Yard walk-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
12. Step twist-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
13. Stretch twist step-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
14. Yard twist step-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
15. High opposite-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
16. High opposite-stride-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
17. High opposite yard-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
18. High opposite stretch-standing, forwards-flexion (G.R.)
Trunk-Sideways-Flexion, or Sideways-Flexion.
The body is bent sideways by the patient into oblique posi¬
tion (fig. 71), while the gymnast resists, and then it is raised
actively up into the commencing position. The resistance is
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
given either on the head or on the arm-pits, or on the lateral
parts of the chest.
The various sideways flexions of the trank are analogous to
those of the head, and are called right or “ left sideways flexion,”
“ altemate-sideways-flexion," &c.
Instances of sideways flexion in free standing position; that
is, where no mechanical apparatus is used during the execu¬
tion of the movement:
The gymnast stands before the patient, and places one hand
in the arm-pit of the bending side, and the other hand on the
shoulder of the opposite side, or sometimes on the hip of that
side. Fig. 13 shows the final position of “ left-stretch right-wing
left-walk-standing, left sideways-flexion (active,).”
1. Wing-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
2. Stride-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
3. Walk-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
4. Twist-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
The patient bends the body generally to tbe side of the
shoulder which is directed forward, and such a movement is de¬
signated by oblique-forwards-flexion. The movement done in
the direction of the shoulder which is turned backwards is
called oblique-backwards-flexion. If the twist is a definite one,
and the movement done only on that side; as for instance, in
the right-standing position, then we denote the sideways flexion
done forward by “ left-oblique-forwards-flexion "; and when the
movement is done backwards, by right-oblique-backwards-
flexion.
5. Twist stride-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
6. Step-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
The flexion is done generally in the direction of the straight¬
standing leg, and is then also designated by “ sideways-back-
flexion,” and in the opposite direction by “ sideways-forwards-
flexion.”
7. Twist foot-edge support-pass-standing, sideways-flexion
(G.R.) (oblique-forwards-flexion, oblique-backwards-
flexion.) - .
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The patient places the foot, whose internal edge is to he sup¬
ported in at least two instances, on an elevated level.
8. Stretch-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
9. Half stretch standing, sideways-flexion. The arm of the
bending side is generally stretched while the gymnast
resists with one hand on the stretched arm, and with the
other on the shoulder of the opposite side.
10. Stretch twist-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (oblique-
forwards-flexion, and oblique-hack-flexion.)
11. Stretch twist stride-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
12. Half-stretch step-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (for¬
wards-flexion and backwards-flexion.) The flexion is
done generally on the side of the straight leg.
13. Yard-stretch foot-support pass-standing, sideways - flexion
(G.R.), (oblique-forwards-flexion, oblique - backwards -
flexion.) The arm which is opposite to the bending side
of the trunk is in yard position. The gymnast standing
behind the patient presses one hand on the arm which is
in yard position, and resists with the other in the arm-pit
of the stretched arm.
14. Half-yard-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
15. Yard step-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.), sideways-for-
wards-flexion and sideways-backwards-flexion.
16. Half-yard foot-support pass-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
(oblique-forwalrds and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
17. Half-yard-walk-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
Instances of trunk-sideways-flexion in lean-standing position:
18. Chine-lean-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
In the chine-lean-standing position, one gymnast standing
before the patient, fixes the hips, by pressing them towards the
horizontal bar against which the chine leans.
19. Chine-lean stride-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
20. Half-stretch chine-lean-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
21. Half-yard chine-lean-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
22. Yard chine-lean-standing, alternate sideways-flexion (G.R.)
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
The gymnast stands behind the patient, places one hand
under one forearm, the other upon the other forearm, near the
elbow-joints. The patient bends first sideways towards that
arm under which the hand of the gymnast is placed, and before
he moves in the opposite direction, the gymnast changes the
position of his hands. This flexion is done three times on each
side.
23. Yard-stretch chine-lean-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
The patient is in stretch position on the side on which he
bends, while the other arm is in yard position.
Instances of trunk-sideways-flexion in hip-lean-standing* posi¬
tion :—
24. Hip-lean-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
In the hip-lean-standing position the patient leans with one
hip against the horizontal padded bar, while the hip is fixed by
a gymnast standing sideways, and pressing the body towards the
bar. Weak patients, being unable to keep their legs stretched
during the movement, must be assisted by a second gymnast
kneeling behind the patient; frequently a third gymnast, stand¬
ing on the other side of the bar, is necessary to fix the head and
body in the same plane ; while the fourth gymnast, standing
before the patient, executes the movements.
25. Right-hip-lean walk-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
20. Left-stretch right-yard hip-lean right-walk-standing, side¬
ways-flexion (G.R.)
27. Right-stretch left-rest left- hip - lean left-twist right-walk-
standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
28. Left-stretch left-hip-lean right-walk-standing, left-sideways-
flexion (G.R.) See figs. 119 and 120.
Instances of trunk-sideways-flexion in deep crooked standing
position:—
In the deep crooked-standing position the feet and hips are
fixed in a similar way as illustrated in fig. 90, in the crooked-
standing trunk-raising.
28. Deep-crooked-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
ty Google
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228
29. Twist deep-crooked-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
30. Half-stretch deep-crooked-standing, alternate sideways -
flexion (G.R.)
The gymnast takes hold of the stretched arm of the bending
side of the patient, and resists.
81. Half-stretch twist deep-crooked-standing, sideways-flexion
(G.R.), (oblique-forwards-flexion and oblique-backwards-
flexion).
32. Half-yard deep-crooked-standing, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
The arm which is opposite to the bending side is gene¬
rally in yard position.
33. Half - yard twist deep - crooked - sideways - flexion (G.R.),
oblique-forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion
34. Yard deep-crooked-standing, altemate-side-flexion (G.R.)
35. Yard - stretch deep - crooked - standing, sideways - flexion
(G.R.)
36. Yard-stretch twist deep-crooked-standing, sideways-flexion
(G.R.), oblique-forwards-flexion and oblique-backwards-
flexion.
Instances of trunk-sideways-flexion in sitting-position :
The sideways flexion in the sitting position may he done also
on both sides alternately.
37. Sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
88. Stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
39. Twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (oblique-forwards and
oblique-backwards-flexion.)
40. Twist stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (oblique-for¬
wards and oblique-backwards-flexion) fig. 126.
41. Half-stretch-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
42. Half-stretch stride sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
43. Half-stretch twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (oblique-
forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
44. Half-stretch twist stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.),
(oblique-forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
45. Half-yard-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
46. Half-yard twist-sitting, sideways flexion (G.R.), (oblique
forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
47. Half-yard twist stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (ob¬
lique-forwards and oblique-baokwards-flexion.)
48. Yard stretch oblique stride-sitting sideways-flexion (G.R.)
(figs. 127-128.)
Instances of trunk-sideways-flexion in long-sitting position:—
49. Long-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
60. Long stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
61. Long twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (oblique-for¬
wards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
52. Long twist stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (oblique-
forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
53. Long half-stretch-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
54. Long half-stretch stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
55. Long half-stretch twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.),
(oblique-forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
56. Long half-stretch twist stride-sitting, sideways-flexion
(G.R.), (oblique-forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
57. Long half-yard-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
68. Long half-yard twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (ob¬
lique-forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
59. Long yard-stretch-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
60. Long yard-streteh twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.),
(oblique-forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
61. Long fall-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
62. Long fall stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
63. Long fell twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.), (oblique-
forwards and oblique-backwards flexion.)
The flexion is generally done on the side which is twisted
backwards.
64. Half-stretch long fall-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
The arm is stretched either on the side to which the body
bends, or on the opposite side. In the latter case the gymnast
presses during the flexion with one hand towards the inward
directed palm of the patient’s stretched hand, and places his
other hand in the arm-pit of the unstretched arm.
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225
65. Long fall half-stretch stride-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
66. Long fall yard-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
67. Long fall half-yard-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
68. Long fall half-yard twist-sitting, sideways-flexion (G.R.),
(oblique-forwards and oblique-backwards-flexion.)
Instances of trunk-sideways-flexion in forwards-leg-lying position:
One gymnast sits astride on the patient’s calves, and fixes
them (see figs. 72, 73); another standing near the patient’s
head resists, by placing one hand on the shoulder of the side to
which he bends, and at the same time supports the patient with
the other hand placed on the other shoulder, especially if he is
weak.
69. Reclined forwards-leg-lying, sideways-flexion (G.R.)
70. Reclined twist forwards leg-lying, sideways-flexion (G.R.)»
(oblique-upwards-flexion.) In this position the patient
reclines obliquely-upwards and obliquely-downwards;
therefore the sideways-flexion may be also called upwards
and downwards-flexion.
71. Half-stretch reclined forward-leg-lying, sideways-flexion
(G.R.) The arm of the bending side is generally
stretched.
72. Half-stretch twist forwards - leg - lying, sideways-flexion
(G.R.), (oblique-upwards and oblique-downwards flexion.)
73. Half-yard reclined forwards-leg-lying, sideways-flexion
(G.E.)
74. Half-yard twist forwards-leg-lying, sideways-flexion (G.R.),
(oblique-upwards and oblique-downwards-flexion.)
Instances of trunk-sideways-flexion in sideways-lying position :
In the sideways-lying position the feet, knees, and hips must
be fixed by two or three gymnasts; and during the sideways-
flexion, which is then an upwards or downwards-flexion, the
gymnast resists slightly with one hand, supports with the other
band the patient’s body, and prevents him from leaving the
plane in which the flexion is done.
75. Right-angleright-sideways-lying, left-sideways-flexion (G.R.)
76. Left-angle right wing left-leg-sideways-lying, left-sideways-
flexion (G.R.)
VOL. XIII, NO. LII.—APRIL, 1855. Q
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826
On the Swedish Gymnastics,
( 126 )
77. Wing twist leg-sideways-lying, left-sideways-flexion (G.R.),
(upwards and downwards-flexion.)
I have referred the reader to the following
three figures representing stride-sitting,
side- ways-Jiexiom, as their detailed des¬
criptions might he of some practical use.
78. Left twist stride-sitting, right side¬
ways-flexion (G.R.) (fig. 126.) The
patient is fixed at the thighs by a gym¬
nast, whose hands only are shown in the
engraving. A second gymnast standing
behind the patient resists the right-side¬
ways-flexion with his right hand placed
in the patient’s right arm-pit, and at the same time assists with
his left hand placed on the left shoulder to keep the patient in
the twist position.
79. Right-stretch left-yard left-
twist left-oblique stride-sitting,
trunk sideways flexion (G.R.)
with left arm pressure (fig. 127).
In the commencing position in
which the patient is fixed as
before, the second gymnast re¬
sists with his right stretched
arm placed on the patient’s
right wrist, and presses with
his left on the patient’s left arm, in order to induce him to
keep this arm in the yard position, and the body in left twist
position; the patient moves only in
the spine, and thus comes into
the right oblique position as illus¬
trated by (fig. 128). When this
latter position is the commencing
one, and the sideways flexion is
done by the gymnast while the
patient resists; the movement is
also called trunk sideways pulling,
( 128 ) because the gymnast actually pulls
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227
the patient’s body sideways, but when fig. 120 represents the
commencing position, from which a sideways flexion to the
left is to he done by the gymnast, while the patient resists, the
movement is oalled trunk tideways pushing , because the gym¬
nast pushes the patient’s body from himself. Many of the
preceding instances of flexion and extension may consequently
serve as instances both of pulling and pushing movements,
the words “ flexion or extension ” being necessarily followed by
the letters (P.R.). According as the gymnast is to pull to, or to
push from him a part or the whole of the patient’s body, the
movement is designated as a pulling or a pushing one.
Although the preceding instances are numerous, they still
form but a part of the trunk-sideways-flexion, which is a most
important movement in many diseases; but I hope these
instances will be sufficient to prove how rich the stock of
medical gymnastics is, and that my previous statement of 2,500
movements being hitherto known is not at all exaggerated.
RAISING UP MOVEMENT.
Is a movement by which either a part, or the whole of the
limbs, or the head, or the trunk, or several of these parts
together are raised from a lower plane into a higher one; the
movement is done either with resistance of the gymnast, or the
patient.
Raising of the arms ,
Is most commonly done from the lying position, but can be
done also in standing, kneeling and sitting positions, and
consists in raising the arm, which is moved only at the shoulder
joints, while the arm in the elbow and wrist joints is stretched
and kept perfectly stiff; several raisings of the arms are
frequently designated by arm guiding.
Instances.—1. Speak half lying, double arm raising (G.R.)
(fig. 120.) The patient moves the arms forwards and upwards
to the rack, yard or stretch position; two gymnasts stand one
on each side of the patient, whose shoulders they fix with
one hand, while with the other placed on the wrist, they resist
2q
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228
On the Swedish Gymnastics,
the raising of the arms; the en¬
graving shows the commencing
position, with the hands of the
gymnasts placed as mentioned;
the dotted arms of the patient,
with the hands of the gymnast,
show the final position, which is
in this instance rack position.
( 189 )
2 . Yard lying, arm raising (P.R.) Two assistants standing
one on each side and near the head of the patient, raise the
arms into rack-position till the patient’s hands touch each
other.
3 . Stretch lying, arm raising (P. R.) Two assistants raise
the arms into rack position, while a third fixes the body.
4. Stretch speak lying,
arm raising (G. R.) (fig-
130.) The arms are raised
simultaneously till they
are in rack position, and
are replaced actively in
the commencing position;
when the movement has
been done three times the
position of the arms is changed, and then the movements
repeated as before; the engraving exhibits right-sp/eak left-
stretch stride-lying, arm-raising (G.R.) (to rack position); the
direction of the arrows shows how the arms are moved into the
final position.
5. Right walk standing, arm raising (P.R.) Two gymnasts
raise the stretched and downwards directed arms, either into
rack-, span-, or stretch-position, according to the prescription;
a third gymnast standing behind the patient fixes the body
either by placing his hands on the patient's hips, or on both
sides of his chest, stronger patients do not require a third
gymnast. ,
6 . Yard speak high half-sitting half-kneeling, arm-raising
(fig. 131) (G.R) One arm is brought from yard position into span
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229
position, the other from speak
into yard position. The engra¬
ving exhibits right-yard left-
speak commencing position, the
hand of the gymnast is placed
on the right arm of the patient
in such a manner as is necessary
to resist him, and on the left arm
the hand of the gymnast is shown
as placed when the patient re¬
sists, his shoulders being fixed
by the hands of the gymnasts
executing the movement; and
on the hips are seen the hands of the third gymnast.
7. Back- half lying, arm raising (P.R.) The arms are
raised by the gymnasts into the stretch position.
Fore-arm raising,
The movement is analogous to the forearm flexion.
Instances.—1. Lying, forearm raising (G.B.) Two gymnasts
standing one on each side of the patient, whose arms are
stretched while the palms of the hands touch the thighs, fix
with one of their hands the upper arms, and resist the move¬
ment with the other placed on the wrist joints till the forearms
are in a vertical line.
2 . Standing (with the arms half
forwards bent) forearm raising (G.B.)
(fig. 132.) The upper arms of the
patient are in yard position, the forearms
are bent in a forward direction, at right
angles with the upper arm, hand and
fingers well stretched, palm inwards.
The gymnast stands behind the patient
beneath whose arms he places his arm,
and takes'hold from above of the wrist
joints on which he presses while the fore¬
arms are raised, which is done by turn¬
ing the upper arm in the shoulder joints, so that this move-
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230
ment belongs also to the half-active arm-rotations; the engra¬
ving exhibits one of the intermediate positions, the two dotted
lines the direction in which the forearms are while in the com¬
mencing position.
Hand- and finger raising.
These movements are also analogous to the various hand
and finger flexions, the forearms must be perfectly fixed in the
hand raisings which are done while the forearm and hand are
perfectly stretched.
Instances.—1. Yard standing hand raising (G.R.)
2. Rack standing hand raising (G.R.)
The finger raising is done either with the palm of the hand
resting on a horizontal plane, or the hand resting with the ulnar
edge only on the horizontal plane, while the fingers are spread
or kept together; the gymnast resists by placing his hands either
on all fingers, or on a single finger only, while the forearm and
wrist as well as the metacarpus are kept perfectly immovable.
Leg raising.
Is a movement by which the leg kept perfectly stiff in the
knee and ankle joints is raised upwards at the hip joint, with
resistance of the gymnast or patient; several of the following
instances are also designated by the name of leg-guiding.
Instances.—1. Lying, leg raising. (G.R.) The patient raises
one leg, while the gymnast places one or more fingers on the
toes of the foot to be raised, and resists very slightly; the
perfectly stiff leg is raised to the height of a foot or a foot and
a half above the couch.
2. Forearm support re¬
clined forwards lying, leg
raising. (G.R) (fig. 133.)
One gymnast fixes the body
by placing one hand on the
patient’s chine, and the other on the leg which is resting; a
second gymnast resists the leg-raising by one hand placed on
the heel, while his other hand taking hold of the anterior and
lowest part of the thigh, assists to keep the leg stretched, which
is raised 6 to 8 inches. The engraving exhibits the common-
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m
cing position, while the movement is done on the left leg,
which is supported above the knee by the left hand, and
resisted at the heel by the right hand of the gymnast executing
the movement, and standing on the left of the patient; the
two hands fixing the chine and right leg belong to the gymnast
standing on the right of the patient.
3. Stride lying, leg raising (P.R.) One gymnast fixes the
hips, the second the resting leg, and the third, who executes
the movement, places himself in a right walk crooked position,
takes hold with both hands of the patient's leg, which he raises
to the height of 12 to 18 inches by raising himself from the
crooked into the erect position.
4. Half rack sideways
lying, leg raising. (G.R.)
(fig. 134). This is properly
an abduction of the leg, the
arm of the side in whioh
the patient lies is in rack
position, a pillow supports
the head, in order to bring it into the mesial line. One gym¬
nast standing before the patient fixes the body by placing one
hand on the uppermost hip, and the other hand below under
the knee of the leg which rests; the other gymnast behind the
patient resists with one hand pressing on the knee, and the
other on the ankle joint while the patient raises the leg. The
engraving exhibits left-rack left sideways lying , right leg rais¬
ing. (G.R.) The right hand of the gymnast fixing the patient
is shown On the hip, while the left hand is pieced below the
patient’s left knee; the right hand of the gymnast who resists
is placed on the right ankle-joint of the patient, and his left on
the patient’s left knee; the raised leg shows the final position.
5. Yard-grasp ohine lean half standing, leg forwards raising.
(G.R.) One gymnast behind the patient fixes the hips, while
the other kneeling before and sideways resists the movement.
6. Hip lean close high standing, leg sideways raising. (G.R.)
The patient leaning with bis hip against a horizontal padded
bar, is fixed by a gymnast standing near the leaning side, while
another gymnast either before or behind the patient resists the
movement by his hand, placed on the ankle joint.
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On the Swedish Gymnastics,
7. High opposite swing standing
leg forwards raising. (P.R.) (fig. 185.)
The patient stands on an elevated
level opposite a vertical plank, and takes
hold with both hands at the height of
the hips, of pegs projecting on each
side of the plank. One gymnast
standing sideways fixes the body by
plaoing one hand on the chine hone
and the other on the os pubis; a
second gymnast standing behind the
patient places also one hand on the
( 135 ) chine hone, and the other on the heel,
and raises the leg forwards, while the patient resists, the dotted
lines show the direction of the leg in the backwards raising;
when the movement is done with resistance of the gymnast,
the hand of the latter is placed on the anterior side of the
ankle-joint. The engraving exhibits high opposite right swing
standing, leg forwards raising (P.R.) The gymnast fixing
the body is on the patient’s left; the gymnast executing the
movement is shown in the final position.
Knee-raising,
Is similar to the knee upwards flexion, an instance of which is
shown in fig. 108.
Heel-raising.
One or both heels are simultaneously raised, while the toes
remain on the floor.
Instances.—1. Wing walk standing, heel raising. (G.R.) Two
gymnasts take hold each of one foot joint by placing one hand
on the back of the foot, and the other on the heel; the body
is kept erect while the heels are raised from two to four inches.
2. Rectangular standing heel raising. (G.R.) The feet are
at a right angle to each other, as in fig. 39.
3. Stride standing, heel raising. (G.R.)
4. Stride sitting, heel raising. (G.R.) Two gymnasts fix
the toes with one hand, and with the other resist at the heel.
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233
Foot-raising.
The foot is raised while resting on the heel; this is analogous
to a foot flexion. It is very difficult to execute the movement
with both feet simultaneously, and therefore it is advisable to
make the movement alternately with the right and left foot, in
walk standing, stride standing, rest-angular* and other standing
positions, the resistance is given by one hand placed on the
patient’s metacarpus.
Toe-raising,
Is an extension of the toes in standing position, while the foot
is well fixed, and a slight resistance opposed by the gymnast’s
hand placed on the toes, when the patient makes the movement.
Toe raising (P.R.) is best done while the foot is on an elevated
level, and the toes only projecting beyond the edge of the level
so as to allow the gymnast to take hold of the toes.
Head raising,
Is a bending of the head either backwards, forwards or sideways,
according to the various commencing positions.
Instances.—1. Forearm support forwards lying, head raising.
(G.R.) One gymnast resists while placed near the patient’s
head, and his hands transversally on the occiput; a second
gymnast standing sideways fixes the body by placing his hands
on the shoulders.
2. Sideways lying head raising. (P.R.) The head is raised
laterally upwards by one gymnast, while a second fixes the
body.
Trunk raising.
The movement consists in raising the trunk straight up,
either from the inclined or fall position, and is combined in the
first case with trunk back flexion, and in the second with a
trunk forwards flexion. Also from the oblique position a
trunk raising is done laterally, and is similar to many of the
trunk sideways flexions. The trunk raising done from the
inclined or crooked position, is also called back raising, and the
trunk which is bent forwards, is not only raised to the vertical
' but also reclined backwards, while the gymnast resists; the
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On the Swedish Gymnastics ,
body is brought again into the commencing position, either
passively or actively. The resistance is given by the gymnast
placing his hands on the back parts of the head, or on the
shoulders, or on the region of the loins. The exact place on
which the resistance is offered is mentioned in the prescription,
either as head-pressure, shoulder pressure, or loin-pressure,
and if the resistance is to be done only on one side, this is
expressed by the addition of right or left to the words “ head,
shoulder, or loin pressure."
Instances.—1. Crooked standing, hack raising (G.R.). The
patient with his feet at a right angle, and the heels close,
stands with the body bent forwards and the arms hanging
down, two gymnasts stand one on eaoh side in walk position,
and fix with their posterior feet the patient’B feet, and place one
arm on the abdomen the other on the back of the patient’s head.
The hands of the gymnasts cover eaoh other on the abdomen
as well as on the head; the hands on the abdomen serve as
a support, and remain fixed, while those on the head resist till
the patient’s body gets into the reclined position. A passive
movement, called abdomen fulling, executed by the gymnast’s
hands, is sometimes combined with this movement.
2. Stretch deep crooked stride
standing, back raising (G.R.) (fig.
136). The engraving exhibits the
commencing position. Two gym*
nasts standing on each side of the
patient resist with one hand at the
stretched arm, with the other on
the head. The hands placed on
the back of the head cover each
other.
3. Crooked walk standing, back raising. (G.R.) As the
foot which is to be placed in walk position is not specified, the
movement is done three times, with one leg forwards, and as
often with the other in walk position.
4. Crooked step standing back raising. (G.R.) This move*
ment is also to be done successively, first with one foot, and
then with the other, in step position.
( 13 «)
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235
5. Crooked heel support standing
back raising (G.R.) (fig. 187.) The
patient is bent forwards, places the
heel of one foot on an elevation, and
stretches his hands towards a gym¬
nast standing, or kneeling before him,
who resists the raising; the engraving
exhibits crooked right heel support
standing , back raising (G.R.) The
dotted lines show the final position,
which is a reclining or fall position,
the hands of the gymnast are placed in those of the patient;
but the movement can be also executed in such a way that the
gymnast takes hold of the patient’s hands at the wrist joint, at
•which he pulls during the whole action.
ON ERYSIPELAS.
A Lecture delivered by Dr. Henriques at the Hahnemann
Hospital.
Erysipelas, which will be the subject of this night’s lecture, is
a special inflammatory process of the skin, involving sometimes
the subcutaneous cellular tissue. The distinguishing charac¬
teristics, as most of you are no doubt aware, are a shining red
colour of the affected part, which on pressure disappears, but
immediately returns on removing the finger, tumefaction, ten¬
sive burning pain, heat, and a great diversity of constitutional
phenomena, that appear to vary considerably in every case,
according to the nature of the remote causes, the previous
condition of the organism, and the sympathetic derangements
of the internal organs. The whole cutaneous surface is subject
to this affection; hence it has occasionally been found to spread
itself all over the body, but it shows in general a predilection
for certain regions, such as the head, face, neck, and extremities.
According to Oelsus, erysipelas of the legs was very common
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On Erysipelas,
amongst the Romans. Frank says that it attacks the lower
extremities in old people, cacheotic persons, and all those whose
occupation obliges them to stand up a great deal. In our age
it appears to attack more frequently the facial region. Be this
as it may, it is certain however, that neither age nor sex is
exempt from it—the newly-born infant and the decrepit old
man are equally susceptible to the disease, which reigns in
every country, climate, and season of the year; it is endemic in
some localities; there are certain, but inappreciable atmos¬
pherical constitutions which sometimes render it epidemical;
and, according to some authors, it may become also contagious
under special external conditions. It has been divided into a
great many varieties according to its anatomical phenomena,
the age of the individual affected, the concomitant symptoms
and complications it presents, the march it follows, and its
primary seat; but all these distinctions established by the old
school, must be regarded as merely nominal expressions of one
essentially identical affection, which varies its form in every
individual it attacks.
Although it is one of the oldest diseases recorded in the vast
and ever increasing catalogue of human disorders, the “ parti-
zans of legitimate medicine ” are at this moment as ignorant
of its true nature and proper treatment as their ancestors were
two thousand years ago; in fact, there is no affection upon
which “ rational medicine ” has so fully proved its irrationality
and incapacity, as is sufficiently evinced by its contradictory
theoretical views and practices.
“ A mystery,” says Mr. Travers, in his Inquiry concerning
Constitutional Irritation, “ has hung over erysipelas to this
day, which has rendered it a sort of enigma.”
“ Nosologists,” says the London Medical and Chirurgical
Review, Yol. XXI, “ scarcely know where to place it, the
systematics cannot tell how to treat it.”
After these humiliating avowals, I am at a loss to understand
upon what grounds the old school presumes to decorate itself
with the pompous and unmerited title of “rational medicine;’’
and it is truly surprising to me, to see in this age of science,
how men, with strong intellectual faculties, go on contented
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237
with their ignorance, and, as it were, denying to medicine the
right of progressive development, refuse to examine by the
positive test of experiment the homoeopathic method, that pro*
claims the discovery of a law, by virtue of which medicine is
rescued from the hitherto just charge of being a science of
reveries and an art of guess-work and conjecture. Instead of
loading with most opprobrious epithets the partizans of this
medical reform, it appears to me that it would be much more
“ rational and legitimate ” if allopathy were to study homoeo¬
pathy, and dispassionately judge of the merits of its improved
method of treating disease; for the legitimacy of error is an
absurd faction, truth alone is the only lawful heir to human
respect and obedience; 'it is therefore perfectly ridiculous to
style the old system rational and legitimate merely on account
its antiquity. Such men as Morgagni, Hunter, and Bichat
must ever receive the admiration of all scientific men, but
allopathy,; as a system of practical medicine, must give way to
the new light of reason and experience. Homoeopathy has
already effected a great good in the camp of Cur enemies, by
modifying the abuses of medicinal substances, and I have no
doubt that the time is not far distant, when homoeopathy, modi¬
fied and rectified by the master minds of medical science, will
be admitted as perfectly rational and legitimate in the domain
of medicine. -
Our knowledge of the pathological anatomy of erysipelas is
still very imperfect, although it has recently very much engaged
the attention of modem pathologists. All are agreed as to the
character of the lesions observed on the skin, but with respect
to the anatomical element previously affected, there exists a
great difference of opinion. According to Bibes, the venous
capillaries of the integuments are the primary seat of erysipelas;
he has observed the internal coat of these small veins inflamed,
and their cavities filled with pus. But it has been demonstrated
by M. Bayer, that these lesions of the capillary veins are not
constant; and he very properly remarks, that the pus found by
M. Bibes in the veins might have been absorbed.
M. Blandin thinks that the lymphatics are primarily affected,
because, says he, erysipelas is often preceded by pains in the
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238
ganglions, and red lines are observed in those parts where the
inflammation will subsequently establish itself; and, as a fur¬
ther proof, he adds, that oedema frequently occurs during con¬
valescence from erysipelas, which must result either from venous
or lymphatic inflammation, or from obliteration of the vessels
which circulate the lymph.
Dr. Armstrong and Mr. Travers considered the nervous
system as the primary seat of this affection: indeed, Mr. Travers
calls it a “ nervous inflammation.” Without pretending to solve
this problem, gentlemen, the pathology of erysipelas seems to
me, to consist essentially in inflammation of the lymphatic
system, and I attribute the difference of opinions simply to the
particular complications observed by each author. I believe
that the cutaneous inflammation is always posterior to the
lesion of the lymphatic system, as you may readily convince
yourself in every case by inquiry into the precursory symptoms
of an attack of erysipelas. You will always find that it is
preceded for several days by a remarkable derangement of the
health, a painfdl tumefaction of the glands in the neighbour¬
hood of the region where the eruption will take place, and not
unfrequently the eourse of the inflamed lymphatics may be
traoed on the skin; in illustration of which, we have now in
C.’s ward, an admirable instance in a child, who entered the
hospital for phlegmonous erysipelas, following a scald on the
foot. In this case you could distinctly trace the line of
lymphatics from the great toe to the inguinal glands which
are now in a state of suppuration. This is a highly inter¬
esting case, but as the result is not yet known, I shall reserve
its history and what I have to say on it for another lecture.
Let us now turn from these general observations to the cases.
Case I.
Mary Tracy, a florid, robust, and healthy-looking servant
girl, of a sanguineous temperament, and cheerful disposition,
was admitted in C.’s ward on 16th February, complaining of
redness, heat, pain and swelling of the left leg. She states that
she is sixteen years of age, and has always enjoyed good health.
The catamenia first appeared two years ago—ever since
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she has menstruated regularly and naturally. About six days
ago she fell and struck the affected leg, and ever since this
accident she has been suffering great pain, which has gradually
increased, till she is now unable to continue her work, and it is
so much swollen that she can scarcely walk. On examination
the leg was found to be very hot, red, and swollen, from the
ankle upwards to within a third below the knee joint; there
was some degree of febrile action; pulse 90, full and strong;
occasional shiverings ; redness with burning heat of the face ;
redness of the conjunctiva and sclerotica; dryness of the mouth ;
tongue red; and agitated sleep at night.
Ordered Tincture of Belladonna, one drop 3rd dilution, a fourth
part every 4 hours. Quarter diet.
17th.—No fever; inflammatory appearance of the leg dimi¬
nished ; a small circumscribed blackish-looking spot, like ecchy-
mosis, is observed at about the centre of the anterior surface of
the leg. Continue medicine and diet.
18th.—Is better in every respect; the black spot observed
yesterday now assumes the aspect of a scab upon an excoriated
surface.
Discontinue medicine. Same diet. Arnica lotion to be
applied over the scab.
20 th.—All constitutional disturbances and local inflammation
have entirely disappeared; the scab is loose and very easily
detached.
Same diet. No medicine. Continue Arnica lotion.
21 st.—Continues well; scab has come away, leaving an
excoriated-like surface about the size of a shilling.
Same diet. No medicine. Continue Arnica lotion.
24th.—Ulcer has cicatrized; feels quite well, except that
she experiences some uneasiness and forcing before evacuating
the faeces—faeces rather dry and hard.
Sulphur 5 /i 2 , in four doses, one night and morning. Half diet.
Discontinue Arnica lotion.
27th.—Quite well. Discharged cured.
I do not consider, gentlemen, the foregoing case to be one of
those simple evanescent attacks of erysipelas, which frequently
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On Erysipelas ,
disappear spontaneously, by the sole reactionary effects of nature,
in the space of a few days. It belongs to that variety which has
been designated traumatic, because the cutaneous inflammation
originated from external violence; but traumatic erysipelas always
supposes a special individual predisposition, or a certain atmos¬
pherical constitution, without which it would not occur; hence
such cases must never he left to nature, hut, on the contrary,
they should always be considered as complicated, requiring
prompt and energetic remedial aid. This case was further
aggravated by the circumstances of her sanguineous tempera¬
ment, plethoric habit of body, and the symptoms of cerebral
congestion which were manifest by the state of the circulatory
system, the burning heat of the face, and hyperemia of the
eyes. Considering the local inflammatory action, the constitu¬
tional disturbances, and the age of this patient, it would have
been thought impossible, by a practitioner of the old school, to
cure this affection without sanguineous depletion. You have
seen, however, the prompt manner in which it was combatted
by a few doses of the tincture of Belladonna of 3rd dilution.
This remedy is one of the most powerful and efficacious reme¬
dial agents we possess in the cure of erysipelas; it was indicated
by the symptoms present, but it is useful because its specific
action is on the lymphatics and venous capillaries, which I
believe to be always the primary seat of the disease; hence
it has been employed in all affections resulting from congestion.
Its pathogenetic effects clearly demonstrate its homoeopathicity
with erysipelas, as you will find on referring to the Materia
Medica. There are, no doubt, many other valuable remedies
which act also on the several portions of the venous system—as
for instance, Digitalis on the right side of the heart; Nux
vomica on the venae ’portae; and Sulphur on the cutaneous
capillaries; but you will find none corresponding so exactly with
the pathognomonic signs of erysipelatous inflammation: in fact,
gentlemen, Belladonna produces a sort of artificial cutaneous
inflammation which is very analogous to natural erysipelas.
That this very valuable remedy really acts on the venous
system, you will not fail to be convinced, if you will reflect on
the numerous symptoms appertaining to its pathogenesis, bear-
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mg particularly in mind, that the whole superficial system of
veins is visibly congested. This explanation of the action of
Belladonna on the economy is also confirmed by morbid ana*
tomy. Thus it is said by M. Giacomini, one of the highest
allopathic authorities on Materia Medica: “ The bodies of indi¬
viduals who have been poisoned by Belladonna, present a black¬
ish-blue hue, and their tissues decompose rapidly. Although
some persons pretend to have seen traces of phlegmasia, it is
easy to discover that what is so called by them is simply owing
to venous congestion. The intestines are distended with gas,
and present neither inflammation nor any other organic lesion."
The very day after taking Belladonna there was a marked
amelioration in the patient, which continued till the fifth day
after her admission, when all traces of the erysipelas had disap¬
peared.
It was necessary on the third day to apply an Arnica lotion
to the hlack looking spot, which I have described in the history
of the case. I was apprehensive at first sight that it was
gangrenous, but on further reflection I became convinced that
it was merely ecchymosis, not resulting fronf the blow, but
arising from rupture of some of the over-distended capillary
veins, and consequent effusion, or simply from morbid exhala¬
tion of the disordered vessels, a circumstance occurring fre¬
quently in acute inflammation of the mucous and cutaneous
tissues. The Arnica lotion, by stimulating the absorbents,
directly promotes the absorption of the effused sanguineous
fluid, and so cures ecchymosis and its consequences. On the
fifth day after its application, all discoloration of the skin
vanished, but the patient still complained of some abnormal
phenomena during defecation, which were promptly relieved by
a dose of Sulphur, and was discharged on the 27th, the eleventh
day after her admission, perfectly well.
Case II.
Francis Smith, 40 years of age, but having the appearance
of a man of 60, short and thin, lymphatic temperament, and of
a worn out constitution, was admitted on 8th January. He
states that he is a huxter by trade, has lived hard, has had cold
VOL. Xin, NO. LII.—APRIL 1854. R
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On Erysipelas,
and cough for three weeks; he struck his right leg against a
truck about six days ago. Immediately after the accident he began
to experience great pain, which was followed by beat, 'swelling,
and redness; since then he has gradually grown worse, till he
is now unable to walk, and feels himself very ill.
On examination there was found considerable tumefaction
from the right knee to the ankle, with shining redness, heat,
and great pain, so muoh so that he could not bear the slightest
touch. There were no signs of external violence.
He appeared stupid, agitated, and frightened, with trembling
of the limbs; pulse was extremely small; there was great
prostration both of mind and body; he has vertigo as if intoxi¬
cated ; eyes sparkling, red, and pupils dilated; tongue was red
and dry; mouth as if parched; great thirst; loss of appetite;
abdominal functions normal; urine turbid and scanty; cough
with hoarseness and weakness of voice; soreness idong the
larynx; the cough is dry, and more troublesome at night; re-,
spiration was short, slow, and anxious, but there was no dys¬
pnoea ; palpitation of the heart, to which he has been subject
some time.
Tr. Bellad. 1 /a a 7<tb part every 8 hoars. Quarter diet.
9th—Erysipelas has extended up to the groin, although it is
very much diminished in intensity; dept tolerably well; pulse
regular and more developed; there is not so much prostration;
in other respects much the same as yesterday.
Continue medicine and diet.
10th.—Cough has been very troublesome during the night;
erysipelas is very much diminished in intensity; there does not
exist the red and shining appearance of the leg, nor is there
much tumefaction, although here and there are observed spots
of a bluish hue, like petechiee; there is also a large bladder on
the great toe of the inflamed leg; pulse is fuller, but there is
still a great want of mental and corporeal activity, not amounting,
however, to prostration.
Quarter diet, with two ounoes of meat in addition.
Bhus 3 /i>, a 7«th part every 4 hours.
11th.—Is very much better in every respect; the vesicle on
the great toe has burst and discharges a quantity of serum.
Continue diet and medicine.
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12th.—Better.
Continue medicine and diet with the addition of potatoes.
14th.—All traces of erysipelas have disappeared ; desquama¬
tion of the skin of the great toe; much dry cough, particularly
at night; nurse discovered to-day, at twelve o'clock, that nearly
half the posterior surface of the affected leg appeared blaok, the
patient himself was not aware of it till informed by the nurse;
it resembled ecchymosis, and the skin looked shrivelled without
any pain. The lungs and heart were minutely explored, but
nothing abnormal was discovered; the pulse, although regular,
was still feeble; digestive and urinary functions normal.
Same diet. Arsenicum 3 /iz, a l jei h part every 4 hours.
15th.—Black appearance of the skin not so diffused nor deep
coloured; tendency in some parts to form vesicles; general
health is much improved.
Rhus lotion. Rhus 3 /n, a 1 l*th part every 4 hours.
16th.—Is better in every respect.
Continue medicine, lotion, and diet.
17th.—Improving. Continue medicine. Half diet.
19th.—Several excoriated spots on the back part of the leg.
Improving otherwise.
Discontinue lotion. Arsenicum 3 /», a 1 /«th part night and
morning.
22nd.—Excoriated parts quite cicatrised; feels quite well.
25th.—Discharged cured.
Remarks. —This, like the preceding case, appertains to that
variety of erysipelas designated traumatic, but if they resemble
each other in the similarity of their origin, they differ materially
in their march, complication, character and duration. The
first patient was dismissed cured the eleventh day. Smith’s case
was prolonged till the seventeenth day; this protracted duration
of the disease was no doubt due, partly to the complication of
the cerebral and functional disturbances, and partly to the
vicious state of this individual’s constitution, which also im¬
parted to the disease the peculiar characteristics that it displayed
in its tedious and tortuous maroh. The former case occurred
in a young girl of robust health, the latter in a man of middle
r 2
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age, and of a broken constitution from intemperance and bad
food. Notwithstanding this difference. Belladonna was first
indicated in both cases. Having previously discussed the use
and action of this remedy in erysipelas, I shall now simply
observe, that it was administered in this instance because it
corresponded, not only to the local inflammatory affection, but
it was likewise homoeopathic with the cerebral and functional
groups of symptoms. It was given in the form of tincture on
account of the acuteness of the symptoms; its good effects on
the constitutional disturbances, as well as the local phenomena,
were evident, notwithstanding that the erysipelatous blush had
extended itself up to the groin. This occurrence I viewed
rather in a favourable fight, because I have always found when-
. ever the disease gradually spreads itself on the same surface,
and at the same time the intensity of the phenomena diminish,
that it augurs a happy termination; hut very different is the
prognosis if the disease assumes an erratic course. It is not an
unusual occurrence for erysipelas to fly from one region to
another, in this case it behoves us to be guarded in our opinion
as to the result. The remedies you will find most suitable to
its fugacious character are Belladonna and Rhus, more espe¬
cially in its acute form, and Graphites when it is chronic.
Although Belladonna had a marked influence in arresting the
inflammation, the patient was not however in a satisfactory
state, for on the third day another series of phenomena pre¬
sented itself, which led me to apprehend an unfavourable result:
I remarked a great deficiency of vital power; the nervous centre
appeared affected; the bronchial affection had increased; the
pulse, although fuller, was still extremely feeble; bluish spots like
petechia were manifest, and there was a large vesicle on the great
toe. Now when we add to these facts Ihe circumstances that
he was of intemperate habits, that he was of a feeble constitu¬
tion, it was much to he dreaded that he would fall into a
typhoid state, the issue of which would no doubt have been
fatal. In order to combat the present symptoms, I prescribed
Rhus toxicodendron, the salutary effect of which was evident
on the following day. This remedy was indicated by the
petechia, the vesicular character of the erysipelas, the cough.
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and more especially by the atony which seemed to pervade
all the internal organs. You will perceive that instead of
diminishing his food, I added to his quarter diet two ounces
of meat; I was induced to act thus, because the patient had
a desire to eat, and because there was no contraindication; had
there been any gastric derangements, it would have been very
unwise to give him meat. There is, gentlemen, no question in
practical medicine more important and more difficult of solu¬
tion than that of determining in acute affections, the time,
the quantity, and the quality of food you should give; no
absolute rule can be laid down, in the actual state of our
knowledge upon this topic. I always consult the instinct of
the patient, and if I find that there is no want of assimilating
power, and that there is no reason why I ought to abstain from
nourishing the patient, I usually give food, regulating the
quantity and quality to the actual want, condition of the eco¬
nomy, and the character of the disease. This was a case in
which the allopathio practitioner would have given not only
a nourishing diet, but he would also have considered wine,
brandy, and all sorts of diffusible stimulants indispensable.
Under the use of Ehus he continued to improve till the 14th,
when suddenly almost half of the posterior surface of the
affected leg turned black and shrivelled; this phenomenon was
no doubt due to sanguineous effusion from rupture of some
of the inflamed venous capillaries : the Ehus was discontinued
and Arsenicum was given, which corresponded to the totality
of symptoms, and the same diet was continued. On the fol¬
lowing day the patient was better. I again had recourse to
Ehus, which he continued taking for three consecutive days,
then Arsenicum was. repeated which completely cured him.
This patient was discharged on the 25th, in perfect health,
seventeen days after his admission into the hospital. Ehus and
Arsenicum are the best and .most appropriate remedies in vesi¬
cular erysipelas, particularly of an acute character. Ehus was
preferred in the first instance because it hew a specific action
on the cerebral functions, the symptoms of which corresponded
to those that were developed in this case; it was followed by
Arsenicum, when the cerebral group of symptoms ceased, and
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On Erysipelas,
the leg assumed a blackish hue. Arsenio is more especially
indicated when the vesicles are of a blackish aspect, or there
is tendency to gangrene. Both were necessary to remedy the
great prostration of mental and oorporeal strength, which did
not seem to me to arise so much from the malignity of the
affection, as from want of his customary stimulating drinks.
I must confess that I was at one time inclined to give him
some spirituous beverages, and the only reason which prevented
my doing so was, that his appetite was good, had this failed
him, I should certainly have considered myself warranted in
administering to him porter. Habit is second nature, is a
common saying, the truth of whioh you will frequently find
exemplified in the practice of medicine—indeed, the physician
who is regardless of the habits of his patients, will often
commit fatal errors; I do not mean to say that you should
blindly adopt any irrational habit of patients under your care,
you must exercise an unbiassed judgment, based upon unques¬
tionable facts of observation and experience. It is notorious
that men who are accustomed to live almost exclusively on
malt liquors, such as probably was the case with Smith, do
not bear well generally its sudden privation, and in acute affec¬
tions, you have no time to wean the economy from habitual and
artificial stimulus. It is true I have known patients to die from
the injudicious and excessive abuse of the stimulating method
of cure; but I must confess also, that I have seen others die
from a contrary cause. Hence, gentlemen, with respect to the
use of stimulants, in my humble opinion—we are not warranted
to adopt an absolutely exclusive opinion—you must regulate
your practice entirely by tbe habit, general condition of the
economy, nature of the affection, age, and numerous other
concomitant circumstances, which clinical experience alone will
teach you how to appreciate. The chief reason which pre¬
vented my administering stimulants to the patient, as I have
previously stated, was, that his appetite, which had completely
failed him before he entered, and that under the use of stimu¬
lants had so increased three days after his admission, that he
begged to let him have some meat, which was the more readily
acceded to as he had no symptoms whatever of gastritis or
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enteritis: be continued taking it from that day till be wa% dis¬
charged without the slightest inconvenience; in fact, he recovered
without any convalescence and left the hospital considerably
improved in flesh, strength, and healthy appearance. You will
have remarked, that on the 15th a Rhus lotion was applied
externally to the affeoted part, as he was taking the same
remedy internally, which was perfectly homoeopathic to the
morbid state, this outward application oould not possibly have
any inconvenience, and it did certainly contribute to bring the
patient more promptly and powerfully under the influence of
the remedy. There is no fear of repercussion under such cir¬
cumstances ; the frequent and fatal metastases which have so
often occurred in erysipelas, from the external application of
cold lotions, composed of vinegar, alum, copper and lead, arise
from their intemperate use, in oonformity with the erroneous
principles and notions of the allopathic school. A remedy
applied externally, according to the homoeopathic law, never pro¬
duces the reperoussion of disease, and it often accelerates the
cure.
Ca.se III.
The clinical history of tbe third and last case of erysipelas
I will relate to you, is that of Elizabeth Nash, an old woman,
72 years of age, who entered the hospital on 21st Novem¬
ber, for erysipelas of the left leg, and died in E ward, on
19th December, of gangrene of the womb. It would appear
from the records of my case book, that this person was never
married; she had lived regularly, and always enjoyed good
health till last March, when she got an attack of bronchitis, for
which she was attended by Mr. Engall as an out-patient, sub¬
sequently she heeame affeoted with boils on the thigh and leg,
then dysentery, anasarca, and lastly, she had a whitlow on the
thumb, for which she has taken several doses of Hepar sulph.
She became affected with erysipelas five days ago, and was
recommended by Mr. Engall to become an in-patient. The
symptoms present on her admission were, dry hacking cough,
worse at night; tongue very much coated; great thirst; no
appetite; bowels regular; felt for the first time this morning a
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On Erysipelas,
sense of tightness across the chest, which she attributes to a
fright; the left leg was very much inflamed, painful, swollen*
red, hot, and shining; the erysipelas, which first made its
appearance on the instep, now occupies the whole foot, and
has extended upwards, involving two-thirds of the leg. The
circulatory system in general, and the pulse at the wrist in
particular, presented nothing abnormal.
Belladonna 2 /aooth was ordered, which she took at once dry
on the tongue. Toast and water, with quarter diet.
23rd.-—Swelling and redness of the leg were less, but several
large bladders have appeared on various parts of the inflamed
surface; the leg is painful, which prevents her sleeping; there
is great thirst; foul tongue; urine abundant, but high coloured;
pulse normal, but weak; cough is better; extreme feebleness
of body and mind; great apathy and mental dejection without
melancholy; no appetite.
Tr. Lachesis, 1 j3, in 12 teaspoonfuls of water, one teaspoonful
every second hour. Quarter diet.
24th.—Slept much better; had very little cough during the
night; leg is still very much inflamed, with large vesicles ex¬
tending up to the knee; less pain; no fever; tongue clean; no
appetite.
Rhus 1 /3, V<th, every 4 hours. Same diet.
25th.—Inflammation is considerably reduced; spirits better;
urine high coloured; constipation.
Continue Rhus and diet.
December 4th.—From 25th ult. to this day, continued to
improve in every respect; a small .abscess formed about three
inches above the ankle, which broke to-day, and discharged a
quantity of thick purulent matter.
Ordered Hepar sulph. 8 / is, V«th, every 4 hours, and same diet.
6th.—Little or no discharge from the abscess; has no pain
in the leg; swelling diminished; pulse regular; tongue clean
and moist; bowels acted spontaneously this morning; com¬
plains only of weakness and want of appetite. Was allowed
some arrowroot at her own request. No medicine. Refused
to take wine or beer, states that she was not accustomed to
drink anything but water. v At eight o’clock this night was
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seized with rigors followed by great heat of skin; quick and
full pulse; much thirst; and an involuntary motion of an
offensive character, very abundant, thick, and dark coloured.
The nurse stated that on cleansing her after the motion, she
discovered a large tumour between the legs, which was reported
to me when I visited her at ten o’clock. On examination it
was found to be a complete prolapsus uteri: the neck and about
a third of the body of the uterus were perfectly gangrenous, the
uterus was not at all strangulated, it caused neither pain nor in¬
convenience,—in fact, the patient said that she was quite accus¬
tomed to it, for she has had a falling of the womb for the last
twenty years, which frequently comes down and returns, and
that she has never used any mechanical means for keeping it
up. She complains of nothing, save of a feeling of weakness;
her intellect is undisturbed; tongue moist and clean; no thirst
nor appetite; pulse feeble and rather accelerated, about 80;
respiration normal; coughs occasionally.
A linseed poultice to be applied to the gangrenous parts,
and Arsenicum l / 3 > in 12 teaspoonfuls of water, a teaspoonful
to be taken every second hour was ordered.
7th.—Has slept well; no fever; pulse regular and not so
feeble; had two evacuations, small, soft, and yellowish; com¬
plains of an aching pain in the left leg, upon which are found
two ulcers, one on the outer malleolus the size of a sixpence,
and of a red colour; the other on the instep, presenting a
lardaceous surface with black spots in the centre, like drops
of ink.
Secale Cornu 1. 1 /3, in 12 teaspoonfuls of water, a tea spoon¬
ful to be taken every second hour. (To take in the way of food
whatever she fancies.)
8th.—Had a paroxysm of> fever at eleven o’clock last night;
only one small evacuation this morning; no pain in the leg;
thick and offensive matter discharged from the ulcers; com¬
plains of soreness and burning heat at the sacrum, which, on
inspection, was found to be very red, and skin disposed to
excoriate. Continue medicine tmd diet.
9th.—Had a paroxysm of fever at four p.m. the preceding
day; pulse was full, hard, and frequent, about 80; ulcers of
the leg extending.
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On Erysipelas,
Aconite 1 /a, 1 /*th, every 4 hours, to be taken during the
fever. As soon as the fever is gone off to have Tr. Secale
comut. l / 3 , 1 /uth, to be taken every seoond hour.
Slept well; had a natural evacuation. On consultation at
ten this morning with Mr. Wilson, it was deemed advisable to
redace the prolapsus uteri, whioh was instantly effected without
the slightest difficulty.
China 5 /*», V»th, every 4 hours. Same diet.
At half-past five p.m.. had a paroxysm of fever, which did
not last longer than three hours, and for which she took a few
doses of the Aoonite mixture that was prescribed yesterday,
after which she continued taking the China.
10th.—Had rather a restless night; slight cough; low spirits;
no evacuation; urinated several times; pulse regular, and by
no means feeble, although she complains of great weakness;
uterus has not descended; leg in the same state as yesterday.
Continue China.
Second visit at five p.m. —Had a natural evacuation in the
course of the day; relished her food; does not feel the sinking
sensation of which she complained, but is still very dejected.
11th.—Restless first part of the night, without any fever
however; slept four hours from four a.m.; had three evacua¬
tions during the night, the last one was watery; two small
ulcers on the sacrum.
Tr. Seoale 1 /a, Vnth, every second hour.
Visit at five p.m.— Has been very drowsy all the day; had
one profuse watery evacuation; pulse 60; no heat of skin;
no secretion or unpleasant smell from vagina. On examination
the uterus was found in its natural position and there was no
sloughing; leg still discharges.
Continue medicine.
12th.—Has had two watery evacuations; feels stronger and
better; continues in the same state in other respects.
Continue medicine.
13th.—Slept very well last night; had but one evacuation
which was still watery; several superficial suppurating ulcers
on left leg; oedema of the left foot and leg to the knee; pulse
80; fetid odour from vagina with watery discharge.
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Compresses of chloride of Zinc. Tr. Carb. veget. 1 /uth,
every second hour.
At five p.m.-— No diarrhoea; poise strong, about 60; com¬
plains of great weakness; discharge from vagina very fetid and
more abundant.
Continue chi. Zinc and medicine.
14th.—Slept well; had no diarrhoea; respiration has become
hurried; pulse regular, but much weaker; legs in the same
state ; appetite is good.
Continue medicine and compresses of Zinc lotion.
15th.—Diarrhoea has returned; two watery and profuse
motions; weakness increases; respiration is still hurried; is
evidently sinking.
19th.—From the 15th till this day, the diarrhoea continued,
the patient became more and more prostrate, and finally died
on the 19th.
Remarks. —Death is the ultimate natural sequence of life;
everything that begins to he, must progressively grow, become
old, and then die. Medicine has no power to prolong the
natural term of existence allotted to men, the province of the
physician is restricted to the more limited, but highly impor¬
tant and most difficult object of arresting prematnre death.
A person, who, like Nash, had attained her 72nd year of age,
may be said to have reached the goal of her earthly career, and
when death oocurs, no matter what are the accompanying
phenomena of decay, it may be called natural, at that period
of life. The first time I saw this patient, I prognosticated a
fatal issue. It is true that she had enjoyed good health till
within a few months of her death, but when old people, even
the most robust, begin to ail, one attack follows another in
rapid succession, they become weaker every day, a general
break up of the system is soon manifest, and they sink often
with astonishing rapidity from the most trivial cause. Such
is the clinical history of this patient. You will remark however,
that she did not die of the disease for which she entered, she
was admitted for phlegmonous erysipelas of the leg, and died of
spontaneous or dry gangrene of the womb, wbioh is a very rare
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On Erysipelas,
occurrence. No post mortem examination took place, because
I thought it unnecessary in a case in which there could not
exist any doubt as to the causes of death. It behoves, however,
the conscientious practitioner, in every fatal oase, to hold
council with himself, and enquire whether every means have
been adopted to save the patient ? whether he had committed
any error, either in the diagnosis or treatment of the disease ?
whether any other method of treatment would have possibly
prevented death? and lastly, whether death was inevitable?
By such self-examination, cases which terminate fatally are
equally as instructive as those which recover. With respect to
the case under consideration, I have no hesitation in replying,
1st, That no means were neglected; 2nd, That there was no
error committed; and 3rd, That death was inevitable. But it
may be asked, would not the bark and wine system, according
to the allopathic practice, have prolonged, if it did not save
life ? I believe not; on the contrary, I am of opinion that it
would have accelerated the death of this patient, because old
people in general, when unaccustomed to artificial stimulants,
bear them very badly; a contrary opinion is, I am aware, enter¬
tained by the members of the old method of treating diseases,
but experience, which is the only authority in such matters,
has taught me to be very cautious in administering stimulants
to aged persons. Nash was not only old, but she had never
been accustomed to stimulating drinks, and she was now quite
averse to take them; she was repeatedly asked if she would
like some beer or wine, which she constantly refused till the
7th, when, at her own request, she took some malt liquor for a
few days, which appeared rather injurious than beneficial to
her. I am not one of 4hose partizans of homoeopathy, gentle¬
men, who think that everything is wrong, and see nothing in
the practice of the old system but sad catastrophes and mon¬
strous evils; I do not therefore systematically and absolutely
oppose the use of vinous and malt drinks, so much abused by
ignorant practitioners of the old school, judiciously employed,
they are useful dietetic substances in certain morbid conditions,
and like all other articles of food, their use must be regulated
as to quantity and quality according to general hygienic prin-
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ciples and individual circumstances. In such oases as that of
Nash’s, I would allow my patients to take as much stimulant
as they required. Where the appetite has not been perverted
by intemperance, and reason has not lost its guiding influence,
you will find the instinct of the patient a safe and certain
monitor with respect to the use of stimulating drinks.
The erysipelas of old people usually attacks the inferior ex¬
tremities, and is frequently the result of over-distension from
oedema of the legs, and it is generally of a chronic character.
In the first instance Belladonna was given, which was followed
by Lachesis. You will find Lachesis a very valuable remedy
in this affection ; it is peculiarly adapted to old people, whose
exhausted nervous energy and languid circulation it seems to
arouse, and thus augments the power of resistance of the
economy. It has also a specific action on this disease.
Rhus was the next remedy given, which I thought indicated
by the inflammatory and oedematous state of the legs, as well
as the vesicular form which the erysipelas was now assuming,
and the manifest want of organic power. It no doubt had the
desired effect, for the oedema and inflammation became less,
and the strength of the patient improved, from the 24th No¬
vember to 4th December, when a small abscess above the ankle
broke, and discharged sofne thick purulent matter; several
other small elevations like boils were also observed on the
surface. On account of these phenomena Hepar sulph. was
administered, and the Rhus discontinued.
It was two days afterwards that a complete prolapsus uteri,
in a gangrenous condition, was accidentally discovered, which
rendered it necessary to change the remedy. Arsenicum was
administered on account of the involuntary evacuations, the
sensation of weakness, failure of strength, and sphacelation.
The displaced uterus was not reduced in the first instance,
because there was no constriction of the organ; it was perfectly
reducible, and as there was already a circumscribed line of de¬
marcation between the lining and the closed parts, I thought it
advisable to await till a separation took place. The process
of sphacelation continued, and with it other gangrenous spots
on the legs appeared, followed by diarrhoea and gradual ex-
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Case of Chorea,
haustion, to combat which, secale comut,, china, and carbo
vegetabilis, were successively employed, without exercising the
slightest impression on the disease; she became daily more
and more exhausted in spite of every remedial and dietetic
means, till death put an end—I shall not say say to her suffer¬
ings, for she had none, but to her life; she preserved her
intellect to the last—indeed, Nash might he said to have died
from the natural exhaustion of the vital principle, or in other
words, of old age.
CASE OF CHOREA.
By Dr. Edward Hamilton.
H. W., aged 14, was brought to me on September 9, 1864,
for consultation.
The history of the case is as follows:
About nine weeks ago he was walking with his father and
mother, carrying a light basket, when suddenly he let it drop
from his hand, (the right) and on taking it up again after
carrying it a short distance he again let it drop, mid then the
father noticed a slight trembling of the arm and fingers. No
notice was taken; the basket was not given him again; he got
home, had his supper and went to bed, and slept well; but the
next morning a constant spasmodic twitching was observed in
his right arm, more slightly in the right leg, and slighter still in
the muscles of the face and eye, on the right side. They sent for
the surgeon of the town, who prescribed a dose of some opening
medicine. The next day, however, the symptoms had increased
in intensity, and in two days had extended ito the arm and leg
of the left side. He then went regularly under allopathic treat¬
ment, and in the nine weeks previous to my seeing him they
had tried every means without effect, and had recommended him
to go to the sea as a last resource; this being impossible, the
boy was sent to me.
I found him in a most deplorable condition; he was lying on
a sofa, for he could not stand; there was constant jactitation of
all the muscles of the extremities and face; his arms and legs
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266
were continually moving one upon the other, bo that his clothes
were in tatters from the constant rubbing; his face was violently
distorted; if he attempted to speak there came a confused jabber
from him that was quite distressing, the very act of speaking
causing violent spasmodic action of the tongue and pharynx.
The only mode of feeding him was by one person forcing his head
slightly backwards, holding it with two hands, whilst another
gave him at intervals some spoon food, which he swallowed with
the greatest difficulty. His countenance had become quite
idiotic ; his eyes staring; his head constantly in motion; there
was a most distressed look; and his saliva ran at times from his
mouth, from the inability to swallow it.
On questioning the mother I found he had been perfectly
healthy up to the time of his seizure; there had been no signs
of worms, nor had he ever suffered from them ; that no cause
could be assigned for the attack; his father and mother were
very fond of him and always used him gently.
His tongue was clean, rather red; his pulse good; pupils
somewhat large; countenance pale, dark circle round the eyes;
skin yellowish and leathery; considerable emaciation ; chest
well developed; heart-sounds normal; liver normal; some slight
tumefaction of the abdomen; no protrusion of the umbilicus;
urine clear; bowels regular, rather constipated; hands and
feet warm, sleep disturbed by the jactitations of die limbs,
which are incessant.
The medicine I first prescribed was Cuprum metallicura 6,
two globuleslalternate nights for three weeks.
The following were some of the symptoms in the pathogenesis
of this medicine that led me to prescribe it: wandering staring
eyes; eyes are vacillating to and fro; paleness of the face; sad
dejected expression of features; spasmodic distortion of the
features; inability to talk owing to spasms of the throat;
general jactitation of all the muscles of the abdomen and ex¬
tremities ; tremor in all the limbs; twitchings of the fingers,
arms, hands, also during deep; spasms of the limbs, &o.
I ordered also a very careful diet of beef-tea and jelly; to be
soused in a cold bath every morning, and the stools to be care¬
fully watched, as, although I could not get any direct evidence.
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Case of Chorea ,
yet I suspected worms, either ascarides or lumbrici. I also
advised an emetic of salt and water.
On seeing the poor fellow again in three weeks I found him
much in the same state; perhaps there had been some cessation
of the twitchiDgs at night, but he could not remain a moment
on his legs; he could not speak; his countenance had become
much more distressed; he was more emaciated; there was less
staring of the eyes, more of a sunken look in them, there was a
complete dark ring round them. The parents had carefully
attended to him and had watched the evacuations, but there
were no indications of worms. I suspected masturbation, but
on examination I was persuaded that there were no grounds for
my suspicions. As there was no marked improvement under
the Cuprum, and my suspicions still tending towards the pre¬
sence of ascarides, I determined to try Cina, although the
symptoms do not so greatly accord, I think so much as under
Cuprum.
The following symptoms will be found recorded as the effect
of this medicine: “jactitation of the orbiculares palpebrarum
muscles. this symptom in the poor hoy was very marked.
“ Paleness of the face, and sickly appearance round the eyes;
convulsions and contraction of the limbs; paralytic twitchings
of different parts of the body, especially the limbs.”
Cina 12, four globules every night for eight doses, and then
every other night for eight doses.
At the end of the three weeks I had the following gratifying
report: that after taking the medicine a few days, there was a
decided improvement in the look of the hoy; he was able to
swallow his food with greater ease; the jactitation of the limbs
was less; and he slept better. That on the twelfth day of
taking the medicine, after rather a constipated stool, a mass of
ascarides came away in a lump, and that every day since worms
had passed in very large quantities ; that after the third day of
passing the ascarides, all the symptoms had lessened in a re¬
markable degree; he could sit still, take his food, sleep, &c.
I saw the hoy a few days after the report, and I never saw such
a remarkable change: his countenance was healthy looking, a
pleasant smile pervaded it instead of the ghastly stare; his
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257
limbs were nearly quiet; lie ran up and spoke plainly and
intelligibly. The thread worms were passing in large quantities
still. I continued the Cina, two globules of the 12th dilution,
alternate nights for three weeks, and then Sulphur V 12 , twice
a week for a month.
In the latter part of December he presented himself to me in
town perfectly free from all symptoms, and his mother informed
me that for a fortnight after I last saw him the evacuations
continued full of ascarides, passing daily, and that as they
became free of the worms, so did the symptoms become gradually
less, and that he had been some time free of the worms and of
the symptoms.
This case exemplifies in a remarkable degree the specific
action of Cina, in small doses, on the cause of the symptoms,
by restoring the mucous membrane to that condition in which
the parasites could not obtain their nourishment, thereby causing
them to pass from the intestines. It illustrates also the advan¬
tages of our system over the usual allopathic treatment of this
disease by expulsion of the ascarides with drastic remedies,
which attack tbe effect, not the cause.
REVIEWS.
On the use of Belladonna in Scarlatina , by J. Warburton
Begbie, M.D. Seventh Article in the British and Foreign
Medico-Chirurgical Review. January, 1855.
The contributors to our Allopathic contemporary have within
these few years adopted the practice of appending their names
to their compositions,—a practice of some importance to the
reviewed at least. When a strict incognito was preserved in the
periodical censorship of the vast orthodox body, the mysterious
“ we ” which fathered the opinions of an article, carried over¬
whelming odds against the victims of an adverse criticism.
Without any known limits to its collective magnitude, it bore
something of the air and authority of the common sense of
mankind when uttering its judgments, and the reclamations of
VOL. XIII, NO. Ln. — APRIL, 1855. s
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the defenceless parties at the bar were usually unheard or
unheeded. The new custom has altered matters a good deal for
the benefit of the once weaker side, since the “we,” whose
multitudinous voice formerly thundered its decisions on the pro¬
fessional ear, has dwindled into the unappalling representative
of a plainly revealed Mr. John Thomas, or Mr. Peter Jones.
Authors should accept the innovation as a benefaction not less
praiseworthy than that of the considerate lion, in the Midsummer
Night’s Dream, who, lest his roaring should distress the gentle
hearts that
“fear
The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor,”
made the composing announcement
“ Then know, that I one Snag, the joiner, am.”
We have made these remarks in connexion with the essay at
the head of this article, not for the purpose of insinuating that
its author is an unfavourable specimen of the young critics who
principally contribute to the work in which it has appeared, but
because they were the reflections which such an essay, followed
by the signature of any ordinary human being, couM not
possibly fail to suggest. It is true no man ought to write what
he would be ashamed or afraid to acknowledge as his, and, so
far, the reviewer in the case before us has acted candidly enough;
but his production would have appeared in some respects a great
deal less absurd, if no avowal of authorship had proceeded from
the lion’s skin, and if the reader had been consequently left to
experience within himself the truth of the Tacitusian aphorism,
“ omne ignotum pro magnifico.” For he would need to be a
magnate,—a man himself of no mean genius and learning, as
well as somewhat of a benefactor of his fellow men, whose
contemptuous allusions to Hahnemann would not appear absurd
and impertinent. The contempt of such a man might be
regarded by us with regret, as unfounded and unjust, it could
hardly appear ridiculous. If he apologised for the disbelief in
the powers of Belladonna, which prevailed among the physicians
of his sect, on the score that it “ was scarcely to be wondered at,
when we considered the quarter from which the recommendation
of its vaunted virtues proceeded,” and asserted that the doctrine
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regarding the efficacy of the medicine, “ was tarnished in its
propounder,”* we should only wonder at the misconceptions of
the learned, or possibly grieve at the infirmity of a genius
soured by sectarian rivalry. But such sneers from persons of
the ordinary stamp, appear simply ludicrous, and, like the
farcical make-believe of our friend the joiner, are best rewarded
by “ well roared lion,” from a tickled audience.
We are not quite clear that our allopathic lion deserves the
character bestowed upon his prototype of being “ a very gentle
beast, and of a good conscience.” Notwithstanding his profes¬
sions of a desire to do every justice to those who differ from him,
it is very plain that his candid “ re-consideration of the whole
matter,” was undertaken with a strong infusion of malice
prepense against Belladonna and its homoeopathic advocates.
Hahnemann as we have seen, has had the “ privilege ” of being
complimented at the outset as a tarnishing propounder, in order,
of course, that the reader may be prepossessed in favour of his
proposition; while Dr. Black, besides being falsely accused in
his individual capacity, is always associated with the allopathic
Bayle when the reviewer has anything to say in condemnation
of the*latter, as if the homoeopathic physician, who professes
merely to translate Bayle’s own resum6 of the experiments made
by the German physicians, ought to share the blame of every
petty mistake that occurs in the original; and Dr. Henderson
is in the most solemn manner charged with a very serious
delinquency, albeit of no consequence to the professed object of
the article, even were the charge as true as it is very suspiciously
the reverse.
In this last particular, the lion shows so much of the
nature of two other animals to which he is compared in the
play, that we must notice it more particularly, in order that our
readers may understand what the reviewer s notions of candour
are, and how far he is to be trusted, when he professes to sum
up the evidence on the main question. At p. 81 he says in a
note, **It is from no desire to find fault, but, on the contrary,
with great reluctance, that we must at the outset of our references
to Bayle, express our extreme astonishment and disapprobation
*
* J. Warburton Begbie, p. 78.
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of the course Dr. Henderson has adopted. He writes at p. 112
of his work—‘ Before adverting to the experiments made in
Edinburgh, I shall adduce from an article by M. Bayle ,' &c.
&c. Now it is quite clear that Dr. Henderson has never had
recourse to Bayle, hut only to Dr. Black’s very inaccurate
representation of what Bayle has written; for he even copies
Black so literally as to transcribe his errors—one of which,
miserable as it is, we must beg Dr. Henderson to correct. He
follows Dr. Black in referring to the Biblioth&que Th6rapeutique,
tom. ii, p. 583, et seq., being unaware that there are only
532 pages in the volume.”
Of the various charges involved in this passage, we shall
take the first, the greatest, and that is a moral charge. We ask
any reader, of any party, whether it is not clearly implied and
suggested in the words we have extracted, that Dr. Henderson
while professing to quote directly from Bayle, actually quotes
from Dr. Black’s translation, at the same time that he studiously
ignores the existence of such a translation, in order that he
himself may appear the more exclusively learned on the subject?
What is given is assuredly from that work, but that it was
taken directly from it is not only not affirmed by the author,
but, at the end of his quotation of a part of Dr. Black’s trans¬
lation, Dr. Henderson actually adds in a note, “ For the whole
(the italics are ours) of Bayle’s article on the subject, the
English reader is referred to Dr. Black’s Principles and Practice
of Homoeopathy —in which reference we presume a candid
person, not addicted to tortuosities, and therefore not suspecting
them in others, would perceive an intimation of the source from
which the quoted part had been taken. That the author of the
review knew that the note existed, appears from an incidental
allusion to it in a subsequent page of his article, and if he were
not something of the fox (as is also said of Snug in the play)
as well as of the stage-lion, he could not have omitted to
mention it in the place where mention of it would have obviated
a false impression on the part of his readers, had he desired that
such an impression should not be produced. No doubt those
who are even but moderately acquainted with the question
regarding Belladonna, may, notwithstanding the tenor of the
note, have some difficulty in at once believing that such an
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impression can have been intended to be produced, considering
that Bayle’s compilation is so well known, that it may be
almost regarded as common property, whose author it is
necessary to specify only for the purpose of not confounding the
data he has collected with those of others, and whose existence
it would be discreditable in any physician not to know.
The second charge implied in the note of the reviewer is, that
Dr. Henderson in quoting from Dr. Black’s translation, has
quoted from what contains “ a very inaccurate representation
of what Bayle has written.” That this assertion is utterly
and absolutely untrue, we aver in the most unqualified manner,
after having carefully compared Dr. Black’s version with the
original. Bayle has made a few trivial mistakes in his resume
of the researches of the German physicians,—but Dr. Black
has not made one in his version of Bayle; though Dr. J. War-
burton Begbie, with rare disingenuousness, tries again and
again to make his readers believe that he has. For example, at
p. 83 of his review, in giving an account of Dr. Gumpert’s
report of his success with Belladonna he says—“ One person
took the disease during the first week of prophylactic treatment,
and another, a child, after taking the Belladonna for two weeks.
We are left to conclude that these were the only two who
contracted the disease after taking Belladonna; but we are
directly informed, that Gumpert never had a case of Scarlatina
in which the specific had been employed for more than two
weeks. We are moreover told, that in one family, consisting of
six, to which the second exceptional case belonged, one took the
disease, and two a few days thereafter became affected with sore
throats, and slight fever, without having eruption or desquam¬
ation.
“In his synopsis of Gumpert’s report, just as in that of
Himly already referred to, Bayle does not adhere to the strict
letter of the observer. This is perhaps pardonable in Bayle,
because within the four comers of his book the statement of
Gumpert is given in extenso; but what are we to say of Dr.
Black, who evidently never read the statement of Gumpert,
either in Hufeland’s Journal, or in extenso, as given in Bayle;
or if he has read either, has continued to ignore both.”
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Gumpert, Bayle, and Black, (all advocates of Belladonna,)
are here included in a general censure,—Dr. Black’s particular
sin being selected for the principal condemnation, as being the
misrepresentation of a matter respecting which Bayle had given
him the means of being accurate. Our readers will scarcely be
prepared to learn that the whole three are perfectly blameless—
Gumpert in having given a consistent statement of his experi¬
ence, Bayle in having given a correct resume of that experience,
and Black in having given an accurate representation of what
Bayle has written. Gumpert had no case of Scarlet Fever in
which the specific had been employed for more than two weeks,
and only two in which it had been employed for less than that
period ;* while another case of the fever which occurred in the
family of six (in addition to the second of the two first adverted
to) had had no Belladonna, for it is added, immediately after this
case is mentioned, “ les autres ont fait un usage non interrompu
de la belladone,” and no mention is made of Belladonna in
connexion with the case in question. In this family therefore,
one case occured in which no Belladonna was given, one in
which the Belladonna had been given for two weeks,—and two
others had sore throat, and “quelques 16gers mouvemens febriles,”
without eruption or desquamation, and were therefore not cases
of Scarlet Fever, but probably of the effects of Belladonna.
Bayle’s account of Gumpert’s report is, that he had two cases
of scarlet fever, after the employment of Belladonna. “L’un
n’avait fait usage de la belladone que quelques jours. Chez
l’autre la maladie se dgclara dans la deuxi&me semaine/’f Dr.
Black’s version of this is—“ In one the Belladonna had only
been used some days; in the other the disease declared itself
in the second week.” (Principles, &c. p. 37.) “ What are we
to say then to Dr. Black ? ” Bayle is perhaps pardonable for
supposing that two oases of sore throat, with slight febrile
movement, but no eruption or desquamation, were not cases of
scarlet fever; but we are to think the worst of Dr. Black,
because he presumes to translate Bayle’s resume literally and
* He speaks of his exceptional cases as “ un ” and “ l’autre.” In Bayle,
t. ii, p. 397.
■f Op. cit p. 505.
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correctly, without giving any intimation that he himself thought
the two cases which were not scarlet fever were scarlet fever,
especially considering the undeniable fact that the slightness
of their symptoms was quite as significant a testimony to the
virtues of Belladonna as if there had been no symptoms at all!
Such is the whole of this serious matter, and such the prepos¬
terous absurdity into which ill-will and disingenuousness betray
their victims. But it is not the whole, in so far as Dr. J. War-
burton Begbie is concerned. He knew that the oase of which
“ we are, moreover, told,” &c., was not among the cases to which
Belladonna had been given, while he pretty plainly, by the man¬
ner in which he introduces it, intimates to his readers that it was!
Next, in connexion with the account of Behr’s happy expe¬
rience of Belladonna, Dr. Black is attacked in a foot-note, and
the goodnatured critic, in kindness to Dr. Henderson, takes
“ this other opportunity of directing him from so unworthy a
quarter.” Noting the elegance of the English by the way,
we pass to the more serious blunder (as Fouoh6 would have
called it), of deliberately leading his readers to suppose that
Dr. Black is the author of an inaccuracy committed in the
account given of Behr’s narrative of his experience. Bayle is
not mentioned as the author of it, it is “ Dr. Black’s account
of this physician’s experience,” which leads to a long note of
reprehensible things, and of duties incumbent, among which
latter is included this—“ from those who ask us to believe ex¬
periences in which they put faith, we require that these expe¬
riences should he by them truthfully and accurately presented
to us; ” from which it seems to follow that Dr. Black has
garbled his text, M. Bayle’s resume (which alone he professes
to deal with), and that too in some most momentous particular.
Well, the simple truth is, that Bayle says of forty-seven cases
put under Belladonna by Behr—“ six en furent atteints (with
scarlet fever), mais d’une mani&re peu sensible,” (p. 506),
which Dr. Black translates thus—“six were attacked, but in
an almost insensible manner,” (p. 38); while most unfortu¬
nately, Behr himself, as translated by Bayle, says of these
six—“mais chez presque tous les six la maladie fut d’une
nature si benigne, qu’aucun ne succomba ” (Bayle, p. 405): a
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foolish way of expressing himself, we cannot hut think, for if
only nearly the whole were of a nature so benign that none of
them died, one or more must have been so severely affected, as
to have done the reverse, which it is plain, however, they are
not accused of. On the whole, there can be no doubt that the
author intended to represent the six as mild cases compared
with those of the “6pid6mie meurtri&re," which surrounded
them; a circumstance which was obviously esteemed by him
as to the credit of the Belladonna. “ Pen sensible ” is not the
correct interpretation of the passage from Bebr, but the words
are Bayle’s, not Dr. Black’s, though Dr. Black alone is blamed
for the inaccuracy—an inaccuracy, however, which proves the
fidelity of bis translation, and again condemns his traducer
when he represents him as giving, a “ very inaccurate represen¬
tation of what Bayle has written.”
The next misrepresentation is quite as deliberate. Dr. Black,
translating Bayle’s resume, as he expressly tells us, and for the
reason that he, being “ an allopathic authority, can have no
object in testifying to facts which bear strongly in favour of
homoeopathy," (p. 35), gives the following sentences, which the
reader will perceive to be a most faithful rendering of his
original:—
“All authors, however, are not partisans of Belladonna.
Lehmann asserts that this medicine had no preservative virtue
in the epidemic of 1825 at Torgo. According to Barth, two
other physicians, Kaminski and Tuffel (sic in orig.) have also
pronounced against it. We cannot justly appreciate the value
of the opinion of these authors, because it is supported by no
facts, and the disease has not been described. Could it not
be possible that the affection treated by these practitioners was
not the true scarlet-fever, but rather the purple miliary fever,
to which Belladonna, according to Hahnemann, affords no
immunity ? ”
Bayle’s words are as follow:—“ Tous les auteurs ne sont
pas cependant partisans de la belladone. Lehmann assure que
ce medicament n’eut aucune vertu preservative dans l’£pid6mie
de scarlatine qui regna in 1825 a Torgo. D’apr6s Barth, deux
autres medecins, Kaminski et Tuffel, se seraient aussi prononc6s
contre ce medicament. Nous ne pouvons appr6cier a leur
juste valeur l’opinion de ces auteurs, parce qu’elle n’est appuy6e
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d’aucun fait, et que la maladie n’est point d6crite. Ne serait-il
pas possible que 1'affection traitee pas ces pradciens, ne fut
point la veritable scarladne, mais bien la fi^vre pourpr6e mili-
aire, dont la belladone ne garandt pas, d’aprds Hahnemann ? ”
(p. 309.)
Besolved to blame Dr. Black at all hazards. Dr. J. Warbur-
ton Begbie remarks on his translation—“ Dr. Black makes it
appear as if Bayle objected to the evidence of Lehmann, on the
score of its being ‘ supported by no facts’ ”—a plain intimation
to his readers that Dr. Black had taken such a liberty with
Bayle’s composition as to alter his statements, an intimation
which our extract from Bayle shows to he utterly false. If
Lehmann appears to he included among those who give no facts
in support of their opinion, that appearance is due entirely to
the manner in which Bayle expresses himself in the passage we
have quoted, and which Dr. Black has rendered in the most
literal and accurate manner. It will not do for the reviewer to
shelter himself from the imputation of deceit by saying that he
subsequently censures Dr. Black for quoting merely Bayle’s
resum6 in regard to Lehmann, for his first censure refers only
to Dr. Black’s version of that very resum§, and accuses the
translator of making his original appear to aver what it does not
aver. The bungling inconsistency with which the censures are
uttered, can be no excuse for what is false in either of them.
To Lehmann’s facts we shall advert by and by, when we shall
show that it would have been better for his side of the question,
if he had given none. But before discussing the facts which
have been adduced against the claims of Belladonna, we shall
conclude our observations on the resum6 of Bayle, to overthrow
the credibility of which, both as given by its author, and as
translated by Dr. Black, Dr. J. Warburton Begbie expends so
much of his ingenuity.
Three instances only,—in addition to that which has been
referred to in connexion with Behr’s report, and which has
been shown to be so insignificant,—are specified by the
reviewer of inaccuracy on the part of Bayle.* In the first place,
• The mis-spelling of two German proper names is noticed also by the
reviewer in his characteristic manner, which we mention only for the purpose
of saying that such hypercriticism proves that he could detect no other
defects than those he has specified.
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he questions the accuracy of Bayle's language when he avers,
that Hufeland and Rhodius “ gave perfect immunity ” to all
those who took the Belladonna. The expressions are, however,
perfectly just, for Rhodius says—“ all those who made use of
the preservative escaped the contagion,” (Bayle, p. 393), and
Hufeland says that “ he had never seen one of those whom he
had treated (with Belladonna) attacked hy the malady,” (Bayle.
p. 409). Next, it is objected that Bayle erred in saying that
these physicians had witnessed such happy results in “ several
very violent epidemics.” Hufeland answers for one such violent
epidemic in the following terms—“ I know one place where,
during an epidemic of scarlatina of the severest (des plus fortes)
nature, the preservative of Hahnemann was tried, and where all
those who made use of it were preserved from the malady.”
(Bayle, p. 394.) Rhodius in giving his testimony in favour of
the medicine, says of another epidemic, that the preservative
had protected all who took it, and had indeed “ un grand suc-
c6s; ’’ while among the four instances he specifies, of families in
which the Belladonna was employed, one had three children
“ dangerously ill,” and another had a ohild “ very dangerously
ill;” showing at least that it was not a mild epidemic of whioh
such instances were merely samples; and he contented himself
with samples because he regarded a lengthened enumeration
of particulars “superfluous,” although he had “many others
which he could add;”—the superfluousness arising from the
circumstance that the same happy result occurred in all the
families which made use of the prophylactic, as in the illustra¬
tive examples. Besides, Hufeland in 1825, reminds his readers
that it was a number of years* sinoe the prophylactic was first
mentioned in his Journal, and that he had in the interval
“ made frequent use of it in his private practice,” and always
with success.
Lastly, Gumpert, senior, is said by Bayle to have prevented
the introduction of scarlatina into “ many villages,” hy means
of the Belladonna, and as such is not the actual language used
by Gumpert the son, in giving an account of his father’s
experience, the reviewer is “ at a loss to discover how Bayle is
• Schenck’s paper on the subject appeared there in 1812, Bayle, p. 390.
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able to assert ” such things. We think, on the other hand,
that he need not have been at any loss in the matter, unless he
had particularly wished it, for the son states that his father had
employed the prophylactic for several years, and during many
epidemics, with suoh success that in “ no case where the Bella¬
donna had been administered in time, and in a continued
manner, did the scarlet fever happen, and that in the few cases
of infection, due to the Belladonna not having been given
sufficiently long, the disease was always very mild.” The con¬
sequence of which was, that, in his “ medical district ” (for he
seems to have been the government medical functionary of a
district of country) the public had the same confidence in
Belladonna as a protection from scarlet fever, that they had in
vaccination as a preservative from small-pox, and came firom
“ great distances ” of themselves to get supplies of the drug.
Here, therefore, there must have been villages, “ many villages,”
and the appearance at least of as complete a prevention of
scarlet fever by Belladonna, as of small-pox by vaccination, a
tolerable proof that the fever was somehow or other kept out of
the villages, a few exceptional cases only occurring.
We have been thus particular in exposing the charges, some*
times entirely groundless, sometimes gross exaggerations of very
unimportant inaccuracies, made by Dr. J. Warburton Begbie
against the account given by Bavle of the German experience
regarding Belladonna, because that account has been the prin¬
cipal medium through which, hy translations and references,
the subject has been recommended by the advocates of Bella¬
donna to the favourable consideration of the profession in this
country. It will not be denied by any candid reader that the
inaccuracies shewn to exist in that account, are so very few and
unimportant, as to leave the resume of Bayle a trustworthy
record of the experience it professes to represent, and therefore
a very suitable and proper subject of translation for the benefit
of English readers. The reviewer, even, who labours so pain¬
fully to throw discredit on that resume, and its English version,
is constrained, after all, to admit that it “ in most instances is
very true, that the important facts in regard to the question at
issue, as given by the German writers, are fairly enough ren-
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dered in both Dr. Black’s and Dr. Henderson’s pages.” We
shall correct him so far as to say, that in every instance, they
are at least “ fairly enough rendered,” and in all hut one or
two, with the most perfect accuracy. We leave this part of
the subject with a correction of the typographical error, at
p. 308 of Bayle, in the tabular statement he gives of the num¬
bers, mentioned by the several authors from whom his account
is derived, of those who got Belladonna, and were either
affected subsequently with scarlet fever, or remained free. In
the figures connected with Gelnecki’s name, as the authority,
the numbers ought to be 79 instead of 94, and 3 instead of
8; so that the general result should stand thus—2012 persons
got Belladonna, 1938 escaped the fever, and 74 became affected
with it, or less than four per cent., including those who had
taken the medicine for only a few days before they fell ill.
We pass next to the consideration of the objections which
have been made to the doctrine of the protective power of
Belladonna, as these are presented to us in the review, in the
form of facts or of arguments. We take the facts first, and
begin with those of Lehmann. This gentleman is an especial
favorite with the impartial reviewer, who strokes him on the
back with much unction and approbation, by way of encourag¬
ing him to weigh a great deal more than he ought to weigh
in the way of damaging evidence, and occasionally puts in a
few words of his own to make the opposing “facts” a trifle
stronger than the conscience of Dr. Lehmann would allow
him to make them. Nay, when occasion calls for it, he ven¬
tures on the familiar operation of putting his hand upon the
good doctor’s mouth to prevent his speaking out, in English at
least, and in the Brit, and For. Med. Chir. Rev., such par¬
ticulars as might detract from the weight of his hostile expe¬
riences. And not only so, but he takes honest Bayle by the
nucha , and forces him to utter in his native tongue so much
of his estimate of Lehmann and his doings, as happens to
be alike favourable and untrue, promptly stopping him short
when on the point of blurting out what would upset the whole
concern.
Dr. J. Warburton Begbie, after giving, in detail, Lehmann’s
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account of the events noticed by him in four families, in which
the Belladonna had been employed, and failed more or less com¬
pletely, adds “ along with other facts of a like nature, Lehmann
mentions that, in his own experience, whole families (one in
particular, consisting of seven children) altogether escaped the
disease, though epidemic in the place where they resided.”
(p. 91.) “Other facts of a like nature,” surely implies that
the four examples selected for the benefit of the British public,
were taken from a considerably larger number of instances;
whereas, our readers will be surprised to learn that after so
imposing a reference to other facts in the “ very important ”
paper of Lehmann, which “ is inferior to none in exhibiting the
precision of the author’s observations” (Begbie), there are
but two more in the whole production. Then as to “ whole
families ,” who had taken no Belladonna, altogether escaping,
our readers will probably be still more surprised to learn, that,
not only does Lehmann not say so, but he says what is tanta¬
mount to the very reverse. His statement is, that in two
families, of four and six sisters, none having taken Belladonna,
one or two individuals became mildly affected with scarlet
fever, while the rest escaped; and that, in one family of seven
children, all escaped the disease though they had not taken
Belladonna.* This, therefore, appears to have been the only
whole family that escaped, and very remarkable it is that there
should have been no more. The fever poison must in that
epidemic have been peculiarly effectual, or the disposition to
the disease singularly general. Dr. J. Warburton Begbie puts
“ too fine a point" upon the weapon of Dr. Lehmann.
Then as to the individual “ facts ” which are so momentous
in their oppositions to the claims of Belladonna, we shall give
the first four in the words of the reviewer:—
“1. In a family consisting of three boys, the eldest was
attacked with scarlet fever. The two others were immediately
removed from the sick boy, and were confined to the floor of
the house below that on which his room was. They got, at the
same time, every morning and evening, the Belladonna solution.
After this boy’s recovery, and at the end of one month from the
first appearance of the disease, he was restored to the society of
* Lehmann in Rust’s Magazine, t. xxii, p. 39.
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his two brothers. Four months later, the youngest brother
was seized with the disease in a severe form; he recovered:
and then the third (in respect of years the second) brother, who
remained on this occasion in proximity to the patient, hut at
the same time took the Belladonna regularly, contracted the
disease on the tenth day, and fell a victim to it.”
On this, we remark, that it is not said that the two hoys had
been taking the Belladonna for the four months, so that the
second case of scarlet fever is not to be regarded as an excep¬
tion to the alleged prophylactic virtues of the medicine, and
that the third and last case has no better title to he adduced
as evidence of the absence of such virtues, because the disease
appeared so early as the tenth day of his taking the drug, for
that is evidently the meaning of the author. We do not know
how long the latent period of scarlet fever may last, after the
poison has entered and begun its secret work, or what is the
exact time during which Belladonna requires to he taken
before it becomes a protection from the disease; hut it appears
to he thought by several of those who have tested the properties
of the medicine, that from one to two weeks should elapse from
the first use of the Belladonna, before its protective powers can
he regarded as established. If the fever-poison have got the
start of the Belladonna, we should he no more entitled to
expect that the disease would not appear (even granting that
Belladonna is a prophylactic), than we should he to expect that
small-pox would not appear when the exposure of a susceptible
person to its contagion had preceded vaccination by eight days
or more. In such circumstanoes small-pox has appeared, even
after the course of the vaccine disease had been completely run,
and yet no man questions the protective power of vaccination.
This first “ fact ” therefore goes for nothing.
“ 2. In a family consisting of five brothers and sisters, a boy
of five years was first attacked with scarlet fever. To the other
four Belladonna was immediately given. After eight days a
little giri of four years old was seized, and on the third day of
the disease died. On the following day a sister of three years of
age took the fever mildly and recovered; another sister, about
eleven years, was almost immediately afterwards affected, and
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on the fourth day of her illness died. The eldest brother, long
a sufferer from had health, and particularly from a chronic
affection of the heart, remained free from the disease. It is of
importance to know, that the four patients together occupied a
small and extremely damp room, on the ground floor; and this,
indeed, was accepted as the probable cause of the early deaths.”
Precisely the same objections apply to this second instance
as to the first.
“ 3. A hoy of five years, an only son, contracted scarlet
fever after having uninterruptedly, during several months, taken
Belladonna. The fever assumed a cerebral character, and on
the fourth day the little patient died.”
'this then was a case in which belladonna was taken long
enough to have proved a protection, supposing it to have been
given in a proper manner. That it was not so given we shall
immediately see, meanwhile we only further remark in con*
nexion with this case, that no one pretends that Belladonna
will never fail to preserve from scarlet fever.
“ 4. In a family of four children, the eldest (who was five
years) became affected with scarlet fever. The remaining three
were immediately put on the Belladonna; two of these, on the
twenty-first day of the employment of the drug, became affected
with the disease in a severer form than the first child, who had
taken no Belladonna.”
On this instance we observe that, had Dr. Black perverted
his text, in the same manner as Dr. J. Warburton Begbie has
done that of Lehmann here, we presume that nothing but the
wholesome fear of an action of damages for defamation would
have restrained the reviewer from expressing, in their native
simplicity, certain conceptions of his oonduct, which, unlike
female beauty, are certainly not when “ unadorned adorned the
most.” Lehmann does not say that the two children became
affected on the twenty-first day, but on the fourteenth (vier-und
zehntagigen) after the commencement of the Belladonna. This
brings the instance before us within the scope of what has been
said of the first two instances. Dr. J. Warburton Begbie was
quite aware that the first fortnight’s use of the medioine has
been regarded as a period during which scarlet fever is liable
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to occur, even by those, (Gumpert for example,) who are strong
advocates of Belladonna being a preventive after that period.
Lehmann’s two other “facts,” we take from his paper for
ourselves.
“ 5. The elder of two sisters became affected with scarlet
fever. Although her younger sister had three years previously
been affected with the disease, under my own care, she never¬
theless got the Belladonna. Notwithstanding that, she became
ill on the tenth day, and was much more severely affected than
her elder sister, who had neither had the disease before, nor
taken the Belladonna.”
In this case the disease occurred within the period believed
to be sometimes necessary for the complete influence of the
Belladonna; and even had it not been so, the failure of the
Belladonna would scarcely have appeared an evidence of its
want of all prophylactic virtue in other instances, considering
that in the example in question it had exhibited no greater
impotency than a previous attack of the disease itself had done,
which, however, everyone knows, is generally preventive of a
second. Perhaps it was for this reason that the reviewer did
not think that the presenting of the fifth instance would mate¬
rially impress his readers.
6. Dr. Lehmann’s five children became affected with scarlet
fever, under the following circumstances:—first, his eldest
daughter of ten years, after having had Belladonna only once;
she was separated from the rest, yet ten days later his second
daughter took the disease, though using the Belladonna, as all
' the children did from the first; and three weeks after his third
daughter became ill; and six weeks after this last case occurred
his two remaining children, boys, took the disease and were
very severely affected.
The two first of these cases fall under the objection we have
already adverted to as examples in which the fever-poison had
anticipated the Belladonna in its impression upon the body.
The third was a case in which the drug had been taken thirty-
one days; and the two last were cases in which it had been
taken for about twenty-tbree days, and in doses given twice
daily. Dr. Lehmann remarks of these two, that they were
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severe cases, and he says at p. 60, “ it happened, not unfre-
quently, that children who had taken the preventive several
weeks and months, were severely affected, and fell victims to
the scarlet fever.” Nor is he the only one who affirms or
implies, that the continued employment of Belladonna as a
prophylactic, had been the occasion of an increased severity
in the fever, when an attack happened to follow. Thus Dr.
Mierendorf, as referred to by Barth in Bayle’s second volume,
is said to have observed that children, to whom Belladonna
had been given, became more severely affected with scarlet
fever, and died in greater number, than those who had taken
none of the drug. Raminski is asserted by the same author
(Barth), to have seen too many proofs of the increase of the
malady, from the employment of Belladonna, to have any
doubts of its inefficacy as a medieine; and Teuffel’s experi¬
ence is said to have been to the same effect. More recently.
Dr. Andrew Wood of Edinburgh evidently suspected that a
hoy who died, in his hands, of scarlet fever, after having
taken Belladonna for nearly a month, had his death occasioned,
or accelerated, by that circumstance; for he says, that on
this death occurring, he took “ alarm,” and discontinued his
experiments.* We wonder that it never seems to have occurred
to any of these gentlemen, that suoh doses of a drug as were
capable of making such inroads on the health as to render
the subsequent attacks of scarlet fever so much more severe
and fatal than when none of the drug had been taken, must
have been likely to make those who were unfortunate enough
to receive them, for the very same reason, more liable to be
affected with the malady. If, speaking generally, impaired
health predisposes those who are the subjects of it to suffer
from the influence of epidemic causes of disease, as all medical
men admit, it seems to us an uncommon stretch of absurdity,
to except from that general fact the impaired health produced
by over-doses of Belladonna. To aver that it is impossible or
unlikely that larger doses of a drug will predispose to the same
disease from which much smaller doses will afford some degree
* Brit, and For. Med. Chir. Rev., Jan. 1855, p. 93.
VOL. XIII, NO. LII.—APRIL 1855. T
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of protection, is in the highest degree irrational, even were it
not an assumption that it is contradicted by familiar and rele¬
vant analogies. There is, as no one doubts, a prudent and
judicious employment of wholesome food, of wine, and other
elements of a generous regimen, which bestows a great measure
of immunity from the epidemic oauses of cholera, of typhns
fever, and other maladies, while there is as certainly an abuse
of the same substances which is capable of so deranging the
digestive organs and the general health, as to make those who
indulge in excesses at table more liable than others to become
the victims of suoh morbid poisons as they may happen to be
exposed to, when in their impaired state of corporeal vigour.
We conceive, therefore, that the advocates of Belladonna as a
prophylactic against scarlet fever, have both reason and experi¬
ence on their side, when they maintain, that those who have
found, or assert that they have found. Belladonna of no service
as a preventive of scarlet fever, should be able to show that
they have employed the medicine in such quantities, and of
such a strength, as cannot have been injurious to the health of
those who have received it. We have said “ of such a strength,”
and “ in such quantities,” because it is notorious that the ex¬
tract of Belladonna (the form employed by many physicians,
who have made experiments regarding its protective virtues,)
is a preparation liable to much diversity of strength in different
samples. We have evidences of this diversity of strength in
some of the experiments which have been made concerning the
prophylactic powers of the drug, and it is curious enough that
those who employed a preparation so strong as to produce
decided disorder of the health, are precisely those whose results
have been vaunted as the most opposed to the alleged protective
properties of the medicine. Bayle, in referring to Lehmann’s
experiments, says that the Belladonna was tried as a preserva¬
tive—“ en le donnant suivant toutes les regies indiqubes par
ceux qui ont pr6conis6 ce moyen*' (p. 417); and thus far
Dr. J. Warburton Begbie quotes the testimony of Bayle, taking,
however, characteristic care not to add the beginning of the
next sentence:—“ cependant il le donna a quelquesnns de ses
malades a des doses telles, qu’il determinait les symptomes du
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narcotisme.” Lehmann’s own statement is, that doses of eight
drops of his solution produced giddiness, dryness of the mouth,
and flickering before the eyes, in some of the persons who took
the drug, although they were grown-up people. Eight drops
of his solution were equal to only one thirtieth of a grain of the
extract, for he employed the proportions of two grains to one
ounce of distilled water. He might well, therefore, laud the
extraot as “ frisch und gut,” and “ dare ” anyone to “ question
the quality ” of his material, which had, moreover, the unspeak¬
able advantage of being prepared by redoubtable Dr. Ficinus
of Dresden, well known to the profession of that day and place,
to be “ as learned and capable a pharmaceutist” as there could
be occasion for, or as could be “ discovered hereabout or far
away.” Freshness, potency, orthodoxy, were what Dr. Leh¬
mann desired above all things in his drug, and if substantial
doses of so genuine a “ mittel ” could not do the business, the
business could not be done at all. He did not confine himself
to eight drops, but gave, even to children of twelve years old,
as many as twelve drops, and that, too, twice a day; those who
were younger getting a drop for every year of their age. No
wonder, if the longer they took his potion the more they be-
oame afleoted with the disease, and the worse was their chance
of escape from its grasp.
Again, Mr. Benjamin Bell of Edinburgh, in the course of
his experiments in George Watson’s hospital, gave the fifth
part of a grain of the extract to the ohildren night and morning;
but the dose being found, “ in a few days, to be too large, from
the dilated state of the pupil and impaired vision which it
occasioned in several instances,” was diminished, yet not so
much as to prevent the future notable observation, that “ cer¬
tainly, a large proportion of the boys who took the Belladonna,
seemed to have more or less furring of the tongue, impairment
of appetite, and other evidences of slight indisposition.” * No
wonder, therefore, we repeat, that after a month of such drug¬
ging the disease should have recommenced, and afleoted, of
fifty-seven children (including the three belonging to the ser¬
vants of the house), no less than twenty-two boys (a twenty-
* Edinburgh Monthly Journal, August 1851, p. 108.
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third had had the disease before, and belonged to the twenty-
eight who ought to be set aside on the ground of having had
the disease once already).
Dr. Newbigging, however, in 1849, gave to sixty-nine chil¬
dren who yet remained unaffected out of ninety-one, that were
in John Watson’s Institution, of the same city, from one fourth
to one sixth of a grain of his extract of Belladonna, observed
no injurious effects upon their health, though he continued the
doses twice a day for more than five weeks, and had only three
new cases of the fever after he began the prophylactic, and
these three occurred within the first four days of its employ¬
ment. The doses were larger than Mr. Bell’s, yet no injury
followed to the health of those who took them, and the epidemic
ceased.
On these “Edinburgh experiments” Dr. J. Warburton Begbie
writes some unintelligible paragraphs, from which we can gather
only, that he labours to prove that there is an inconsistency in
Dr. Henderson’s objection to Mr. Bell’s experiments, on the
score of the largeness of the doses having probably caused the
fever by impairing the health, seeing that Dr. Newbigging gave
larger doses, and yet no scarlet fever followed. This he terms
a reductio ad absurdum, but the absurdity lies only in his own
confusion and incapacity. The reason that Dr. Henderson
gives for the larger doses of Dr. Newbigging not having been
followed by an extension of the fever is, that “his extract of
Belladonna was not so powerful as Mr. Bell's,” * and that it
was not, must, we think, have been obvious to anyone but the
reviewer, considering that Mr. Bell’s smaller doses caused dis¬
orders of the health, which Dr. Newbigging’s did not! Dr. J.
Warburton Begbie, indeed, at the close of his mystification on
this subject, at length alludes to this opinion of Dr. Henderson’s,
and adds, “ we venture, however, to remark, that just on account
of the variation in the strength of the extracts of Belladonna, both
gentlemen would satisfy themselves of the potency of the speci¬
mens they obtained.” What sheer nonsense is this as a reply
to the objection in question! Suppose that they had, each for
himself, and at an interval of two years and more between their
* Homoeopathy Fairly Represented, p. 119.
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respective sets of experiments, before commencing the use of
the drug, gone about ascertaining the potency of his extract,
how should that enable them to know the comparative poten¬
cies of their extracts, or to make the potency of their doses the
same? That they never attempted to do so, and that they
never communed together on the subjeot, “ we venture to
remark.” *
On the part of those German physicians who have found
Belladonna apparently of use in checking the epidemic diffusion
of scarlet fever, and in lessening the severity and proportionate
mortality of the disease, when it did happen to follow the employ¬
ment of the prophylactic, we have generally a total silence regard¬
ing any other than those beneficial effects. Berndt, though the
medicine was given by him in doses of the same magnitude as had
heen employed by Lehmann with the poisonous effects already
noticed, says, it was “ without any inconvenience to. the health
of the individual ” who received it (Bayle, p. 401.); and Kunz-
mann, who used a solution of equal strength and in equal
quantities, states, that though it was continued for six weeks,
“ it never produced the least morbid effect” (p. 411). Duster-
berg, however, relates that the greater number of those who
received the prophylactic from him, experienced, at the end of
some days, “ a general eruption similar to that of measles,”
(p. 403,) though they remained free from the scarlet fever. If
we are to presume this eruption was due to the Belladonna, it
was certainly a proof of over-dosing and consequent morbid
effect; but as all the persons affected with the eruption adverted
to escaped the fever, we can explain this latter occurrence consis-
* When on the subject of the nonsense uttered by the reviewer, (and we
have never read so much in so short a space, when he is giving forth his own
opinions and judgments) we cannot refrain from presenting our readers with
the following choice specimen, which for modesty surpasses anything we
know: “ Notwithstanding the introduction of belladonna, and its extensive
employment, both in this country and abroad, as a prophylactic against
scarlet fever, we are not aware that the mortality in either has been reduced;
a circumstance which in itself militates very strongly both against the pro¬
phylactic and the remedial efficacy of belladonna.” (p. 99.) Being as much as
to say, that his own ignorance about the mortality of scarlet fever at present
throughout the world, and in everybody’s practice, militates against the
claims of belladonna 1
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tently with the opinion we have expressed of the injurious
consequences of too strong doses of the Belladonna, by in¬
ferring, that the manifestation of such an eruption is no
evidence of so serious an injury to the health as those symp¬
toms are which were witnessed by Lehmann and Bell. It
might he supposed, indeed, that if an eruption on the skin was
caused by the Belladonna, as given by Dusterberg, after it had
been used only “ quelques jours,” the continued employment
of it for weeks longer must have been followed by other signs
of its action on the body, were it not that he appears to intimate
that it was given for only a very short time—“durant plus
d’une semaine” being the words of Bayle, in noticing the
period during which Dusterberg had continued to administer
the medicine, with the effect of preserving all those who took it
so long from being attacked with the fever. Whether he con¬
tinued it longer is not mentioned. We are not, however,
entitled to conclude that the eruption in question was due to
the Belladonna; indeed it appears highly improbable that the
“ greater number ” of those who took about the fourth or fifth
of a grain of Belladonna twice a day, for only “ a few days,”
should have been affected with a measly eruption as a conse¬
quence of their having taken the drug, and more especially
without any other of its pathogenetic effects being noticed.
We regard it as much more likely that the eruption had been
of the nature of roseola, so often epidemic, and so frequently
resembling measles.
Maizier is the only other author mentioned by Bayle as
having suspected that the Belladonna he used with advantage
as a prophylactic had produced pathogenetic effects, and these
were limited to “ plaques rouges,” on some of those who had
had the scarlet fever during previous epidemics, and not among
those who had not been previously affected; who, on the contrary,
while all protected, with the exception of “ une faible portion,”
are not stated to have presented any eruption ascribed to the
Belladonna, or any other evidence of its pathogenetic operation.
Of the two methods employed for testing the prophylactic
virtues of Belladonna, one has a great advantage over the
other. The more conclusive method is unquestionably that
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in which a part only of those exposed to the epidemio influence
is placed under the action of the medicine, while the rest are
left to the ordinary chance of infection. This method would be
productive of a speedy solution of the problem to the satisfac¬
tion of all who remain sceptical on the subject, if it were ex¬
tensively tried in families and in hospitals for children, as it
very easily might be. To our minds, the other method, which
puts all who are exposed to the chance of being infected, under
the influence of the medicine, considering the very great pre¬
ponderance of favourable results contrasted with those that
have been reported as unsuccessful, carries with it a strong
conviction that Belladonna possesses in a very striking degree
the power ascribed to it by Hahnemann; but we are far from
denying the existence of difficulties in the way towards that
conclusion, as derived from such a method of investigation. At
the same time, we regard these difficulties as having been greatly
exaggerated by our opponents, who seem to make no distinction
betwixt difficulty and impossibility, when adverting to the mega--
tive character of the evidence furnished by the method in question.
Negative evidence on the point in dispute may so accumulate,
and so outnumber the exemptions which can be reasonably
escribed to the acknowledged fitfulness which characterises the
diffusion of scarlet fever, as, making every allowance for that
source of difficulty, to render a decision in favour of the powers
ascribed to Belladonna by far the more justifiable and rational;
and such accumulation of evidence we believe to have occurred
already, and beyond all question. The objections adduced by
the reviewer as stated by Dr. Pereira, that “ twenty oases of
failure are more conclusive against the opinion than one thou¬
sand of non-occurrence are in favour of it,” applies logically
only to one point, to wit, the universality of the protection
afforded by Belladonna; it does not touch the more important
question—the possession of a protective power in a measure so
great as to render the medicine a valuable means of limiting the
extent, the severity, and the mortality of scarlet fever. One or
two cases of failure notwithstanding an unobjectionable em-r
ployment of the drug, are as good as twenty or a hundred in
the way of positive evidence that Belladonna does not always
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protect, and therefore the question of the universality of the
protection is easily settled. The great amount of negative evi¬
dence as to the other point remains, however, unshaken and
untouched by the positive evidence which hears upon quite a
different proposition.
The ezpervmentum crucis afforded by the method to which
we first alluded, as capable of more directly and easily leading
to a satisfactory conclusion regarding the protective powers of
Belladonna, has been followed but in a few instances, and to
but a limited extent. Still, in so far as it goes, its results are,
with one scanty exception where the numbers were equals
strikingly in favour of the medicine. In addition to the ex¬
periments of this kind by Dusterberg and Gelnecki, we have
those of Dr. Balfour, and of Dr. Andrew Wood. The last are
related in the words of their author, and for the first time in
print, by Dr. J. W. Begbie, and we give the account of them
in full, because they are evidently highly esteemed by our
opponents, and were adverted to in Dr. Simpson’s work as very
damaging evidence against us.
“The plan which I proposed to myself,” says Dr. Wood,
“ was this—viz., whenever scarlatina appeared in any particular
'ward,* and not till then, I immediately made enquiry, and
having ascertained the boys who had previously had the fever,
these I left out of the question. I then divided the remainder
into two nearly equal sections: to one I gave one-eighth of a
grain of Belladonna, twice a-day: to the other no Belladonna
was given. This experiment was continued for several weeks,
and the reason why it was then discontinued was simply this,
that a fatal case occurred in the person of a boy (J. B.) who
had been taking the Belladonna for nearly four weeks. Taking
alarm, I resolved to discontinue the experiment. The following
is a brief analysis of the trial:—
“ First ward—containing 11 boys. Case occurred April 17th.
Three already had scarlatina; five boys got Belladonna; two
got no Belladonna. One of the five took scarlatina June 2,
and died on the 7th. No other case.
* The experiments were made in a charitable institution for children.
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“Eighth ward-—containing twenty boys. Case occurred
April 25th. Seven already had scarlatina. Five got Bella¬
donna; three got no Belladonna. No subsequent case.
“ Fourth ward—containing twenty-five boys. Case occurred
May 9th. Four already had scarlatina. Belladonna given to
ten; no Belladonna given to ten. On the 19th May, J. G.
who had accidentally slept in the same room as a boy who
had scarlet fever, and had been taking the Belladonna since
the 28th April, became affected with the disease in a mode¬
rately severe form: he recovered. On 4th June, a boy, who
had taken no Belladonna, contracted the disease in a mild
form. No subsequent case.
“ Fifth ward—containing eighteen hoys. Case occurred
May 23rd. Had had the disease, four. Took Belladonna, six;
took no Belladonna, seven. No subsequent case of fever.
“ Seventh Ward—containing thirty-six boys. Case occurred
May 28th. Had had scarlet fever, six. Took Belladonna,
eighteen ; took no Belladonna, eleven. No subsequent case.”
At first sight it appears as if this narrative told against the
protective power of Belladonna, whereas the little it tells, and
that is very little, is actually in its favour. One would suppose,
as no doubt the author, and the two others who ascribe so
much consequence to the experiment, do, on a cursory reading,
that there were two cases of scarlet fever after the use of Bella¬
donna, and only one among those who had not used it; hut in
point of fact, after subtracting the first case which preceded the
commencement of the Belladonna in the institution, there were
five cases of fever among those who had taken no Belladonna, and
only two among those who had taken the drug. To concentrate
attention on the occurrences in each ward, and to regard each
ward as the theatre of an independent experiment is absurd.
The just and proper light in which to regard the matter is, as
one experiment conducted in a building tainted, however
slightly, with the poison of scarlatina, and thus the moment
the Belladonna was commenced in the first ward, the boys
throughout the institution became divided into two classes;
those receiving Belladonna, and those not receiving it. Con¬
sequently each case which occurred first in the several wards.
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as well as the one whioh occurred in the fourth ward on the
4th June, was a case of scarlet fever among those who were
not taking Belladonna. That this is unquestionably the fair
and only accurate manner in which the experiment can be
regarded, will appear to every one who reflects on the way in
whioh scarlet fever will spread through such hospitals for
children irrespectively of all exposure to contagion from those
previously affected. These are removed to the sick-rooms of
such institutions as soon as they are discovered, and before
they can have been sources of contagion to the rest, so that the
subsequent cases have no connexion with those whioh had
preceded,* It is absurd, therefore, to set aside each first case
that occurs in a chamber, or ward, as not belonging to the
experiment, instead of including it among the cases which
occurred among those to whom no Belladonna had been given.
Dr. Balfour’s experiment in the Boyal Military Asylum at
Chelsea, is the unimportant one to whioh we adverted above.
He placed seventy-six boys on Belladonna, and to seventy-five
he gave none. Two cases of the fever occurred in each set..
The facts are interesting as showing how limited an epidemic
may be, where we should have expected it to spread widely,
but are of no worth in any other respect.
Dusterberg’s experiment is related by Bayle as follows—
“ In order to make the effect of Belladonna the better appear,
and to remove the influence of chance, I chose in each family
one child, which was excepted from the treatment (with Bella¬
donna). But all these children were attacked by the contagion,
to whom the use of the prophylactic had been forbidden.”
While in the preceding sentence, he says, that all the children
who had taken the medicine for above a week were protected
from the disease, although in intimate contaot with those who
were affected with the fever.
Gelnecki’s experiment was still more striking in its results.
In Glasow there were ninety-four children; seventy-nine had
* This is well illustrated by what occurred in Donaldson’s Hospital in
Edinburgh under Dr. Gillespie—where though each successive case of scarlet
fever was removed to sick-rooms totally apart from the dormitories or class¬
rooms, 52 cases occurred among 100 ohildren that were liable.— Ed. MmtMy
Joum.
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Belladonna given to them, and of the whole number only three
beoame affected with the disease; fifteen had no Belladonna,
and all of them became affected, “ dans le m$me temps," and
that too, as Bayle observes (though Dr. J. W. Begbie suppresses
the fact), “ even after the period at which the others were sub¬
jected to the prophylactic treatment,” (p. 411), that is to say,
the giving Belladonna, and the not giving, were simultaneous.
These facts speak for themselves.
A good many affirmations of questionable character, .and
some of the feeblest possible endeavours to reason, present
themselves in the review, besides those we have noticed. As a
sample merely of the former we may mention the silly misre¬
presentation of the grounds on which Hahnemann selected
Belladonna for the important function he assigned it—to wit:
“ Belladonna produces a scarlet rash; therefore, concludes Hah¬
nemann, it will cure scarlatina, or is Homoeopathic to it.” (Rev.
p. 94.) As a sample of the reasoning, we intended to state the chief
particulars of what is too long to insert entire—something about
Dulcamara; but it is sheer nonsense, seeing that Dr. Hender¬
son limited his assertion, that Dulcamara may have been used
instead of Belladonna, to the experiments of a single individual
in Edinburgh, and he made the assertion only, as he tells us,
because he had the best opportunity of learning that the former
plant had been habitually furnished to some of the Edinburgh
apothecaries, instead of the latter/ by a person from whom they
purchased their botanical riches. He never made that source
of error a general charge against the allopathic experimenters,
as the oandid reviewer seems to imply.
We leave the subject, for the present, with the satisfaction of
knowing that notwithstanding all the misrepresentations of our
opponents, and all our own shortcomings, we have now, as
heretofore, the best of the argument and the best of the facts in
our favour. And we part with Dr. J. Warburton Begbie, re¬
gretting for his own sake, that he should have written so much
of what he ought to blush for, and that he should have missed
so good an opportunity of giving a truthful disquisition on an
important point in practical medicine.
Before finally dismissing the subject however, it may be well
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to direct attention to the importance of some positive rule for
the dose of Belladonna it is expedient to administer for the
purpose of prophylaxis. The following is what MM. Barthez
and Billiet say upon the subject.
“ It is very difficult to discover the truth in the midst of such
contradictory opinions. It has been objected that all children
are not susceptible to the contagion, and if they escape the dis¬
ease after taking Belladonna, they would equally have been free
had they not taken it. But we are forced to believe that some
efficacy ought to be attached to the remedy when a consider¬
able number of persons after taking the prophylactic enjoy an
immunity from the disease.
“ We therefore think that the prophylactic treatment by
Belladonna may without inconvenience be carried out in such
doses as prescribed by Hufeland, Bemdt, Pitschaft, and Gum-
pert. [Here follows a sentence suggesting, according to Dr.
Kiihlbrand, the use of frictions of camphor and vinegar, in order
to antidote the effects of an over dose.] It seems to us prudent
to reserve the employment of Belladonna to very severe epi¬
demics : if the character of the epidemic be mild, there is little
inconvenience in the children becoming affected, for they will
thus be protected in future years.
“ Besides new experiments are necessary, and if they lead to
favorable results, they may also solve some accessory ques¬
tions.
“ Thus—For what length of time ought the remedy to be
used ? What is the best manner of administering it ? Is the
preservative effect permanent or temporary ? Ought the em¬
ployment to be renewed at each epidemic? In the cases
ivhere it has not prevented the development of the disease, does
it exercise any influence on its after oourse." *
In the present state of our knowledge the advice given by
Drs. Barthez and Billiet is best calculated to elicit the truth.
The prophylaxis of Belladonna in scarlatina may have no ex¬
istence, but that such is the case has not been shewn by Dr.
J. Warburton Begbie, the greater mass of testimony being very
much in favour of its prophylactic power.
* Trait6 clinique et pratique des Maladies des Enfans, tom. i, p. 209.
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Some of the queries proposed by Drs. Barthez and Billiet
admit of the following answers.
It is much safer to follow the spirit of Hahnemann’s direc¬
tions, or at least not to give the medicine in larger doses than
the 100th to the 200th of a grain: this dilution may easily be
made by dissolving a grain of good fresh extract in 100 or 200
drops of alcohol: the dose of this, as many drops as the child
has years, up to 10 drops, given daily or twice a day for a
week, then every second day from two to four weeks. If any
physiological symptoms are produced, the remedy ought to be
suspended for a few days.
As the preservative virtues of Belladonna are only tempo¬
rary, it ought to be readministered on every new exposure to
contagion. This suggests the question is Belladonna a prophy¬
lactic in the same manner as vaccination to small pox ? In
the latter case the efficacy is in virtue of the well known patho¬
logical law that passing through one attack affords immunity
from a second infection: and the vaccine is merely a modifica¬
tion of the variolous virus. But with belladonna such a ration¬
ale can hardly be given. Does it then act by producing a state
of the system which diminishes the susceptibility to tbe scarla¬
tinal contagion, or does it act curatively, that is, does it in
virtue of the homoeopathic law arrest the action of the poison,
during the period of incubation ?
Whichever of these explanations be correct, it is evident that
tbe Belladonna can exercise no beneficial effect until it has been
taken for some days. This circumstance must lead to its failure,
when the formative period of the disease ia well advanced. As
vaccinating a patient in whom the formative period of variola
has well advanced is of no efficacy, neither can Belladonna in
similar circumstances be expected to arrest, though it may
modify the course of the disease. In future experiments it were
well to bear this in mind, and to deduct from the list of fai¬
lures, cases where the disease shews itself within the first week
or ten days of using the Belladonna, and to watch them as
merely answering the question, whether the course of the disease
is modified.
Future trials ought to be limited to those times when the
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disease is decidedly epidemic, and the subjects for experiment
ought to be chosen, except in the case of large institutions, from
the poorer classes, where fewer means of isolation can be adopted,
and where therefore there are fewer agencies to account for the
immunity. Tha age of the patient ought also be limited to
under thirty, as after that period susceptibility to infection
considerably diminishes. Children at the breast under six
months old also ought to be excepted.
The Pathology and Treatment of Hysteria, by R. B. Carter,
M.R.C.S. Eng., pp. 161. London, 1853.
The varied ailments designated as hysteria are not more nume
rous than are the treatises written for their elucidation, but
so many of these contain mere idle speculations, that the
profession look on them suspiciously, regarding their practical
value in the inverse ratio of their number. The work, however,
whose title we give above, olaims an honourable exception to
any such rule. Mr. Carter’s treatise has the great charm of
being a small book, but full of clear concise descriptions of
the disease, and the appropriate treatment. Its perusal gives
at once the conviction that it is the work of one who has care¬
fully studied this most puzzling malady, and made himself
practically master of its varied forms. In addition to these
advantages, it amply commends itself to our notice on other
grounds, for the author discredits the power of ordinary drugs
to combat the disease, and therefore turns especial attention
to the moral treatment, a common ground, too much neglected
by all therapeutic schools: a mode of treatment, curative and
prophylactic, which, if properly worked, tends not only to the
well-being of the patient, but to the mental culture of the
physioian.
Mr. Carter had the privilege of enjoying for several years
the friendship of the late Mr. Mackenzie, who was extensively
known by his successful treatment of the most inveterate
hysterical disorders. His practice our author long witnessed.
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and assisted in, and he has been the more induced to give it
publicity, by observing the tide of medical and physiological
literature approaching very near the views which Mr. Mac¬
kenzie had long advocated in private.
By the title hysteria , Mr. Carter designates a disease which
commences with a convulsive paroxysm. This paroxysm is
witnessed under various aspects, and in various degrees of
severity, being limited in some cases to a short attack of
laughter or sobbing, and in others producing very energetic
involuntary movements maintained during a considerable time,
and occasionally terminating in a period of catalepsy or coma.
“ In a large number of cases the * fit' thus produced will not
return; but when it does so, the exciting oause of the next
two or three attacks is often obscure, and then, after a while,
the convulsions occur frequently, when no reason whatever can
be assigned for their commencement; although if the patient
be vexed or thwarted, they are pretty sure to follow. This state,
which may be called simple hysteria, and consists in the liability
to fits of greater or less severity, either with or without distinct
intervals of remission, and perfect health, is subject to many
complications, which constitute the various disorders known as
hysterical spine, hysterical knee, hysterical neuralgia, &c.
Complicated hysteria generally involves much moral and in¬
tellectual as well as physical derangement, and when it is fully
established, the primary convulsion, the ‘ fons et origo mali,' is
sometimes suffered to fall into abeyance." (p. 3.)
But the convulsive paroxysm Mr. Carter regards as the
essential characteristic of the disease, and he also insists strongly
on the circumstance that some strong emotion is the only in¬
variable precursor of its presence, and seemingly the only thing
at all essential to its production. This in some oases may not
at first be admitted, from the emotion being of a secret cha¬
racter, and thus requires great tact and patience to lead to its
discovery. “But it may be taken as an invariable rule, that
the paroxysm will be violent in exact proportion to the length
of time during whioh the feelings giving rise to it have been
concealed.”
Various writers have admitted the agency of emotion in
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producing hysteria, but they have regarded it as a mere ex¬
citing cause, requiring for its operation the existence of some
unknown coq|titutional state. This hysterical diathesis Mr.
Carter disclaims. It is quite unnecessary for us to enter into
all the various theories as to the nature of hysteria, our space
may be more profitably occupied in considering practical points.
The views and treatment that Mr. Carter adopts may be
better understood, if we first describe what emotions are, and
then rapidly glance at some of their effects.
Combining the definitions of Drs. Carpenter and Brown,
emotions are vivid sensations, associated with an idea of plea¬
sure or pain, arising immediately from the consideration of
objects perceived, or remembered, or imagined, or from other
prior emotions.
Whenever an emotion is experienced, it does not remain as
a matter of mere intellectual consciousness, but always mani¬
fests itself by the production of certain effects, either upon the
intellect and will, or upon the physical organism. In the latter
case speedily exhausting itself, but in the former appearing to
exercise a continuous, and even cumulative effect. Effects ex¬
clusively mental are observed under the influence of intense
depressing emotions, as when a person is said to be stunned by
grief, stupified by terror. When severe, even death may ensue,
but in general recovery follows, either gradual from the lapse
of time, or immediate by the removal of the cause, or by the
production of physical effects, such as tears, &c. Physical
effects are not so often the sequences of the mental, as they are
the direct results of the emotional influence. The effects that
emotions produce on the human frame are familiar to all; they
are witnessed in every degree of intensity, singly or in com¬
bination, and are all alike in affording speedy and evident
relief to the emotion itself, which may be said to be exhausted
in producing them. In the muscular system we observe the
effects ranging from restlessness and trembling to violent mus¬
cular movements, these again becoming objectless, and pre¬
senting themselves as convulsions, tetanus, &o. Even involun¬
tary muscles respond to the stimulus of excited feelings: the
heart, from simple disturbance of its action to destruction of its
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tissue, for under the influence of fright, and despair, and even
joy, the left ventricle has again and again been ruptured; * and
depressing passions occasion hypertrophy of the left ventricle.
Again, in the intestines, not only as regards peristaltic action
and change of secretion, hut in the formation of partial con¬
tractions, giving rise to apparent tumours, which have been
called by Dr. Gull “ phantom tumours.” +
The following extract from Mr. Carter, on the influence of
emotion on the muscles of expression, is interesting, as throw¬
ing much light upon many problems in hysterical pathology :
" In early childhood they are employed in the performance
of two distinct classes of movements; involuntary, designated
expressions, and voluntary, grimaces.. As age advances, the
movements included in each class beoome much more nume¬
rous, and the former are brought in some degree under voli¬
tional control; but this is accomplished in a manner which
marks their distinctive characters even more strongly than
before.
"Any grimace within the power of the individual to accom¬
plish, is produced by an effort of the will, similar to that excited
in raising the arm, &o. * * But it will be quite evident, upon
very cursory observation, that expressions are never called forth
in this way; and that persons wishing to convey by the coun¬
tenance a feeling which they do not really entertain, will attain
their object, not by the exercise of any control over the face,
* Dr. Stroud on the Death of Christ.
f These tumours sometimes simulate the condition of pregnancy, or per¬
manent tympanitic distension. Dr. Simpson has adopted an excellent plan
for testing the reality of these tumours; he administers chloroform by in¬
halation, while under its action these phantom swellings entirely disappear.
We doubt not that some cases of reported cures of supposed ovarian dropsy
have been occasionally this kind of tumour. Dr. Bright (Guy’s Hosp. Rep.
voL iv, p. 223,) mentions a case, where a surgeon actually cut down on one,
supposing it to be an ovarian cyst. We would also allude to an error which
may be made in diagnosis, by forgetting that not only is a hysterical patient
quite capable of making a circumscribed portion of the abdominal wall hard
and rigid, while the rest remains comparatively flaccid, but even in a person
of calig nervous system, the same condition may be produced, by an instinc¬
tive reflex act, for the protection of a part of the belly which is tender to
pressure.
VOL* XIII., NO. LIT.—APRIL, 1855. U
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bat by thinking of the proper emotion, and surrendering their
features to its influence. * * Success being much greater when
this can he distinctly remembered, than when it has to he
imagined; so that young and joyous people find it no easy
task to express by looks a sympathy which they do not experi¬
ence, while those who have felt sorrow can produce and main¬
tain its aspect with little difficulty. But it is worthy of remark,
that the power of remembering or imagining emotions, so as to
obtain their effect upon the face, is capable of being greatly
increased by practice, a fact which explains the improvement of
actors, so far as gesture is concerned. * *
“Again, the difference between volitional and emotional
movements of the face, is shown by the circumstance, that,
whereas the former are never excited, except by an effort of the
will, the latter not only take place independently of it, hut can
seldom he entirely prevented, even by its most determined ex¬
ercise. * * Nothing, however, shews more dearly the relief
afforded to emotion by its effects, than the comparative ease
with which the features can he controlled, under circumstances
which allow them to he withdrawn from observation, even if hut
for a moment at a time, so as to give the excited feeling its
play.” (p. 9.)
Perversions of ordinary sensations, as the result of emotion,
are not very common in healthy persons, hut not unfrequent in
sensitive women. But even in the healthy, the power of fear
to deaden pain has been experienced by many, when the dentist
threatens to commence operations. On the organs of circula¬
tion, and on the secretions the effeots are very marked, from
simple blushing to persistent congestion. The effects of fear
and anger of rapidly changing the character of the milk, and
extreme terror in causing the secretion to become so poisonous
as to cause to the sucking infant speedy death, are well authen¬
ticated. Anger, Dr. Ramsbotham enumerates as one of the
common causes of puerperal peritonitis, &e. Other secretions
are in like manner increased, diminished, or vitiated by mental
emotions. Thus the breath is sometimes instaneously affected by
had news, so as to become fetid. The gastric juice is increased
by exhilaration; freedom from anxiety favours the deposition
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of fat, and, according to Dr. Fletcher, despair has an eqnal
tendency, for persons left long to pine in condemned cells,
without a shadow of hope, and badly fed, have frequently
become remarkably fat. But on this point we need not further
enlarge.
The power of emotion to produce disease is greatly increased
by two causes: first, by the operation of all debilitating influ¬
ences, local or general; and secondly, by all circumstances
tending to make individual parts the subject of attention. This
latter point is a subject which Dr. Madden has in our pages
deservedly commented on; to those who are interested in this
matter, we recommend the perusal of a very able article on
the subjeot, in the British and Foreign Medico-Chirurgical
Review,* as explanatory of many mesmeric phenomena.
Our space will merely permit us to state, that this expectant
attention plays a most important part in the production of many
hysteric states, especially such as depend upon intellectual or
sensorial disturbances, or upon actual changes in the nutrition
of parts. And these parts which are the subject of close atten¬
tion are also rendered liable to be the outlet for any strong
emotion which may be experienced, as shewn in the uterus, &c.
Mr. Carter gives a very remarkable instance of the powers of
attention.
“A lady who was watching her little child at play, saw a
heavy window-sash fall upon its hand, cutting off three of the
fingers, and she was so much overcome by fright and distress
as to be unable to render it any assistance. A surgeon was
speedily obtained, who, having dressed the wounds, turned
* Dr. Holland, in his Mental Physiology, has also an interesting chapter
on the “Effects of Mental Attention on Bodily Organs.” The following
remark is worthy of the attention of those who readily procure pathogenetic
effects from infinitesimal doses. “We may reasonably refer to the same
principle, some of the alleged facts in homoeopathy, such as the long train
of symptoms, sometimes amounting to hundreds, which are catalogued as
♦ proce edin g from infinitesimally small quantities of substances, inert or insig¬
nificant in other manner of uses. The attention urged to seek for local
sensations, has no difficulty in finding them. They generate one another, and
are often, as we shall afterwards see, excited by the mere expectation of their
occurrence.” (p. 21.)
2 U
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himself to the mother, whom he found seated, moaning and
complaining of her hand. On examination, three fingers, cor¬
responding to those injured in the child, were discovered to he
swollen and inflamed, although they had ailed nothing prior to
the accident. In twenty-four hours incisions were made into
them, and pus was evacuated, &c.” (p. 24.)
Hysteria is a disease of which well-marked instances are
sometimes met with in men, but these instances are so rare that
it may he asked, why is it an ailment so peculiar to women ?
We agree with Mr. Carter, that it is not because hysteria is
a disease necessarily connected with the uterus, but because
women are so much more the subjects of emotional influence
than men. Where the one thinks, the other feels. Woman,
with less of the volitional power than man, possesses much
more of the emotioned and instinctive; these more frequently
become the leading springs of action, and act more on the
bodily frame than they do in the stronger sex. In addition to
this mental confirmation, woman is also much more liable to
emotional influences from the very necessity of endeavouring to
conceal her feelings. When sexual desire is taken into account,
it adds immensely to the forces bearing on the female, who is
much under its dominion, and who, if unmarried or chaste, is
compelled to restrain any manifestation of its sway. We think
that in general Mr. Carter applies sexual feelings in a too
limited sense; we admit fully its power and its prevalence, but
by sexual feelings we do not mean simply lust, but those purer
influences which attach woman to man; passionate attractions
which exercise great power in many women who are wholly free
of all aphrodisiac feeling. The remark of Frank is also a true
one: “Coelibem vitam plures sine noxa degere possunt foemin®,
sed vix unam illarum invenias, qu® prope maritum impotentem
impune decumbere possit. Idem de uxoribus a maritis neg-
lectis, valet.”
The third chapter is devoted to the hysteric paroxysm. He
divides it into three kinds :—
Primary, when the paroxysm is produced by some original
and fresh emotion, to the action of which the system has not
before been subjected.
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Secondary , when the attacks follow the suggested or spon¬
taneous remembrance of the emotions to which the primary fit
has been due.
Tertiary , those that are designedly excited by the patient
herself, through the instrumentality of voluntary recollection,
and with the perfect knowledge of the power to produce them.
Paroxysms of the primary and secondary kinds may often be
induced by the operation of an exciting cause, so powerful that
no effort of the will is sufficient to prevent them taking place,
even if delayed for a time. But in general, the attacks, though
not volitional, are yet a matter of surrender, and might he pre¬
vented under the pressure of an adequate motive.
Of the primary, little further need be said, than that an
attack leaves a great liability to another from mere remembrance
of the emotion. When these remembrances are pleasant, there
is a great danger of the tertiary form being established. But
when painful, involuntary hysteria of a severe and lasting
character is often induced, partly beoause while the causes
of excited feeling are fresh in the mind, the fits are apt to
recur so frequently, that a condition of almost tetanical suscep¬
tibility is the result: and partly because so often connected
with sexual feelings, the catamenial periods are apt to recall the
exciting emotions.
The facility of establishing the tertiary form varies much.
Some persons rapidly gain the power, first trials affording suffi¬
cient encouragement for future efforts, until at last the power of
producing a paroxysm may be compared, both in its extent and
nature, to that exercised by a finished actor over the muscles of
the face. These attacks may be distinguished from primary hys¬
teria by the frequency of their occurrence without any evident
cause, and from their taking place under circumstances to
excite observation, and sympathy. The same features, together
with the existence of complications, and absence of mental dis¬
turbance, distinguish them from the secondary kind.
The next chapter is devoted to the moral state and motives
of hysterical women. This is a very interesting section, and a
right comprehension of the subject, is an essential requisite for
successful treatment. In primary and secondary hysteria there
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is very little change in the moral condition, very little that is of
a permanent character. The temporary alterations met with
Mr. Carter attributes to a sudden ascendency of pre-existing
feelings: for example, the occurrence of nymphomania he
explains by the circumstance that the emotion absorbs all the
mind, and thus for a time weakens the sense of decency, but
when the paroxysm passes away, so do all erotic feelings. But
it is in the tertiary form that we have such painful evidence of
moral aberration. We shall give as clearly as our space permits,
our author’s views.
Tertiary hysteria can scarcely be produced unless the exciting
emotion be of a pleasurable and of a secret kind. Feelings of
a pleasurable kind which can be confessed and acted on never
excite even secondary attacks; on their first gush, they may
produce a primary paroxysm, yet afterwards they have abun¬
dance of outlet, both in talk and action.
Among secret feelings then, the choice is almost limited to
those connected with the amatory instinct, and to jealousy
and envy. So that the subjects of this disease may be divided
into classes; the first will comprise women whose sexual pro¬
pensities have been disappointed, but whose lot in life may
be in all other respects desirable, and the second those in whom
some form of envy or discontent is the predominant feeling.
A morbid and absorbing oraving for sympathy is the ex¬
citing oause to the production of tertiary hysteria; so that it
will be observed that snch being the case, the moral obliquity
is small in patients of the first class. They have many compli¬
cations, chiefly of a purely congestive kind, and the paroxysms
are induced with extreme facility; but the patients are much
more amenable to treatment than the second class, as they often
appear to suffer from not clearly seeing their way, and are most
glad to abandon the wretched habit to which they have sur¬
rendered themselves, when once the means of doing so have
been explained to them.
In the second class where the subjects regard themselves as
neglected and uncared for, it is here that the desire for sympa¬
thy leads to such moral obliquity, which Mr. Carter sums up
“ as an union of selfishness and deceptivity allied in order to
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indulge that desire for sympathy which is the chief motive of
action, the others being only means for attaining an end. The
victims will present many differences of apparent character, some
seeming to be devout, others frivolous, but in all of them, on
close examination, the same chief traits may be discovered—of
selfishness, that will indulge its own small caprice at jbhe cost of
real suffering to others, and of mendacity that verges upon the
sublime, and that never fails, like that of the lacquey in the
* Rivals,’ having told one lie to endorse it with another.” (p.56.)
In this fearful craving for sympathy most of the complica¬
tions of tertiary hysteria take their origin: to its ever increas¬
ing force may be ascribed their progress in multiplication; at
last the paroxysms are abandoned, and the complaints are
limited to the knee, to the spine, <fcc.
To Complications chapter iv is devoted. It contains much
useful information, but we can now only remark that these
complications may be divided into two classes, the real and the
simulative. The reed being divided into such actions as Dr.
Carpenter has described as ideo-motor, such as certain convul¬
sive movements, vomiting, cough, &c. and into local conges¬
tions. These congestions being the result of close attention to
certain parts, especially the uterus. The simulative, viz. those
which owe their origin to the ingenuity and deceptivity of the
patient, are shewn in attempting to produce hemoptysis, heema-
temesis, suppression of urine, long abstinence from food, &o.
Pains are often feigned, and when real are always exaggera¬
ted. Pains and other symptoms though feigned do by close
attention become real. While alluding to the forms of atten¬
tion, we cannot refrain from giving an extract, which coming
from Mr. Carter, who has had great experience in these matters,
merits serious attention, and which fully corroborates the re¬
marks made by Dr. Chapman at the Cheltenham Congress,
1850.
“ This process has been greatly extended and increased by
the researches of gentlemen engaged in the treatment of uterine
disease, and by the consequent discovery that a large number
of our countrywomen are invalided by some of its numerous
forms. It is scarcely possible at present for an hysterical girl
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to have no acquaintances among the many women who are
subjected to the speculum and caustic, and who love to discuss
their symptoms, and to narrate the sensations which attend
upon the treatment. These patients would probably give the
impression that a little leucorrhoea, a backache, and a few
blushing affirmations to leading questions would be deemed
sufficient to justify an examination, and that this might be ex¬
pected, to reveal abundant grounds for further treatment. In
many cases ladies are quite ignorant of the nature of the reme¬
dies administered to them; and even if they heard the name of
Indian hemp, would scarcely know the purposes for which
it has long been used by the Hindoos; but still they may
possibly find out by observation that the speculum becomes
more grateful to their feelings the oftener it is applied, and that
the wish for it is in some degree excited by each successive
dose of the medicine, (p. 67.) * * * * If regarded as a
dernier resort, even for married women the speculum would
lose none of its utility, aud would be infinitely less liable to
abuse'; and there is much reason to think that many uterine
diseases of the virgin, have a decided tendency towards spon¬
taneous cure. Those occurring as complications of hysteria
may certainly be removed in a very simple manner, which will
be fuljy described hereafter; and no one who has once realized
the amount of moral evil wrought in girls thus suffering, whose
prurient desires have been increased by Indian hemp, and par¬
tially gratified by medical manipulation, can possibly deny that
the remedy, even if effectual, is infinitely worse than the disease.
I have more than once seen young unmarried women, of the
middle class, reduced by the constant use of the speculum to
the mental and moral condition of prostitutes, seeking to give
themselves the same indulgence by the practice of solitary vice;
and asking every medical man under whose care they fall to
institute an examination of the sexual organs.” (p. 69.)
Chapt. vi contains the treatment. We stated at the com¬
mencement that Mr. Carter has no faith in the efficacy of
ordinary medicines in the cure of hysteria, except in so far as
they may remove predisposing causes, such as chlorosis, &c.
We are, with him, inclined to agree that there are few diseases
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less under the control of medicine than hysteria: yet homoeo¬
pathic means are sometimes so decidedly useful, as to foster the
hope that a better knowledge of their action, coupled with moral
treatment, may do much to remedy this sad affection. We
believe that our remedies may succeed in doing what Mr. Carter
believes beyond the range of medicine, that is the power of
working an organic change in the nervous constitution. We
found this belief on the success of medicinal treatment carried
on for six years in the worst case of hysteria we have yet met
with.
But in such circumstances, especially, it is necessary to have
patience, to avoid changing from one remedy to another because
relief is not immediate, but to remember that time is a necessary
element in effecting such changes, and that a gradual procedure
is the only way to ensure ultimate success.
But our object at present is not to review the medicinal, but
to direct attention to the moral treatment, because it is a mode
which Mr. Carter has systematised more than any other writer
with whom we are acquainted. The reader if he remembers the
views of the cause of hysteria and its divisions, may almost
anticipate the general directions for the moral treatment: these
may be briefly stated as follows.
In primary cases nothing must be attempted beyond the with¬
drawal of all causes of excitement, and the endeavour to
substitute for them incentives to intellectual exertion.
In secondary hysteria, when the disturbing emotion is sub-
jective, benefit will accrue from any excitement, whether of
mind or feelings, which is produced through the agency of
external things.
In the tertiary form the objects are two-fold:
1st. Destructive, removing the motives of the patient, by
defeating the ends which she proposes to herself for attainment.
2nd. Constructive, elevating the moral and intellectual ele¬
ments.
Let us suppose ourselves called to a patient who for the first
time has had a hysteric paroxysm. The paroxysm may safely
be left to itself: after it has passed we are to examine into the
general health, and meet any derangement by appropriate
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remedies, then direct our enquiries to the emotion which has
excited the paroxysm. Our space will not permit us to enter
into the various full directions given by Mr. Carter, we must
rest satisfied with stating that the success of such an investiga¬
tion depends much on the tact of the physician. It is always
desirable to know the character of the patient; with some, a
direct questioning in private under the seal of professional con¬
fidence will secure the end, but with others a more circuitous
course is necessary, and the aid of friends required. But the
greater the difficulty of getting an answer, the more sedulously
must the endeavour be carried on, for the deeper the emotions
lie the greater is the importance of discovering them. The
cause then being discovered, the patient must be informed of
the danger of yielding to such emotions, and every precaution
adopted against any return of the feeling. Of means calculated
to carry off, and to direct emotional disturbance, one of the best
is muscular exercise carried, to fatigue. Mr. Carter recommends
a heavy wheel fixed into the wall, which is turned by the patient.
We have often with benefit directed the patient on experiencing
the least feeling of the emotions, to resort immediately to some
decided muscular exertion, such as using the skipping rope,
sweeping the room, &c.; by such means the force is directed
upon the voluntary action of the muscular system, and thus
many a paroxysm is prevented which would otherwise have
certainly taken place.
The same end may be gained, but with greater difficulty and
less certainty, by some intellectual exercise.
In order to guard against secondary hysteria, measures must
be adopted for turning the thoughts into some other direction.
Intellectual exertion, thus strengthening the judgment as a
counterpoise to the emotional element, active exercise, change of
air, occupation, and travelling. Allusion has already been
made in this Journal (Vol. xii, p. 454) to the good effects pro¬
duced by the Swedish exercises of Ling. Music as an occupa¬
tion has been condemned by Dr. Lay cock as deleterious Mr.
Carter has not seen any facts which tend to support such views,
and is strongly of opinion that when hysteria is developed,
music, t. e., piano or harp playing, is a very valuable remedial
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occupation, from its affording employment both to the mind and
the fingers. It is hardly necessary to add that halls, theatrical
and operatic performances are strictly to he forbidden. Care to
be taken in the selection of hooks, and reading aloud to he
preferred, as silent reading encourages reverie.
“ When secondary hysteria is once established, very little can
he done in the "way of curative treatment. The preoccupation
of mind, and the physioal disorder are generally too great to
permit file application of the remedies most likely to he effectual.
When one feeling is in possession of the thoughts, and has pro¬
duced an intellectual state akin to reverie, it is plain that the
effect of time in removing it can only be very gradually pro¬
duced, because not aided by observation of the events which
that time brings in its course. Nevertheless, the prognosis of
secondary hysteria may, in most cases, be favourable, and the
progress towards recovery may generally be made evident by
directing attention upon successive stages of the disease, the
period of natural recovery being sometimes postponed until the
age for strong emotions has passed by. But as soon as some
positive improvement can be recognised, any circumstance
capable of giving a new and powerful bias to the thoughts, is
always followed by speedy and beneficial changes, so that the
excitation of pleasurable emotions may be looked upon as the
most important of remedial measures." (p. 103.)
Of tertiary hysteria Mr. Carter states in limine that no system
of moral treatment can be effectually carried out so long as the
patient remains at home; amd although it is possible that in
some mild cases, an attempt at doing so might be successful,
still it cannot often be obtained, and never confidently predicted;
as at home the patient will always possess the means of baffling
the best laid plans, and will not fail to use them if the deceptive
element be at all a strongly marked feature of her case. More¬
over when disease has been simulated, the very progress of the
cure almost establishes the fact of imposture; and it is highly
conducive to the future well-being of the sufferer that she should
not know this imposture to be perceptible to her friends. Now
and then he says cases will be met with in whioh the patient is
weary of and sorry for the system of deception which she has
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commenced, and waits only for the smallest help from a friendly
hand to abandon her practices, which she would have previously
left off had she known how to do so without exciting the
suspicions of her friends. But such individuals form a small
minority of the hysterical. Mr. Carter has an establishment for
the treatment of tertiary cases at Leytonstone, near London.
The first step in the treatment must he the discovery of any
special motives by which the patient may he influenced. Every
available source, such as the history of the case, the aid of
friends, &c., is required.
These points being ascertained, a few days may he devoted to
close observation of the patient, and she is to be left so as to he
thrown off her guard. Being thus thoroughly satisfied of the
nature of her ailment, the medical attendant should wait for
some complaint of illness to he made to him, or for the
occurrence of an hysteric paroxysm.
The attack will in all probability occur during a meal, or
when there are strangers present, or at some most inconvenient
time and place, and it may on this account he necessary to have
the patient removed to her bed room; or if the room in which
the attack takes place can he spared, every one must withdraw
and leave the patient to herself, the bystanders expressing no
sympathy nor alarm, &c. But our space will not permit of us
entering into details of the admirable rules laid down for observ¬
ing, questioning and convicting the patient; we may however
give one extract as to the mode of addressing the patient.
“ The chief object to he attained, is to produce full conviction
on the part of the patient that her medical attendant thoroughly
understands her case, and knows not only how many of her
symptoms or ailments are self produced, hut also the exact
manner or train of thought by which they are set going on each
occasion; and the plan which will he found available for this
purpose in the greater number of cases, and with some slight
modifications, perhaps, in all, is to commence with a positive
assertion that she has nothing at all the matter with her; her
ailments being one and all fraudulent imitations of real disease.
Such a statement will usually he met by an indignant, but still
half frightened denial of its truth; and it should immediately
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and unsparingly be followed up by a complete analysis of tbe
case from its commencement to that time. * * * The first hysterio
paroxysm should be taken as a starting point, and tbe emotions
which produced it should he described and censured. This
done, the case must be as it were built up, and put together by
the speaker, the share in its production of every vicious pro¬
pensity or selfish feeling being quietly and dispassionately laid
down, and the probable motives for each new trick being de¬
scribed. When the historical sketch is completed, the attention
of the patient should be drawn to the effect of her conduct upon
her own physical and moral health, and to the terrible degrada¬
tion of her state, &c. * * * This plan being continued until either
the resources of the speaker are exhausted, or until, as will now
and then happen, the patient exhibits signs of contrition. In
either case, and especially in the latter, the tone of conversation
must be changed. If what has been said appears to produce
little effect, it will be sufficient to add that her condition is not
irrelievable; but that, on the contrary, if she behaves well, she
shall be assisted to discontinue her bad habits, and to regain
her position in society, with which assurance she may be left for
a time to her reflections.
“ But if any sign of penitence or regret be manifested, this
assurance will not be sufficient. The patient will require more
tender treatment: and the evidence of a wish for better things,
small though it may be, should be carefully fostered and en-'
couraged.” (p. 112.)
Deception requires to be steadily counteracted by an entire
withdrawal of sympathy, while at the same time the patient is
treated with every possible kindness and cQnsideration, whenever
there is no question of illness involved. When the means used
to imitate morbid action can be discovered, they must be pointed
out, and upon all practicable occasions, the first warnings as to
the effects of hysteria, and the substance of the first lecture
must be reverted to, and insisted upon, while the threat of
exposure is used to accelerate tardy progress, and encourage¬
ment is given to every indication of a desire for amendment. It
is scarcely necessary to repeat that the effect of such a system
as this is to withdraw all motives for continued imposture, and
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to arouse by the fear of physical illness, and of social degrada¬
tion, strong inducements to the preservation of health.
The after steps are much the same as have already been
given under the other forms of hysteria, only that the difficulties
are here much more formidable, for the moral perversion and
physical lesions exist to a far greater extent. #
Chapt. vn is devoted to hysteria among the 'poor , but our
space does not permit us to enter on this. We think the usual
procedure, as recommended by Hahnemann, of noting down in
presence of the patient a detail of the history and symptoms, or
wherever any kind of hysteria is concerned, to be honoured in
the breach rather than in the observance. The reasons are
self obvious ; a careful record can be made from memory; and
such a record is also much more valuable than the verbatim
details, which are as protean as they are never ending, of the
hysterical patient.
It is a question whether in many other cases than hysteria, it
is not better to record at home, than in the patient’s presence.
Better as regards the relation of the patient to his physician,
and of the latter to the cultivation of bis memory.
In closing our abstract of Mr. Carter’s work, we reoominend
its careful perusal to our readers, in the full confidence that they
will derive, as we have done, much assistance and many useful
bints, not only in hysteria, but in many so-called “ nervous ”
complaints. Our acquaintance with it extends to more than a
year, and to his directions we have been indebted for great
improvement in two cases which were placed under our care as
being phthisis; we have benefitted others, and failed in several;
but where we have failed we have had this satisfaction that we
were examining and regarding the disease from a much clearer
point than we had hitherto done. A few cautions, the result of
our experience may be noted; the practical pathology of this
view of hysteria, appears so simple that one is inclined to rush
too hurriedly to the charge, and mistake a primary or secon¬
dary type for a tertiary. We may, when urging a strong effort
of will to resist the emotional paroxysms, and finding our
patient fail, be inolined to be impatient or even harsh on
account of the failure; forgetting that first efforts may not at
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first sucoeed, and also that when once the emotional influence
has gained a certain point, it passes beyond, the limits of the
will, and must exhaust itself. The task of elevating the
judgment as the counterpoise of feeling, is one which can only
be carried out by fully entering into the sympathies and feel’
ings of women. The change to us may appear an easy one,
but a very hard one to those whose nature it is to feel where we
think. It must be remembered that the great object is, occupa¬
tion of her thoughts for a certain time, more than the attain¬
ment of excellence in the pursuit itself.
To attempt to remodel too much, not only must end in
failure, but the quick tact of woman will lead her to feel that
we know not her nature. In our desires to succeed, we must
remember, that there is a limit which cannot be passed without
destroying all that is distinctive of womanhood. Tennyson, in
his Princess, so truly and beautifully expresses this, that we
cannot resist the quotation:—
For woman is not tmdevelopt man,
But diverse; could we make her as the man,
Sweet love were slain, whose dearest bond is this,
Not like to like, but like in difference:
Yet in the long years liker must they grow:
The man be more of woman, she of man:
He gain in sweetness and in moral height,
Nor lose the wrestling thews that throw the world:
She mental breadth, nor fail in childward care.
War, Cholera, and the Ministry of Health. By J. J. G. Wil¬
kinson, M.D. Theobald, London. 1855.
Dr. Wilkinson’s book bears evidence of the period in which it
is written—that period in the present medical revolution, when
homoeopathy has gained too high a position to fear dangers from
neglect on the part of the public, or opposition from that portion
of the medical world who look upon it as a hostile system. The
question to which Dr. Wilkinson directs attention is not whether
homoeopathy is to be received or not, but how it is to be receiv¬
ed—he does not ask that it should be tried, (for it has been tried
and has succeeded) but he demands that it should be adopted.
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At present, however widely homoeopathy is adopted by the
British people individually, as a nation they ignore its existence.
An Army and Navy are sent out, in which, however the nation
sanctions freedom of opinion in matters of religion, it by no
means permits the same in medical matters. The soldier and
sailor must die in an orthodox manner. In this point of view
Sir B. Hall to whom the book is addressed may be looked on as
a type of the public—as an individual he thinks homoeopathy a
great blessing, but as a minister of health he knows not that such
a thing exists—although well aware of the vast benefits which
the advance of science renders available in homoeopathy, and
placed in a position to extend those blessings widely to his fellow
countrymen—yet he disregards modem innovations, he confines
his attention to matters which were equally well managed two
thousand years ago—he acts “ not as presiding over a Board of
Health in a medical sense," but “ as a mere director of a board
of cleanliness.” And such might reasonably be his occupation,
had homoeopathy not disclosed means hitherto unknown, of en¬
countering the dangers which threaten health; for no one will
question the truth of Dr. Wilkinson's remark, that “ there is
clearly no evidence that medicine plays any other than a des¬
tructive part, in its relation to Cholera, or that it is any other
than a violent, indecent way of disturbing inevitable deathbeds,
and doing worse than nothing.” p. 3.
But the people are not left in the hour of peril to lean on
such broken reeds; for “ nursed and reared in and to the medical
profession, there is a rapidly growing set of dissentients, called
the Homoeopaths, who alone offer to occupy the place which the
‘infallible’ profession has ceded. Alive with faith bom of ex¬
perience, standing upon the everlasting and everliving rock of
facts, they know that they have medical or healing powers
equal to the emergency of pestilence, and are willing to put them
to the proof, on fair terms of trial, such as will secure their own
independency of action, so far as this is necessary to a successful
issue. They have printed and published all this, and from their
little housetop have cried it aloud with all their might to all
whom it concerns; but they have cried to stopped ears and
scornful faces,” and here again the often repeated evidence is
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presented to the publio, showing how allopathy ever vacillating
and uncertain in its treatment, preserves uniformity in this alone,
that it is unsuccessful in its results. It tries theoretical treat¬
ment, empirical treatment, and so-called rational treatment, all
differing only as far as the results are concerned, in the degree
of comfort with which they permit the patient to die; and medical
men must be content at best with Sir W. Burnet’s happily con¬
ceived compliment, that the treatment has been most judicious,
although it does not appear to exercise any influence over the
disease. On the other hand. Dr. Wilkinson presents the homoeo¬
pathic statistics, now too well established to require comment,
showing the uniform success of homoeopathic treatment; yet in the
eyes of the nation allopathy is orthodox medicine;—homoeopathy
if known at all, is known only as heresy. “ The moral of all this
is strange, old, and edifying. Here is a grand perplexity of
horrors, deaths by thousands and tens of thousands, in our
cities, our villages, our fleets and our armies; the doctors at
their wits’ end, with all their resources broken, of most approved
badness; the population, the medical profession, and the jour¬
nals rushing about in panic-terror for something—anything to
stop the mischief; some looking into the air with microscopes,
after floating fungi, and imps to be peppered, and have Times
sulphur put upon their tails; some with wild uplifted faces,
imploring Hercules Chadwick to wash, flush, drain, and perfume
away the destroyer; some convulsively grasping at Castor Oil,
and with angry convulsions, throwing it away again; some in
prayer, and all in despair; and yet the terror-stricken crowd will
not for one moment look at the very only thing that pretends to
be somewhat of a sheet anchor, that has proved itself such in
all lands, under these fearful visitations.”
But this cannot last long; already the change has begun;
the public daily become more sensible of the unsoundness of
the hackneyed arguments against homoeopathy, which Dr. Wil¬
kinson so justly ridicules; and the more widely homoeopathy
spreads in consequence, the more manifest becomes the contrast
between the two systems—the one simple yet efficacious, doubted
only on account of its extreme simplicity, and opposed on account
of its extraordinary success, a system which seeks to apply to
VOL. XIII, NO. LII.—APRIL 1854 . X
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medicine the sound Baconian principles, “ inter empiricam et
rationalem facultatem conjugium verum et legitimum in perpetu-
um firmare,” which proceeding from a copious induction of facts
established by carefully conducted experiments, now rests
securely, not on any fancifully devised theory, but on a great
principle of nature.
While allopathy on the other hand, mistaking ceaseless
change for constant progress, ever engaged in perilous experi¬
ments, yet never establishing useful results, already begins to
descend from that position which it now no longer owes to its
own merit, but to the natural tendency of the human mind,
“ quieta non movere.”
But there are some of the old school who are not content to
treat as they think right those who are foolish enough to commit
themselves to their care, they have actually demanded that the
legislature should interfere to suppress this system, which has
the audacity to rescue from death those who ought in their
opinion to be the victims of “ regular practice.” This point Dr.
Wilkinson takes up strongly : after exposing the atrocity of an
enactment which would in effect forbid that the mortality in
Cholera should be reduced one third, and pointing out that tire-
real danger here is on the part of regular practice, he proceeds
to advocate universal tolerance in medical, as well as in all other
matters.
“ What I should propose,” he says, “ instead of this attempt to
put down ‘ quacks,’ is a simple bill, making it obligatory upon
each medical practitioner, man or woman, to declare their style
and titles without reserve. Let any one in the kingdom who
pleases be a doctor, but let him or her say where they got the
degree, and let there be a general registration of all medical
practitioners of every class, done with no partiality for any
almunus or any sex, so that the public shall know exactly the
credentials of those whose brass plates they see, and whom they
may choose to call in ” (p. 40); then after pointing out the evil
consequences of the contrary system, he says, with regard to the
principal objection to his measure, namely, that many lives
would be endangered by unqualified practitioners:—“ Of course
whenever a practitioner does a piece of culpable mischief, he
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will still be as liable to an action at law, for an assault, as he is
at present, the only difference will be that bis diploma will form
no part of the eloquence of counsel, of the scrutiny of medical
prosecutors, or of the prejudices of the jury; the question will
be as to the injury inflicted by his incompetency, violence, or
neglect.” p. 48. Were such a measure adopted, we certainly
might expect that a check would be given to the indiscriminate
salivation, and rash bleeding, in which so many practitioners of
the present day indulge with impunity; and still more would
surgery feel its effects, for Dr. Wilkinson says most justly “ as
we know that old physic by no means represents what can be
done by therapeutical means, it follows that operations are in
the main not justifiable until the patients have had the better
chance afforded by homoeopathic treatment. To be operated on
at the dictum of an allopath, is as if a prisoner were to be con¬
demned by a coroner's jury, and executed forthwith, when we
know that there is a still further process, sifting the rights of life
and justice, and that a grand jury alone can deoide on the capital
events of a case: all that the allopathist ought to do is to commit
a patient for operation, the homoeopathist alone should sentence
him to undergo it. Hence the public necessity in the interest
of the poor, of super-adding by authority of parliament, a co¬
equal homoeopathic staff, to each and all of our great hospitals
and infirmaries." p. 51.
Now although from the constitution of our public hospitals
it would be impossible, .even if it were advisable (which we
doubt) to call in the authority of parliament in the way Dr.
Wilkinson proposes, surely his suggestion is not wholly un¬
deserving the consideration of those who at present have
authority in these matters; to wit, the subscribers and governors
of those charities. No one will dispute the justice of his remarks
when he says “ on a single other ground also, and one of the
most considerate kind, I would base my advocacy of the intro¬
duction of a homoeopathic department into the hospitals. It
would give the poor a choice in medical practice, and it would
be seen which they like best, allopathy or homoeopathy. To
ascertain this would be very important, because in fact ultimately,
the public are the judges of good and bad doctoring, safe means
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and unsafe, cure or no cure, so that the testimony of the masses
of this country might settle much, might provide convenient
statistics for guiding the choice of the other classes, and even
might influence the medical officers, by showing them the
practice most in demand." p. 55.
Dr. Wilkinson next addresses himself peculiarly to the subject
of the ministry of health. Sir B. Hall, the President of the
Board of Health, confines his attention merely to the removal of
those things which are manifestly prejudicial to health. Dr.
Wilkinson thinks he should turn his attention still more to the
adoption of such measures as are manifestly beneficial to it.
Up to the present day it is not surprising that a board of health
should find it impossible to give general directions concerning
the treatment of an epidemic, when doctors recommended and
practised the most opposite methods of treatment, and that too
with equal success, or rather equal want of success: now the
circumstances of the case are altered; now it is quite possible
for a Board of Health to perform what Dr. Wilkinson affirms
is its first duty, viz. “ to issue specific directions to the people
of Great Britain, for the treatment by them of the early
stages of any diseases that may be prevalent in any year.”
p. 73. Thus he suggests the course which should have been
pursued on the approach of Cholera, the general orders that
should have been issued before and after the battles of the
Crimea ; and though his enthusiasm has doubtless induced him
to entertain too sanguine expectations of the results, and his
medical directions smack of an acquaintance with some of the
diseases he mentions, obtained rather in the pages of Jahr, than
from actual experience of them, yet the right and wrong of the
question are not affected by this, if such a course would indeed
effect “ a saving of life, saving of cash, saving of the material
power and glory of Great Britain, saving also of medical
humanity.” p. 121.
It will no doubt be some time ere the principle here urged is
fully carried out. At present anything homoeopathic is looked
on as connected with medical controversy, and therefore belong¬
ing peculiarly to medical men ; yet there seems to be no reason
why those in authority should not adopt or recommend whatever
is proved by satisfactory evidence to be beneficial to the public
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health, withouf regard for medical parties or theories. The
utility of Vaccination has been nationally recognized, although
fifty years a,go it was as virulently opposed by the medical world,
as homoeopathy is now; thus the first step has already been
made, and many who now ridicule Dr. Wilkinson's enthusiastic
ideas, may live to see some at least of his recommendations
carried out. It is to be hoped that his book may at least excite
reflection on the subject of which he treats among the public,
whom in reality it most concerns, and no less among medical
men.
But while thus expressing our high opinion of Dr. Wilkinson’s
book, as containing many valuable suggestions, calculated to
incite thinking men to useful reflections, we must enter our
protest against the idea that might be obtained from a perusal
of the work, that homoeopathy promises anything like absolute
specifics for names of diseases. It is not the case, as all our
readers are well aware, and as Dr. Wilkinson also must know,
though he allows his zeal to outrun his discretion, when he
makes the assertion, that “ cuprum will do for cholera, arnica
for wounds, rhus for wettings, and rhus and bryonia for fever,
that same saving, which lemon-juice has effected for scurvy.”
At least we have not found these remedies to be such absolute
specifics for these diseases in this country, and therefore it is
the height of rashness to assert that they would be so at Varna,
Scutari, or Balaklava. Indeed as regards the Bulgarian fever,
which Dr. Wilkinson alleges, p. 94, might have been success¬
fully treated by bryonia and rhus in alternation, we believe him
to be completely in the wrong. His recommendation of these
remedies is doubtless derived from Hahnemann’s account of a
typhus or hospital fever, cured by them (given however, in a
very different way to that recommended by our author) but we
doubt if the Bulgarian fever bears the slightest resemblance to
Hahnemann’s typhus; and consequently we fear the remedies
useful for the latter, would be useless for the former. The force
of Dr. Wilkinson’s arguments would not have been weakened,
had he been more cautious in his selections of illustrations of
homoeopathic treatment.
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CLINICAL RECORD.
A group of Headaches , <&c.
By J. Rcjtherfurd Russell, M.D.
It is impossible for the practitioner of homoeopathy not to be
struck with the great advantage he would derive, if it were
possible to amass the experience acquired, either by himself, or
still more by others also, into such a form as to make it im-,
mediately available for practice,—to organize it, in short. This
attempt is now being made, with considerable success, by Dr.
Peters, of New York, in the valuable monographs he has pub¬
lished; and in this country we are all under obligation, among
others, to Dr. Black, for his treatise upon headaches. With,
the view of assisting in this important object, I have collected
a little group of headaches, which have been successfully treated
by me within the last year; and what I think is the most inter¬
esting part about them is, that they all occurred in females
above forty years of age. How far they were dependent upon
the organs of generation, must be left to the decision of tbe
reader. Besides the remedies commonly employed in this class
of affections, it will be seen that some excellent cures were
effected by naja tripudians, a medicine which, when properly
prepared and kept, I am quite satisfied possesses powerful
virtues, although I have not yet been able to procure a
sufficient collection of provings to determine, in sufficient
fulness or precision, the effects it produces. I am in hopes
that those who have time and inclination tb assist in the further
investigation of this interesting substance, will put themselves
in communication, either with Mr. Turner or myself, and obtain
the poison in the strongest form in which it remains undecom¬
posed, and I have to request that all who use it in practice, will
keep a note of every case in which it does obvious and unde¬
niable good. To proceed to the group of headaches.
Case I.
E. M. rot. 47, applied at the dispensary, February 1st, 1854.
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A Group of Headaches.
For many years she has been subject to violent pain about the
top of the head; the pain has been almost constant, but it was
always much more intense at the catamenial period. It was so
violent at that time that she almost lost her senses. It is
accompanied with flushing of the face. [This kind of agoniz¬
ing headache seems to me to be a species of neuralgia of the
brain. It is, as far as my experience goes, generally met with
in women who are subject to hysterical and neuralgic affections,
and more frequently attends excessive than deficient menstrua¬
tion. In this case, the cessation of the menstruation, which
had taken place gradually some time ago, did not seem to have
had much effect upon the pain in the head. When she applied
to me it was very bad indeed, and she was afraid she should go
deranged.]
The tongue was clean ; the bowels always costive; the urine
was much diminished in quantity; there was constant depres¬
sion of spirits.
Prescription: Naja trip. 3rd dil. gtt. ij, a dose 3 times a day
for a week.
Feb. 8th.—The report is: better; bowels less costive; urine
more copious; spirits better; less pain in head. Bepeat.
Feb. 14th.—Much pain in head.
Prescription: Nux v. 2 gtt. ij, a dose 3 times a day for a week.
Feb. 22nd.—Better. Repeat.
March 1st.—Pain returned. Naja trip. 3.
March 15th.—Head much better; pain in legs and back.
Bepeat.
March 21st.—Much better every way. Repeat.
April 5th.—Has caught cold, coughs, &c. Bry.
July 7th.—She has remained quite free of the pain in the
head up to this time, and all she suffers from now is a drawing
pain between the shoulders and down the spine. For this she
got Naja again, and has not returned to report her state. The
important fact is, that after having suffered for many years
constant pain in the head, she remained perfectly free of it for
four months, and probably much longer, owing to Naja and
Nux v. How much was due to one, and how much to the
other of these medicines, must be afterwards decided.
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Clinical Record.
Case II.
S. K. set. 48, applied on the 9th of November, 1853.
Stated that the catamenia had stopped eight years ago, and
that ever since that time she had suffered from frequently re¬
curring attacks of violent pain at the top of the head. The pain
was like as if something were moving over the part, and is very
severe; it is attended with ringing in the ears and cough. It
lasts in its extreme severity about five minutes at a time, and
will come on several times a day. She describes it as very severe
and difficult to bear without screaming out. When the pain is
bad there is pyrosis and much flatulence. There is no palpita¬
tion of heart.
This was obviously a case of neuralgic headache, depending
probably on some derangement of the uterine system originally
and implicating the digestive system secondarily. In the old
system such headaches are almost always treated with purga¬
tives, which give relief for a tipae, hut permanently injure the
nervous system, on whose integrity the permanent recovery
depends.
She was ordered Bellad. 1st dil. gtt. ij, a dose three times
a day— i. e. two drops in two days.
November 16th.—The report is, that she has been better
this week. Repeat.
Nov. 23rd.—No more violent pain; occasional oppression of
breathing. This was probably owing to some implication of
the upper part of the spinal chord in the previous cerebral
affection.
For this she got Naja ttip. 3rd dil. in the same doses.
Dec. 2nd.—The breathing was better and head better.
Calc. carb. 3.
Dec. 9th.—Pain returned very had. Chamomilla, 1 gtt. ij.
Dec. 16th.—Pain better. Repeat. *
Dec. 28th.—Better every way. Bepeat.
Jan. 13th.—Burning pain returned like fire on the top of the
head. Ars. 2 gtt. ij.
Jan. 27th.—Better. Bepeat.
Feb. 3rd.—Better. Repeat.
She continued to improve under the use of Arsenicum till
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313
the 17th of March, when she was again attacked with very
violent pain, no longer at the vertex, but over the brow. The
pain seemed of the same character, but it had changed its seat.
She then got Naja trip. 3rd, as before.
She continued to remain quite free of all pain in the head,
and to get perfectly well, under the use of Naja, till the 3rd of
May, at which period she ceased to attend, and I have every
reason to suppose she continues well to this day. In this case
it will be seen, that headaches, of an intermittent and neuralgio
character, had existed for eight years, and they seem to have
been completely cured in six months.
Belladonna, Arsenicum, Naja and Chamomilla, all appear to
have been of use in this case.
Case III.
A. M. set. 56, applied on the 1st of May, 1854.
Till the age of forty-eight years she enjoyed perfect health—
at that time the catamenia ceased. Ever since then she has
been subject to agonizing pain in the head, so bad as to deprive
her of sense and memory. It generally comes on at noon, and
is attended with pain in the upper part of the back, and flushes
of the face. She has not been more than two or three days free
from an attack for some years.
Her sleep is too deep; her pulse is regular and small; the
tongue is clean; the appetite good; and the bowels natural.
Naja trip. 2nd dil., a dose three times a day.
May 8th.—Has had no pain in the head for three days.
Repefct.
May 15th.—No pain now for ten days. Repeat.
May 22nd.—Pain in head quite gone; violent pain at lower
part of back worse of late. Repeat.
May 25th.—Head keeps well; pain in hips and knee at
night. Rhus 2nd dil.
June 5th.—Pain in knee no better; head keeps well.
Merc. corr. 2.
June 28th.—Quite well.
As far as I know, this woman has continued free of all pain
in the head from that day to this.
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Clinical Record.
Case IV.
B. D. oet. 60, applied on 13th of March 1854.
The patient complains of having had a pain in her head,
attended with ringing in the ears, for the last two or three
years. Except that the pain was severe, there was nothing else
stated about it. It was accompanied by palpitation of heart,
and a small quick nervous pulse. The bowels were costive;
the abdomen large; the urine was scanty and sedimentitious.
This was manifestly a case of nervous headache which often
simulates the congestive type, as they are both generally at¬
tended by ringing of the ears and palpitation of the heart. The
pulse indicates the true character of the complaint: in the
nervous it is always small, sharp, and quick, in the congestive,
large, soft, and rather slow.
Prescription: Naja trip. 1, three powders.
March 20th.—Rather better till yesterday. Repeat.
31st.—Better in general health; bowels regular; less pain
in head. Repeat.
April 7th.—Better; much less noise in head; less palpita¬
tion of heart. Repeat.
April 17tb.—Better; less pain in head; less palpitation;
still noise in ears. Repeat
April 24th.—Better every way. Repeat.
After this the head symptoms almost entirely disappeared,
and she became affected with aching pain in the arms and feet.
These yielded to Carbo veg. and Bryonia, and when last seen in
July she was in comparative health, all the symptoms for which
she originally applied had gone, and as she discontinued her
attendance, I presume she remains well.
Case V.
E. C. set. 40, applied September 6th, 1855.
For the last three years, ever since the catamenia have
become irregular, she has been subject to severe pain in the
posterior part of the head; there is also much pain down the
spine and in the left side, and palpitation of the heart without
any organic affection of that organ. The bowels are rather
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Cases of Heart Disease.
315
confined; the appetite is capricious; the tongue is swollen and
covered at its edges with small white blisters.
The first medicine she got was Mercurius vivus, 3rd trit.
Sept. 11th—Better; less pain in the side; complains much
of palpitation, and pain in her back. Naja trip. 2.
Oct. 11th.—Pain in side and back and palpitation all much
better; bowels confined; pain in back of head entirely gone.
Nux v. 2.
Oct. 20th.—On the whole much better; slight pain in chest.
Bry 2.
Nov. 1st—Almost quite well. She did not return.
Cases of Heart Disease ,
By Db. Hilbebgeb, of Trieste.*
I. A man, set. 24, stoutly made, healthy from his childhood,
became affected, four years ago, with articular rheumatism, accom¬
panied apparently by endocarditis, as far as could be learned from
his description. After six weeks of allopathic treatment he was
restored to health, but there remained a frequently recurring palpita¬
tion, accompanied by asthmatic fits, for which he tried all sorts of
remedies. When he consulted me first, I found, on examining him
very carefully several times, the most decided symptoms of imperfect
closure of the bicuspid valve. As the patient was engaged in the
manufacture of machinery in the naval arsenal, and was constantly
exposed to considerable heat, he, on that account, continued only to
get worse, and in addition to his former symptoms he was attacked
with spitting of blood from the lungs, and frequent accessions of
fever, so that at last he could not continue at his work. I gave him
for some time aeon. 6, two doses daily, which completely removed
the congestive symptoms. Thereafter I gave him .for some weeks
spigelia 6 every other day, whereby his condition became so much
ameliorated, that for some months past he has resumed his previous
work. To my no small astonishment, I found on examining him,
that the abnormal bruit in the heart is now scarcely perceptible, and
the normal tick-tack of the heart is now distinctly audible.
* From Zsch.f. Horn. Klin. iii. 59.
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Clinical Record.
II. A man, set. 50, had, for twelve years, suffered from imperfect
closure of the bicuspid valve, and considerable hypertrophy of the
right ventricle,' for Ifrhich he has tried all methods of treatment. For
the last two years he has been gradually getting worse, so that he
has been unable to pursue his ordinary avocations. When he
applied to me he appeared to be quite cachectic. The face and
extremities were cedematous; the temperature of the skin decidedly
lowered; the respiration impeded, attended with troublesome bron¬
chial catarrh; the upper part of the lungs somewhat cedematous.
At the same time he was very weak, had no appetite, and passed
sleepless nights, on account of the asthma. Under these circum¬
stances, I had little hope of producing even a transient amelioration,
especially as ascites had already commenced. I gave arsen. 6, two
doses daily. Amelioration soon occurred, the oedema went off ra¬
pidly, as did also the asthmatic sufferings, the strength and appetite
increased, and for several months back the patient has been following
his ordinary occupation with ease, and is now better than he can
remember to have been for many years back.
III. A man, set. 25, well formed, who had enjoyed good health
all his life, was, after a violent fright, seized with a fainting fit,
which lasted several hours. The cause of the fright was the com¬
munication to him of the sudden death of his sister, who had fallen a
victim to the cholera, that was then raging. Since this attack he
had always been subject to palpitation of the heart, almost constant,
which latterly was so much aggravated by any muscular exertion,
as often to prevent his speaking for hours together. Conjoined with
this was a peculiar trembling of the whole body, and muscular
twitchings similar to chorea. As, on auscultation, nothing but
bruits could be hfeard usually in place of the normal heart’s sounds,
his former physicians had diagnosed an organic disease of the heart.
The patient had been treated for two years with various remedies,
without the slightest improvement in his state. When he placed
himself under my care, I did not allow myself to be deceived by the
sounds heard on auscultation, but taking into consideration the
whole morbid picture, the origin of which I attributed to the ner¬
vous shock, I gave stramon. 15, and, as thereafter I soon observed
an amelioration, I continued the same medicine, one dose daily for
several months, during which time the patient was completely re¬
lieved from his malady, and for the last two years has had no relapse.
IV. A similar case in a man 30 years of age, but in whom the
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317
trembling was not present, who had besides, violent attacks of perio¬
dical headache, was cured by bellad. 6, and the patient can now
perform the most violent exercises, without being at all Inconveni¬
enced by his former malady.
Clinical Contributions, by Db. Thinks.*
Measles prevailed epidemically in Dresden during the whole of the
winter of 1852-1853, gradually extending itself over all the quarters
of the city, and disappeared in the spring. At the same time scar¬
let fever appeared sporadically in a mild form, there were however
some few cases of a bad character. Both diseases were of frequent
occurrence in the same family, measles being usually followed, after
some time, by scarlet fever.
In the latter part of December, all the children in one family
were seized successively with scarlet fever, all were more or less of
a scrophulous habit. The eldest, a boy 10 years of age, who had
suffered for some time from enlarged cervical glands on both sides,
was the first one attacked. The fever and angina tonsillaris were
excessive, while the rash was quickly and intensely developed.
The child was delirious until the third day.
All the symptoms subsided by the use of Aconite, when on the
eighth day the enlarged cervical glands and parotids became in¬
flamed, and quickly suppurated with the application of poultices
and internal use of Mercur. solub. 2 every four hours.
On the 18th day, when the suppuration had considerably lessened,
and the boy had nearly recovered from these violent attacks, he
was suddenly seized with hsematuria without any apparent cause, or
other premonitory symptom. A strict examination could not dis¬
cover any cause in the kidneys or bladder for this painful affection.
The blood was deposited, after standing some time, and the super¬
natant urine proved to be albuminous on chemical analysis. Ana¬
sarca rapidly supervened without any increase of thirst or disturbance
of the intestinal canal.
Viewing the hematuria as a primary affection of the kidneys,
and the anasarca as a necessary consequence, and that the hema¬
turia was an active congestion of these organs, I had recourse to
Aconite, Cannabis, Canthar., and subsequently to Pulsatilla and
Mezer. But all these remedies had no influence upon the disease,
* From Horn. Viertdjahrschrift.
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Clinical Record.
nor upon t(he constantly increasing dropsy. Under these circum¬
stances, I made use of a remedy which I had found of great service
in a case of chronic hematuria, namely Secale cornut. Three drops
of the 1st dilution, in water, were administered every four hours.
In twenty-four hours the disease subsided, followed by such an
abundant secretion of urine, that in four days the dropsy had dis¬
appeared, the urine returned to its normal quantity, and there was
no longer any trace of albumen. The last quickly recovered, and
has since remained well. His sisters were successively attacked
with the disease, during which nothing unusual occurred. Not¬
withstanding, however, the greatest care, towards the 16th, 17th,
and 20th days, hematuria occurred in connection with the so-called
albuminuria. All took, on the second and third day, the same
remedy, and I had the pleasure of observing in how short a time
this morbid process in the kidneys could be arrested, and a period
put to the further extension of the anasarca. The children recovered
very quickly, and are now quite well.
I have made these remarks on a disease which is rarely cured
without medical aid, with the view of drawing attention to a remedy
which would seldom occur to a practitioner at the commencement
of the disorder, as well as to append a few more observations.
In former epidemics, I have frequently had dropsical conditions
fall under my observation, and have endeavoured to ascertain their
cause. These conditions could not be ascribed to the severity of
the disease, for they occurred under any form of the disorder, nor to
any external cause, for this appeared whether the children were
taken care of, or the contrary. Anasarca, as well as other dropsical
effusions, do not follow scarlet fever alone, but occur after measles
and typhus, hence cannot be regarded as the result of the scarlet
fever poison. My examinations of the urine of children with scarlet
fever, prove that the albumen first makes its appearance on the
supervention of anasarca or abdominal effusion.
The anasarca which follows scarlet fever is often cured by very
different medicines, as Bryon., Rhus, Digital., Hellebor. nigr.,
Arsen., Colocynth.: large doses of the two last named medicines,
I have observed to produce bloody urine in many cases.
The circumstance, that the greater number of the disorders which
follow the acute exanthemata, occur in subjects with fully developed
' scrofula, leads me to assume, that they are all attributable to a more
active local development of scrofula excited by the preceding acute
eruption on the skin.
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A further consideration of the morbid conditions apt to ensue
after scarlet fever will tend greatly to confirm the opinion just
expressed.
1. Otorrhcea from one or both ears, consisting at first of a simple
blennorrhcea of the meatus auditorius externus, and easily cured.;
or of exfoliation with perforation of the tympanum, and caries of its
cavity and ossicula; or, commencing with caries of the mastoid
process, and destroying the organs of hearing, with consequent
deafness.
2. Inflammation, suppuration and ulceration of one or both
parotids, often commencing on the fifth, sixth, and seventh days,
sometimes, however, only taking place at the period of desquama¬
tion. Resolution but seldom occurs, and every effort should be
made to encourage suppuration, to evacuate the pus formed, in
order to avoid the formation of sinuses and ulceration.
3. Anasarca, with effusion into the large cavities, in which case,
the urine, on examination, shews the presence of albumen. The
removal of this kind of dropsy leads to the conclusion that Bright’s
degeneration of the kidney in its varied forms, is but rarely the
cause of the disorder, although in certain cases it may exist or
occur at a later period of the disorder.
4. Urea in the blood (uraemia). In the same winter I saw a case
of this disease in a deaf and dumb lad, 10 years old, highly scrophu-
lous, and who was attacked by so mild a form of scarlet fever, that
it was some time before it was perceived. On the commencement
of desquamation of the cuticle began anasarcous swellings of the
feet, scrotum, then of the hands and face, with albuminuria. Vio¬
lent clonic convulsions occurred, which seemed to be subdued by
the oxide of Zinc. The anasarca appeared to be on the decrease
rather than otherwise, when on the morning of the eighth day after
the first attack of the convulsions, it returned and continued until
his death, which occurred the evening of the same day.
In former epidemics, I have seen several instances in which
scrophulous children, who have had to pass twenty-one days in bed,
have become affected with weakness of the spinal column, and have
shewn considerable deviations of the spine to the left side.
Scrophulous ophthalmia with great intolerance of light, fetid dis¬
charges from the ear followed by loss of hearing, and anasarca, have
been observed to occur in scrophulous children after measles.
We have too few observations on the influence of scrofula on the
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morbid processes which follow typhus. A lad 14 years old,
whose mother died of consumption, and whose sisters were all scro-
phulous, became lame during typhus.
English practitioners not only speak of a nephritis scarlatinosa,
hut consider all the inflammatory conditions of the serous cavities
which ensue after scarlet fever as diseases peculiar to that fever,
which is far too comprehensive.
The above mentioned cases of hematuria after scarlet fever,
cannot he ascribed to an inflammatory condition of the kidneys,
because all the pathognomonic symptoms of nephritis are wanting;
they must however be considered rather as instances of hemorrhage
of a positive character, for which Secale cornut. is the specific
remedy.
The ergot of rye must at the same time have regulated the
renal functions, for after its employment the albuminuria disap¬
peared with the anasarca.
In the Autumn of 1852, I had under my care a lad 16 years old,
highly scrofulous, suffering from anasarca, and effusion into the
thorax and abdomen, said to be the result of a cold after an attack of
scarlet fever in 1851. A practitioner of the physiological school
had given him a great quantity of hydrogogue, drastic and strength¬
ening medicines, for many months, without any rational indication,
but in a purely empirical manner, without any result. Even the
celebrated lime juice treatment was not neglected. He finally ordered
the tincture of Colocynth in increasing doses, which brought on se¬
vere hematuria with an enormous excitement of the arterial system.
The great physiologist considered these symptoms as highly bene¬
ficial, because the tubuli renales stopped up by the albumen would
be opened by the hemorrhage, an expectation which however was
not fulfilled. In consequence of the extreme excitement of the
vascular system the respiration became so much impeded that there
was imminent danger of suffocation.
In addition to the immoderate quantity of medicines a dietetic
regimen was prescribed, which could scarcely be pardoned in a non¬
medical man, and thus the functions of the intestinal canal were so
charged that the powers of nutrition became extremely enfeebled by
a diarrhoea of some weeks duration, while the dropsical effusions
were considerably increased. A subsequent examination of the
stools showed that they contained pus, thus proving that this irra¬
tional treatment had occasioned a scrofulous ulceration of the intestinal
canal.
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321
The hematuria as well as the vascular excitement subsided under
the use of Aconite, but the albuminuria continued the same, as also
the chronic diarrhoea. The former was entirely removed by Arseni¬
cum, but the latter remedy had no influence on the ulceration of the
intestinal canal and hectic fever, of which the lad subsequently died.
A post mortem examination was not allowed.
As far as I have observed. Ammonium carbonicum possesses no
specific influence in scarlet fever, neither modifying its development
nor shortening its course. It is nevertheless a valuable remedy in
this disease when the eruption is suppressed owing to the deficiency
of the vital powers, and other symptoms supervene, such as op¬
pressed, short and greatly accelerated respiration, frequent and rapid
pulse indicating an impending paralysis of the lungs or heart—or
when the skin assumes a blueish tint, evincing a tendency to a
malignant type.
I have always observed that in great degrees of cold scarlet fever
shews a malignant character, and appears in the most fatal forms,
such as paralysis of the brain. Similar observations have been made
by Dr. von Rusdorf in Russia, and especially in St. Petersburg.
(Archiv f. wissenchaftl. Kunde von Russland, 1852, xi, s. 194.)
“ The cold (he says) impedes the breaking out of the eruption of
the acute exanthema upon the skin. In no country can a better
opportunity be obtained of observing cases of suppressed scarlet
fever, in which there is infection without the breaking out of the
eruption.” At very low temperatures I most frequently observed that
the brain became affected in Scarlet fever very much earlier than any
appearance of the eruption on the skin.
Alleged Scirrhus of the Stomach ,
By Dr. V. Meter.*
Frederica D—, 45 years of age, the wife of a man of property in
the neighbourhood of Leipzic, had, her husband told me, suffered
for ten years, and none of the many allopathic physicians in the
vicinity had been able to give her relief. Now she has become so
bad, that she is completely bed-ridden. At the husband’s request
I visited the sick woman on the 28th February, 1852.
I found a woman lying in bed, looking more like seventy than
forty-five years old. The face was haggard, the projecting bones
* From Horn. Vierteljahrschrift, Vol. v.
VOL. XIII, NO. LII.—APRIL, 1855. Y
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covered with a dirty grey, very wrinkled skin, the eyes, deeply sunk,
surrounded with blue rings, the whole body emaciated to the utmost;
Bbe looked more like a living skeleton than a human being. Hec
husband had to support her while she related to -me her case. When
a child she had had the measles, followed by an eye disease. In
her ninth year she had had the ague for six or eight weeks. She
does not remember ever being affected with glandular or cutaneous
disease. When seventeen the menses occurred for the first time;
they had continued regular until two years ago. She had always
been strong, and able to perform the usual country work. She was
married at twenty-six, and had three children, the youngest of whom
is eleven years; her confinements were regular. During nursing,
which she continued for twelve to fourteen months, she was not
subject to any ailments. Her habits of living were good, and so
was her house, she never wanted for anything.
Ten years ago, shortly after weaning her youngest child, she had
an attack of spasms in the stomach, shortly after eating a rather
large dinner; this went off in a few hours, after vomiting a portion
of her food. Three months afterwards she had another and a worse
attack, which she could not- attribute to any error in diet. For
many years these attacks recurred at longer and shorter intervals,
at one time worse, at another less severe, though the patient was
very careful as to diet. The appetite continued to be tolerable, and
she could still go through her household duties. She remarked that
after vomiting a greenish fluid the pain in the stomach did not go off
so perfectly, but continued for a day or two longer, though in a
slighter degree. Up to two years since things remained pretty much,
in this state, but after that period her health deteriorated rapidly.
Every attack was now very severe and long-cpntinued; they were
not always accompanied with vomiting, notwithstanding nausea and
retching. Scarcely a day passed when she was exempt from suf¬
fering. The appetite commenced to decline, the strength gave way,
the muscles disappeared, the menses became irregular and scanty
and finally went away altogether. She was at length obliged to.
relinquish all her household duties, and she had been confined to
bed for the last nine weeks.
At my visit I found her lying on her back in bed. The pain in
the stomach was then moderate; but when it was severe, which
happened several times a day and night, she could not speak a word'
on account of the accompanying oppressed breathing and palpitation
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Alleged Scirr/ws of the Stomach.
of the heart. She described the pain as a burning and spasmodic
feeling, that sometimes extended to the back and up to the throat;
but this was not always the case. No change of posture now re¬
lieved the pain, though formerly she used to derive some comfort from
curling up her body and drawing in her belly. The pain, especially
at night was sometimes so severe that she disturbed the neighbours
with her cries and groans. Her food, for the past three weeks
consisted chiefly of a little white bread soaked in sugared water: if
she took anything of a more solid character, it occasioned in from
two to three hours a more violent attack of pain, generally accom¬
panied by vomiting of a greenish-yellow fluid, in which were some
fragments of half-digested food and some mucus. The vomiting
was preceded by eructations of a putrid taste, and violent retching
in frequent attacks, which greatly exhausted the patient's strength.
She was now never quite free from pain, but she was in such a state
that she considered herself comparatively well when the pain was
moderate. The burning thirst that tormented her day and night
she quenched with sugared water, toast and water, or milk and
water; of these drinks, however, she could only take a mouthful
at a time, as she found by experience that larger quantities increased
the pain. She had a great dislike to coffee. The appetite was very
bad; she had not the least wish for food of any kind; and only
very rarely she had an inclination for sour or piquant things, from
which, however, she abstained, from fear of the consequences.
Bread soaked in water was the only thing her friends could per¬
suade her to touch, and even that she as often rejected, for the
putrid taste in her mouth took away all desire for eating. She had
a motion of the bowels only about every eight days, and then often
only after a clyster of Chamomile tea, or a purgative compounded of
Senna, Aloes, and Rhubarb. The motions consisted of small hard
very fetid lumps, and were evacuated with pain in the rectum.
Urine bright yellow, without particular odour. Her greatest com¬
plaint was want of sleep. Wearied and exhausted, her eyelids
closed in the evening involuntarily, but scarcely a minute would
elapse before some shoots in the scrobiculus cordis, followed by the
pains above described, compelled her to open them again. This
had been the state of things for a fortnight, when the patient
urgently entreated me to procure for her an hour’s sleep, as the
most powerful narcotics prescribed by her late medical attendant
had no longer any effect. As might be supposed, her mental facul-
Y 2
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324 Clinical Record.
ties did not remain unaffected: she had weakness of memory, she
commenced to talk unconnectedly with open eyes, indifference,
moroseness, irascibility, complete hopelessness with regard to her
health, were the natural effects of her corporeal state. She had no
disposition to shed tears. Now and again she was affected with
flying heat; rarely rigors; when these occurred they were usually
limited to the back.
Her body was emaciated to a perfect skeleton. Everywhere the
muscles were reduced to a minimum size. The skin was earthy
looking, of a dirty yellowish-grey colour. The epigastrium was
filled out by the projecting stomach. Immediately under the scrobi-
culus cordis a hard lump, about three inches in size could be felt;
this yielded to percussion a duller sound than the rest of the stomach.
I could not detect any well-defined limit to this hard swelling, it
gradually lost itself in the neighbouring parts. This part, as also
the whole stomach, was so sensitive to the least touch, that the
slightest percussion caused the patient the most intense pain. The
liver projected almost two inches beneath the edge of the ribs. I
could not detect anything abnormal in the abdomen. The respira¬
tion was accelerated and shorter than usual, but the intercostal
spaces rose and sank in a normal manner. Percussion elicited a
somewhat tympanitic sound over the whole chest, but neither heart
nor liver was out of its natural position; it was evident, therefore,
that this sound was owing to the deficiency of muscle. The heart’s
sounds were normal. Pulse small, dicrotic, compressible, 105.
Tongue covered with a yellowish-white fur; teeth thickly covered
with tartar, but otherwise healthy.
Under her former physicians she had taken a variety of medicines,
such as Senna, Aloes, Rhubarb, Bismuth, Nux vomica, Hyoscyamus,
Opium, Morphine, &c. She had also had cuppings, leeches, vene¬
sections, foot-baths, mustard plasters, blisters. After the whole
apparatus medicamentorum had been exhausted, she was pro¬
nounced incurable.
I could of course offer very small hope of relief. Bellad. appeared
to me to be best indicated; I gave therefore, on the 28th of Feb¬
ruary, five drops of the 6th dilution in 1 oz. of water, a teaspoonful
to be taken three times a day. As there had been constipation for
seven days, I ordered a clyster of cold water, to be repeated every
forty-eight hours, unless a natural motion should occur. For food I
prescribed diluted milk, sugared water, and a small quantity of
bread soaked in milk.
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Alleged Scirrhus of the Stomach.
325
6th March. —The pain in the stomach is slightly relieved; she
can turn and move about better; the painful parts are now scarcely
sensitive to touch. For the last three days the vomiting has been
much less frequent, and there is scarcely any appearance of food in
the matters ejected. After the second clyster a small lumpy stool
was passed. Anorexia; tongue not quite so much furred; great
thirst; and still complete sleeplessness. Arsen. 6, three drops morn¬
ing and night; to continue the clysters. To make a trial of a few
spoonfuls of weak beef tea.
13th March.—Still no sleep; the pains most violent at night, by
day not so severe as formerly: the burning in particular has become
less, and the pain in the stomach is more of a pressive and pinching
character, which often extends to the bowels. Only twice vomiting
of a greenish water during the last eight days, once after a mental
emotion. The beef tea is borne well. Motions of the above cha¬
racter on the 9th and 12th inst. Continue arsen., five drops in the
morning only ; at night five drops of coffea 2.
20th March.—After the first dose of coffea she slept for the first
time l£ hour; on going to sleep the sharp pains in the stomach
recurred, but they were less severe. Only once this week the sleep
was short and unquiet, otherwise the coffea has always had the
effect of procuring several hours of sleep every night. The pains in
the stomach go away for hours at a time, and they are less agonising.
Appetite still nil, it is only with an effort that she is able to swallow
the beef tea. No more retching nor vomiting; still occasionally
heartburn and fetid eructations. Thirst less. Three motions during
the past week, but only after clysters. Disposition better; hope
revived. Continue arsen. and coffea. Undiluted milk ; a wine glass
of good beer.
27th. March.—The state has remained much the same. One
night she slept for four hours consecutively. Pains the same, still
no appetite. Less thirst. Two motions during the week by means
of the enema. Tongue still thickly furred. Nux vom. 9, three
drops morning and night. Beer and milk to be continued.
3rd April.—Has slept tolerably well without the coffea, otherwise
no change. Continue the nux vom.
10th April.—Not much better. Stomach pains more of an aching
character; they sometimes become very violent, especially at night,
when they wake her up after two or three hours sleep. For some
days past there has accompanied the pains in the stomach more
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frequently than before, a flying heat in the face; one cheek being
redder than the other. Likes the beer. Still no appetite, and foul
taste in the mouth. Retching and heartburn occasionally, but no
vomiting. Sometimes shootings in the pit of the stomach. Only
one stool this week in spite of the clysters. Chamom. 3, three drops
thrice a day.
17th.—The first time for many days a normal stool occurred
without assistance. Appetite and taste better; she has a longing
for coffee. Tongue only furred at the edges. No retching nor
vomiting; occasionally sour eructations. Pains in stomach seldom
so severe as formerly, not even at night; no more flying heat. Re¬
peat the chamom. To try a piece of roast beef, and to have barley
coffee to drink.
24th.—The roast beef agreed with her; the appetite has returned.
Stools almost every third or fourth day, without lavement. She
could not sleep well on account of increased pain in the stomach
and restlessness: for this she took coffea , whereupon she again slept
well. Appearance better; strength increased. Sacch. lact.
1st May.—She has gone back a little this week. Sour taste and
repugnance to meat and broth. Tongue only thinly coated, but
very dry at night. Much heartburn, and severe aching in the
stomach, especially at night. Sleep disturbed, anxious dreams;
she awakes with dyspnoea. For Borne days shooting pains in the
loins. Disposition irascible and apathetic. Calc. carb. 12, three
doses, one every fourth day.
15th.—Immediately after the first powder the appetite returned
and has continued to increase, so that now the patient wants some¬
thing to eat every two hours. For the last six days she has been
able to spend an hour at a time out of bed: of course she cannot
walk yet. She sleeps for four or five hours at night. The pain in
the liver went off after the first dose of calc. The aching in the
stomach is less. Rarely heartburn, but every time she eats she has
eructations with the taste of food. Thirst moderate; desire for cold
drinks. Natural motion every two or three days. Omit medicine.
A more generous diet of meat.
29th May.—Much the same as at last report; no improvement.
Calc. carb. 12, two doses, one every sixth day.
12th June.—Considerable amendment; perceptible increase of
strength; she can sit up for several hours at a time. Appetite very
good, she eats little at a time but often. Tongue nearly quite clean.
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Sycosis.
327
Pressure in stomach much less. Occasional traces of heartburn;
still frequent eructations after eating. Bowels opened every two or
three days, motions hard but natural. Her husband reports that the
lump in the epigastrium is not so hard and prominent as it was. No
medicine. A warm bath. . Nutritious diet.
From this time the patient recovered rapidly. Once more a dose
of calc, was exhibited on account of heartburn; that was on the
26th July. On the 24th August I was informed that she was going
on well, but that for eight days she had been plagued with morning
sickness and burning pain in the scrobiculus cordis. Appetite and
bowels right, but a full feeling in the stomach after every meal;
when she does not eat for some time she has bulimia aud faint
feeling with trembling. A dose of silic. 30 removed this. When
seen fifteen months afterwards, she was fat and strong; the picture
of health. All her functions were quite regular, and there remained
nothing of the former hard tender lump in the epigastrium, which
could now bear the strongest pressure.
Dr. Meyer states at .length his reasons for supposing this to have
been a case of scirrhus of the stomach, which are in brief these:
1. The hardness in the region of the stomach which could be dis¬
tinctly felt, had no well-defined callous borders, and had continued to
increase gradually. 2. The occasional occurrence of lancinating
pains. 3. The age of the patient. 4. The dirty grey colour of the
skin. 5. The long continued sleeplessness. And 6. The obstinate
constipation.
We confess ourselves not thoroughly convinced by our friend’s
arguments, of the correctness of his diagnosis. That the disease
was of a very serious nature, which would probably have terminated
fatally had it been kept under allopathic treatment, we are willing to
admit, and we will also admit our belief that if scirrhus of the
Btomach be at all curable, homoeopathic treatment offers the best
chance of effecting a cure; but we should feel unwilling to peril our
pathological reputation by pronouncing in favour of Dr. Meyer’s
conclusion.
Case of Sycosis,
By Mb. Wilson, of Hull.
Mr. R. S., set. 66, a carpenter, of dissipated habits, and very fond
of indulging in intoxicating liquors, applied to me last March for an
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Clinical Record.
eruption on the upper lip, involving the hairy portions, very ex¬
tensive, nearly covering the entire surface of the lip ; the integument
was raised with tubercles of a red colour, covered with pustules,
leaving dark crusts; there was also a tubercular redness of the skin
under the chin, about the size of a bean. He had dyspeptic and
catarrhal symptoms, with great depression of the nervous system
(the effect of strong drinks). Various homoeopathic remedies and
white bread poultices were tried by me without the slightest benefit
for six weeks, after which the patient discontinued attending. In
about five weeks time he again made his appearance, having tried a
round of druggists and nostrums without success, the disease being
still in statu quo. This time I commenced the treatment with the
local application twice a day of tartarised antimony ointment (gr. V 8 th
to 3 ij of lard), and the internal exhibition of the l /„»th of a grain of
the tartrate of Antimony night and morning. This plan was so suc¬
cessful, that by the end of a month every vestige of the disease was
gone, although towards the termination of the cure he had indulged
in his old drinking propensities, which brought on a slight attack of
delirium tremens. At the present moment he is quite free from the
skin affection.
Cholera and Homoeopathy y by Dr. Gebstel, of Vienna.*
The cholera, this destroying angel of humanity, numbering thou¬
sands among its victims, appears henceforth to become the angel of
salvation, for it is owing to its prevalence that Homoeopathy has been
brought into estimation, has obtained admission into circles, and been
listened to by those to whom it had hitherto seemed to be an illegiti¬
mate object for inquiry.
The homoeopathic mode of treatment of Dr. Hahnemann was
prohibited in Austria by a decree of the Chancellor’s Court of the
2nd October, 1819. Notwithstanding this, the cholera was success¬
fully treated in 1831 by Austrian homoeopathists in Galicia , Moravia,
Austria , Bohemia and Hungary. 1 was permitted to have a large
proportion of patients under my care, and thus, in the space of less
than three months, treated near 300 cases of cholera in different vil¬
lages, in which it had shewn itself of a most inveterate character.
The extremely fortunate results obtained, and which were for the
* From the Zeitschrift fur Homoopathische Klinilc.
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329
most part officially certified, only shewed 32 deaths (Arch, xi, 2,
121; 3, 58; xii, 1, 145— Quin du Traitement Homoeop. du Cholera,
Paris, 1832, p. 32), and had for effect that notwithstanding the in¬
terdiction of the commission by the chief magistrate of Prague, the
faculty of medicine had to discuss the question whether my petition,
that a portion of the hospital should be allotted for cases of cholera,
should be granted. A breach of etiquette which I committed on
that occasion—I neglected to pay a visit at the right time to a
person of importance—may possibly have contributed to my petition
being unattended with any result. A proposal was made to me to
practise under the control of a district superintendent, Dr. Nushard,
within a certain district, in order to establish proofs of the success of
the homoeopathic treatment. An offer which I declined. Another
consequence of these results obtained by me was that the Bavarian
ministry, having received information from private sources of my
success, sent Dr. Both from Munich to Austria to collect information
respecting the homoeopathic treatment of cholera, and embody it in a
report. — {Both, die homeopath. Heilhunst in ihrer Anwendung gegen
die Cholera, Leipzig, 1833.)
The cholera epidemic of 1836 was of still greater benefit to homoe¬
opathy. It raged with great violence in Vienna. The prohibition
of 1819 still hung over us Austrians, like the sword of Damocles,
although, at least in the chief cities, it was not brought into practical
operation. As to the allopathic treatment, the practitioners were,
as formerly, still groping in the dark. The most disproportionately
favourable results obtained by Dr. Fleischmann in the hospital of the
Grey Sisters at Gumpendorf in Vienna excited such great attention,
that, as Fleischmann himself relates ( Hyg. 8, 316), he was com¬
missioned to lay before the court a report upon the cholera, and the
best mode of treatment in accordance with his experience. The imme¬
diate result obtained was the removal of the prohibition to practise
homoeopathy in Austria in Feb., 1837. The liberty to dispense the
dilutions and triturations was subsequently accorded.
It is well known what progress the new system of medicine has
since made, especially the physiological school, which may be said to
have originated in Vienna. The increasing simplicity of allopathic
treatment, when considered in reference, on the one hand to a pro¬
minent feature, expectant medicine, or on the other to the mania for
specific remedies, is really attributable, not so much to the principles
of physiological pathology, but much more to the facts as shewn by
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Clinical Record.
homoeopathic treatment, which can no longer be either denied or
ignored. My experience has led me to believe that the operation of
these circumstances has caused in many places, and especially in
Vienna, a closer approximation between well informed allopaths and
rational homoeopaths.
I was delighted to find such a feeling existing in Brunn, where
I was residing till the year 1842. Science and the good cause, how¬
ever, demand something more. It cannot be doubted that now
having attained the present position, stirring energy combined with
honest openness, discretion and firmness, with an impartial and
unprejudiced critical estimation of the performances of each school,
must lead to a further and growing recognition of homoeopathic prin¬
ciples on the part of the old school.
Impressed with this conviction, the cholera again afforded me a
favourable opportunity of bringing homoeopathy one step nearer to
this end.
In the College of Physicians of this place there was a very praise¬
worthy regulation, that, after the termination of the usual business,
any person might read a medical or scientific paper of which be
had previously given notice, on which occasion frequent discussions
ensued.
At the commencement of the present cholera epidemic, a resolu¬
tion was adopted, on the 12th of October, that during the present
epidemic, a weekly meeting should be held, without invitation, at
which an unrestricted discussion should be allowed, with a mutual
interchange of observations; at the same time that a weekly medical
journal should be published, in the name of the college, containing
the communications of both parties on the nature and treatment of
the epidemic.
It would not be uninteresting to make here an abstract of the
most important modes of treatment adopted; to do so, however,
would not correspond with the object of this paper, even if space
allowed, I therefore limit myself to the following:—
One of the physicians, a Dr. Horst, announced that he had reason
to believe cholera to be a catarrh of the kidneys, and that his treat¬
ment, based upon that hypothesis, had been crowned with great
success; it was therefore his intention to read a paper before the
College of Physicians. At the meeting on the 7th November, he
endeavoured, by demonstrating the physiology of the kidneys, with
the aid of diagrams, to render his hypothesis intelligible, and then
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proceeded to describe his treatment as follows: cataplasma emol-
lientia to the region of the kidneys; an infus. rad. Ipec. with flor.
Chamom. (of the former 4 grains, of the latter one grain in 4 ounces
of liquid: does not this seem to be an inclination towards homoeopathy
with an effort at concealment? G.); then tr. Veratri alhi, gtt. sex,
in a glass of water, a tablespoonful every half-hour, with the obser¬
vation, that by the employment of this remedy, he has seen very
dangerous cases of vomiting recover.
Before these communications were made, I had determined to
make use of these meetings and introduce the subject of homoeopathy,
the more so as 1 was well aware that it would be well received by a
large portion of the younger colleagues. Still I was desirous for
some time to follow in the wake of these transactions. Although I
had many cases of choleraic disease under treatment during the
epidemic, I had not had any of real cholera, still I could not allow
this opportunity to pass of fulfilling my intention, to speak earnestly
on the subject of the homoeopathic treatment of this disease, at the
next meeting. I must, however, express my thanks to our present
dean. Counsellor Dr. Knolz, whom I had previously informed of my
intention, who, besides being very polite, requested I would furnish
him with a paper for the next number of the journal.
I therefore spoke at the meeting on the 14th November, observing
that it was the object of these meetings to exchange observations on
the treatment of cholera, on which point there seemed to he now some
degree of approximation, as well as to receive contributions for
future discussion. I therefore thought it my duty to explain its
homoeopathic treatment, which I had jdready adopted in 1831, and
which, in fact, I use exclusively in all other forms of disease. An
unprejudiced auditory, really anxious on the subject, would impar¬
tially weigh the observations I had to make; but still, to avoid any
misconceptions, I must beg previously to remark, that it is of fre¬
quent occurrence to consider homoeopathy nothing more than a differ¬
ence of dose, whereas the dose is no essential constituent of homoeo¬
pathic treatment; the most essential principle being, the proper
selection of the remedy according to the law of similarity , as shewn
by the character of the medicine in its physiological and toxicological
provings. In speaking further of specific remedies, I do not wish
the term to be applied in its usual acceptation, that there is any
specific remedy for cholera without due consideration of the different
stages, but that there are specifics for the different stages of cholera.
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I observed, moreover, that in homoeopathic therapeutics one remedy
is used alone, without any other as an adjunct, whether internally
or externally, excepting in those instances in which two remedies
are clearly indicated, when they are given alternatively. With re¬
gard to the observations I had made respecting the dose, they were
to be considered as general, and not referring to the remedies I was
about to name, but I should be ready at the conclusion of my paper,
if desired, to give any further explanation.
After this introduction I named the following remedies in the order
as I considered them indicated in cholera. Camphor, Phosphorus,
Acid, phosph.; Ipecac.; Veratrum ; Cuprum ; Secale ; Arsenic ;
Carb. veg.; Conium ; Nicotiana (and Nicotin) ; and Acid. Hydro-
cyanicum.
I then proceeded to describe cholera and its different stages, from
the precursory symptoms and their varieties, to the stage of collapse,
noticing, as I went on, the characteristic indications for the employ¬
ment of the corresponding remedies. To repeat all that was said on
this subject is not the object of this paper, and would present no¬
thing new to the readers of this Journal. At the conclusion of my
paper, which was listened to with the greatest attention and which
met with much approbation, as I was informed by several allopa-
thists, I was questioned by one of the members as to the dose, and
with the following intimation: he must confess he now heard of
remedies, the employment of which in cholera had been entirely
unknown to him, for example, Cuprum acet., Nicotin, &c.; but
surely it cannot be indifferent as to what doses of these remedies
are given. I here mentioned? the doses of each of the above named
medicines, as I was in the habit of dispensing them, usually, with the
exception of Camphor, from the 1st to the 6th decimal dilution. I
do not intend to call in question the action of the higher dilutions,
but only remark that the above dilutions were those which I used
exclusively in 1831.
No further observation was passed.
I do not, however, flatter myself that much was done, on this
occasion, in favor of Homoeopathy, and am resolved that the subject
shall not be forgotten. The scanty seed has already taken root, and
will with proper culture still bear some fruit; on my part at least
every effort shall be made to secure success.
That the seed had taken root was shewn by the fact that on the
5th of December the subject of Homoeopathy was again referred to.
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A colleague who had only been in Vienna a few weeks, was of
opinion that it would be very interesting if an impartial comparison
of the two methods of treatment could be made. He was an eclectic
and also practised homoeopathy, and thought that in ordinary cases
it was more beneficial, but that in severe cases, especially in aged
people, in children and cachectic subjects, the allopathic treatment
was much to be preferred. He was not prepared to maintain that
the success obtained in the cases mentioned was strictly attributable
to the homoeopathic remedies, for Skoda remarks, that even the
evacuations may prove to be the crisis of the disorder; (Skoda
makes no such observation. G.;) therefore the results would be so
much the more favorable, the more simply the cholera is treated.
Another colleague sitting near to me made this remark nearly audible
to all; ‘ That is a contradictio in thesi.’ Dr. Melicher, (brother of
our late and much lamented Berlin colleague,) made a reply. He con¬
firmed, from his own experience, what had been stated by me as to
the homoeopathic treatment of cholera, still he would not exclusively
speak in favor of homoeopathy; it was the duty of every physician
to make himself acquainted with every method of treatment ,—Allo¬
pathy, Homoeopathy, Hydropathy, Gymnastics and Electricity, &c.
to be able to employ either the one or the other, but always with the
utmost consideration. In aged persons and cachectic subjects, any
remedy would scarcely be of any service; he had obtained great
success in the homoeopathic treatment of cholera in children, and
mentioned a family in which four children were violently attacked
with cholera, but who were cured by homoeopathy. Of Veratrum
album, which he considered had an especial specific relation to cholera,
he remarked that Hippocrates had used it in a very severe case of
cholera, but that the medicine had since been entirely forgotten,
great merit was to be attributed to Hahnemann for again bringing
it into notice. He promised in a future paper to detail in full his
experience of the treatment of cholera. An assistant physician of
the general hospital stated^that in reference to the treatment, he con¬
sidered Camphor as especially valuable, for he had given a strong
solution of it mixed with Acetic aether (as he informed me only on
account of its agreeable taste) in drop doses, and then mentioned
some surprising cases of cholera spasmodica, which without diarrhoea
would have passed into collapse. I expressed my determined oppo¬
sition to these mixtures, and repeatedly drew attention to the fact,
that the benefit was solely owing to the Camphor; that it was only
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Miscellaneous.
of use in some forms of the disease, and that it was not by any means
the sole cholera medicine. I then remarked that the object of my
communication was not to secure a preference for my mode of
treatment, but I wished it rather to be considered as a contribution
to cholera therapeutics.
Criticism and the decision upon this subject may be put off to
another time.
We are however desirous of pursuing sine ira et studio our way
still further, and to push forward the good cause with vigour and
with honour.
MISCELLANEOUS.
Coroner's Inquest at Darlington.
In our last we gave the report of a Coroner’s Inquest on a patient
alleged to have died in consequence of Homoeopathic Treatment, on
the other side of the Atlantic. Our American friends will be pleased
to observe, that Ihe similarity of our Institutions, in regard to Coro¬
ner’s law, gives rise to similar persecutions of homoeopathists.
Coroner Ball of Brooklyn, will, we doubt not, hail Mr. Piper of
Darlington as a kindred spirit. We cannot conceive what principles
of justice animated the Coroner at the English Inquest, that he
allowed Mr. Piper to bully and rant in the way he is reported to have
done. If Mr. Piper was not the person who “ got up ” the Inquest,
at all events we must allow that he entered into it with great zest,
and shewed pretty clearly his animus against poor Dr. Galloway,
who seems to have defended himself with calmness and moderation.
We commisserate Dr. Galloway for the disagreeable position in which
he was placed, subjected to the vulgar insolence of such an ill-natured
adversary. The allopathists have nothing to congratulate themselves
on in the result of the Inquest, which is thus reported in the local
Journal.
Alleged acceleration of Death by Homoeopathic Treatment.
An inquest was held at the Wheat-sheaf public-house, Skerne-row, in
this town, on Wednesday morning last, before W. Trotter, Esq., coroner,
on the body of a child named Thomas Armstrong, whose death has occa¬
sioned not a little interest amongst medical men and others.
The jury having viewed the body,
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Maria Armstrong was called and deposed: I am mother of the deceased,
and wife of Thomas Armstrong; deceased was fire years old; the child
was lately ill with measles, and I went to get a dispensary ticket, bat could
not get one, and Miss Proctor gave me a ticket to take to Mr. Galloway,
saying what a nice doctor he was; the measles had gone in again ; I had
no doctor before, but as he seemed poorly I thought I would get him some
assistance; Mr. Galloway came to see the child at night on Thursday
fortnight, and ordered me to go to bis house for some medicine; he gave
me three powders and a small box of pills, one powder to be given night
and morning, and a pill every night; the medicine was given as ordered
till Monday the 12th, when I first observed that the child’s teeth were gone;
we sent for Mr. Galloway, and he came at night; he saw that there was a
little “ pimple ” on the child’s under-lip, working into a hole ; he told us
not to use any more of the medicine, and gave us some other powders and
pills; next day when he came the hole was getting larger, and he changed
the medicine again to powders only; I thought I would see some one else,
and went for Mr. Fothergill, but he was not at home ; on Wednesday he
came and looked at the child; as 1 had no means of paying for medical
assistance, he advised me to get a ticket for the dispensary; I got one,
and Mr. Piper came about mid-day on the 16th; as soon as he saw the
child, he went out, and returned with Mr. Jackson’s assistant (Or. Hen-
zell); Mr. Galloway had come in meanwhile, aid all three were there
together; Mr. Piper asked Dr. Henzell what he thought was the matter
with the child, and he said it was the most like a case of salivation that he
had ever seen ; Mr. Galloway declared there was no Mercury in his medi¬
cine ; Mr. Piper continued to attend the child until Saturday, the 24th,
when he died; the sore under the lip extended to the cheek, and half of his
nose was gone; he was always healthy before, and never had a doctor in
his life; five of the lower and one of the upper teeth were lost during his
illness; he had lost pone before.
The Coroner asked if any one knew where Mr. Galloway was, and
whether he would attend.
Dr. Galloway said he had been present from the commencement of the
inquiry: but the notice given him was so short—in fact, it was only this
morning he had heard that an inquest was to be held—that he had no time
to prepare himself. He was ready, however, to give any explanation that
might be required.
S. E. Piper, Esq., Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England,
was next sworn. I attended the deceased (he said) on Friday the 16th, as
a dispensary patient; it was about mid-day ; I found he had lost several of
his teeth; gangrene had commenced in the softer parts of the lower jaw,
and there was that peculiar fetor, which any one who knew anything of
mercury would at once say arose from salivation; the child also had dysen¬
teric diarrhoea, and I asked the mother what she had given him; she
replied that Dr. Galloway had given him three small pills and three white
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powders on the first two or three days, and that he had since changed the
medicine ; I administered a mixture of iodide of potassium, and a lotion
composed of the chloride of Sodium : the latter was used up to the time of
the child’s death ; the woman gave me a small box containing some
globules, which she said Dr. Galloway had sent, and of which three only
had been given ; as I was returning from toy first visit I met Mr. Henzell,
and asked him if he would see the child with me; at the same time I gave
him half of the globules to analyse, retaining the others myself; he went
with me to the house, and after a careful examination he pronounced it as
his opinion that the case was one of salivation; we both agreed in this ;
Dr. Galloway was present, and two or three times denied that there was
Mercury in the globules, or that he had given the child any preparation
of Mercury ; the globules were analysed ; but not in my presence; I
afterwards gave the child Quinine and Opium, and three or four medical
men with myself did all that could be done; wine, milk, and proper
stimuli were administered, but he gradually sank, and on Saturday died;
in my opinion Mercury had been injudiciously given, and had accelerated
the child’s death ; I will not go so far as to say it caused it; no prudent
practitioner would give bi-chloride of Mercury (corrosive sublimate) to a
child of such tender years; it is a most dangerous medicine even in
homoeopathic doses. Witness further expressed a wish that it should not
be thought he bad u got up” this inquest; on the contrary, he had said
there was no necessity for holding it, and had written a certificate of
the death, stating his opinion that the child had died of salivation. In
reply to questions from the coroner, Mr. Piper added : I am still of
opinion that salivation, if not the cause, greatly accelerated death ; corro¬
sive sublimate, I believe, has been clearly detected in the medicine; the
globules had been so carelessly made up, that four of them contained no
sublimate at all, and others had a proportionate excess ; there is a disease
called cancrum oris (gangrene of the mouth) which might arise sponta¬
neously or from the use of Mercury, but where corrosive sublimate is
given, a very little would cause this destruction of parts; sometimes the
disease spontaneously follows measles, but the instances are exceedingly
rare, and have never, to my knowledge, been attended with dysenteric
diarrhoea; this latter was the strongest evidence that Mercury had been
administered; the disease I have mentioned would not have developed
itself so rapidly, nor would the child have lost his teeth ; I was present
last night when part of the globules were analysed by Dr. Henzell, and I
was perfectly satisfied that they contained mercury, no post mortem
examination was made, there being no necessity for it in my opinion ; my
mind is quite clear that the child’s death was accelerated by salivation,
how or by whom produced I do not pretend to say.
The Coroner : Will Dr. Galloway suggest anj r question ?
Dr. Galloway : Perhaps it would be sufficient to do so in the course of
my evidence.
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Coroner 8 Inquest at Darlington.
The Coroner: Bat would you wish to ask Mr. Piper anything now ?
Dr. Galloway : No, I have nothing to ask him. Mr. Piper did not
analyse the globules, and it would therefore be useless to question him on
that point.
The Constable (Littlefair) stated, in explanation of the circumstances
^under which a jury had been summoned, that the parents said they would
not be satisfied without an inquiry.
G. H. Henzell, Esq., B.M., deposed: I went with Mr. Piper about
noon on the 16th, to see the child Armstrong; it had a bandage over its
mouth; a very disgusting fetor filled the room, and on removing the
bandage I found it proceeded from a large wound or ragged sore in the
child’s chin, communicating with the cavity of the mouth; the front teeth
were gone from the lower jaw, leaving a hideous chasm; I at once inquired
what the mother had given the child; she said some pills and powders,
supplied by Dr. Galloway, a homoeopathic practitioner in the town; about
three days after commencing with Dr. Galloway’s medicine, (she told me)
she observed the teeth were gone, and a day previous he had complained
of griping pains in the bowels, which were accompanied by dysenteric
symptoms; from all the facts I learned, from the sores having commenced
in the bones of the jaw, from the difficulty of swallowing accompanying
it, and from the infection of many of the glands about the mouth, 1 came
to the conclusion that the sore was excited by the action of Mercury in
the system ; I saw the child twice afterwards; the wound had enlarged
each time, and the foetor was almost insupportable; I attribute the child’s
death to sinking of the constitution under the irritation of a large sloughing
sore in the face, implicating both the bones and the soft parts,—in other
words, I am convinced that Mercury was the exciting cause of the disease,
but will not say it was the predisposing, as this might have already existed.
Cancrum oris is a very uncommon disease,—I have only seen two cases in
five years’ attendance at Hospital; Mr. Piper gave me two boxes of glo¬
bules, one of which he told me was a portion of the first and the second of
the changed medicine; No. 1 box contained seven globules, weighing about
three grains altogether, very irregular in size, one of them weighing a
grain by itself and another only three-sixteenths of a grain; upon subjecting
them to the various re-agents for mercury,-
Dr. Galloway : Will you mention them ?
Witness: Yes, certainly ; I succeeded in detecting corrosive sublimate
in some of the globules; iodide of potassium produced a yellow precipitate,
changing after a while to an orange red; potash produced a yellowish
white precipitate, and lime a dirty yellow ; >upon bringing a drop of the
solution of the largest globule in distilled water in contact with bright
metallic gold a white stain was produced, which vanished on the applica¬
tion of heat.
Coroner: What will all this lead to ? Are these chemical analyses of
any importance?
VOL. XIII, NO. LII. — APRIL, 1855. Z
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Miscellaneous.
Dr. Henzell add, he had only gone into them because requested to
do so.
Dr. Galloway expressed himself perfectly satisfied, and
Witness then proceeded: No. 2 box containing 11 globules whieh
weighed altogether 3% grains, I submitted to similar tests, and^bould dis¬
cover no trace of metallic poison; the globules which Mr. Piper retained
I analysed last night in his presence, and clearly discovered the presence
of corrosive sublimate.
Dr. Galloway : Were the same results shown by the same re-agents ?
Witness: Yes.
Dr. Galloway: Were the same re-agents used in the second analysis ?
Witness: Only one test was used last night—the iodide of potassium,
which is the principal re-agent, and this gave the some results as before.
The Coroner: Assuming that the presence of corrosive sublimate is
proved, what will it lead to ? You do not say that this was the predispos¬
ing cause of death.
Witness: Certainly not; I do not say mercury was the predisposing
cause, but I do say that it was the exciting cause; the predisposing cause
to gangrena oris might have been there before, but 1 do not say that the
disease was gangrena oris ,—indeed I am inclined to think it was not.
The Coroner: Can you say that the child would have been alive if
mercury had not been administered P
Witness: No man eould possibly say that If a man is walking along
a railway and an engine runs over him, no one could say that he would
have been alive if he had kept off the line. He might have died from
some other cause.
The Coroner: That is a very different case to this; but can you say that
a skilful practitioner would not have given mercury in such a case ?
Witness: I cannot say that, but I will say that he would not give the
bi-chloride of mercury ; there are cases in which mercury is very useful—
such as pneumonia, following the measles.
Mr. Piper: May I be allowed to ask whether Dr. Henzell did not hear
Dr. Galloway deny that he had administered mercury ?
Witness: Two questions were asked by Mr. Piper in the room—1st, did
you ever give the child a grain of mercury ? to which Dr. Galloway
answered in the negative; 2nd, did you ever give or cause to be given an
atom or particle of mercury ? to which also he answered “ no.”
The Coroner: Do you think a post mortem examination would be of
any service ?
Witness: I fancy not; the cause of death is very palpable, I think,
without any such examination, considering that a medical man has been
in attendance and has seen the child gradually sink j it is plain that the
constitution has sunk under severe salivation.
A Juryman (Mr. W. Oliver): Dr. Henzell says that a skilful practi¬
tioner might give mercury, but not the bi-chloride. Would the. tests used
distinguish between the two ?
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339
Witness: Yes, very clearly; calomel, which is a preparation of mer¬
cury, is frequently given in cases of pneumonia arising from measles, and
very properly no doubt—in fact, many practitioners have doubted whe¬
ther calomel is a poison; the bi-chloride, however, is one of the most
deadly poisons we know of: metallic mercury in itself is quite innocent;
the lime test would at once distinguished between calomel and corrosive
sublimate.
The Coroner: Does Dr. Galloway propose to give evidence ?
Dr. Galloway: I should wish if you will allow me.
The Coroner: Oh, certainly.
Dr. John Mason Galloway was then sworn, and said : I am M.D. of
Edinburgh; on the 8th instant (February) I first attended the deceased,
late in the evening; it waB on the father's knee at the time, labouring
under great difficulty of breathing, with cough, and according to their
statement, it had been so for several days; they told me it had had the
measles some short time previously, and they had given it some saffron tea,
and that the eruption had gone in suddenly ; I told the mother to call at
my house for some medicine in the course of half-an-bour, and I then gave
her three or four powders, three globules in each of bryonia alba , with
some pilules of sugar of milk, the powders to be taken one every morning,
and one of the pills in the afternoon and evening; three days afterwards
1 went again, and found the child breathing more easily, more cheerful,
and decidedly better; the mother asked me to look at its mouth; as nearly
as I can recollect, three of the teeth were gone, the bone visible and quite
black; there was a very offensive smell; my first question was, “Have
you ever had any one to attend the child before ? " both parents said “ no;”
then I asked had the child had any medicine, and they said “ nothing but
saffron;” then I asked if the child, to their recollection, had ever had any
•mercury, to whieh they also replied “ no ;" I told them the treatment
must be changed; not being able to ascertain the fact of mercury having
been previously given, and knowing that similar symptoms have been
produced by large doses of mercury, and also that, according to the well-
known homoeopathic law, “ Similia similibus curantur,” I exhibited a
homoeopathic preparation called mercurius tolubilis , about a billionth of a
grain at a dose, twice or thrice a day ; 1 don’t know how many doses the
child took, but in a day or two afterwards I found the disease progressing
rapidly; I then wished to change the medicine, and accordingly gave
some powders containing three globules of phosphorus and silicea, a dose
of each alternately every day; while the child was taking this, Mr. Piper
was called in by the parents; I may as well mention that the mother said
the stools were bloody, and I saw what he had passed, but could perceive
no trace ; I never saw the child afterwards; previous evidence would go
to show that I bad given corrosive sublimate, a medicine that I have never
used since I came to Darlington rather more than a year ago ; it has been
stated that 1 denied having ever given mercury to the child, but there
z 2
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Miscellaneous .*
must be some misunderstanding, because my words were (in reply to Mr.
Piper’s question, “ Do you mean to say that is not the result of mer¬
cury ?”) “ No, I deny that, so far as I know the case ; I believe it to be
the result of some constitutional cause he then said, “ Do you mean to
say you have never given the child a grain of mercury ?” I replied “ No,
nor half a grain; before the disease was discovered the latter part of my
answer I think Mr. Piper did not hear.
Mr. Piper: You are quite right—I certainly did not.
Witness: The noise was very great; with regard to the analysis, I don’t
see how it is possible to detect the billionth of a grain, and I am sorry I
was not aware of the inquest taking place so soon, because a sample of the
medicine given to the child has been, at the recommendation of several
friends, sent to Professor Gregory of Edinburgh, and his analysis has not
arrived; not being sufficient of a chemist myself, I can give no evidence
on the point.
Dr. Henzell, in answer to the Coroner, repeated that he saw the
evidences of dysenteric diarrhoea, and there was a large amount of bile
present, which showed that the liver had been violently acted upon.
Mr. Piper wished to ask Dr. Galloway a question. As there were
several persons present when he denied having given mercury at all, he
would ask if he adhered to his evidence on that point? Whether Dr.
Galloway was labouring under excitement at the time he did not know,
but that he said there was no preparation of mercury given to the child he
(Mr. Piper) most solemnly declared. Another question, would any man
in his senses ever think of administering mercury to a child suffering from
cancrum oris *1 “ Like cures like ” indeed 1 The sooner such a system
is put an end to the better.
Dr. Galloway adhered to his evidence, and, in answer to a juryman,
repeated that he at the time of his second visit suspected mercury had
been given to the child.
Mr. Piper: And you gave him more. The best way is to be straight¬
forward, and tell people that you are giving them poisons.
Dr. Galloway retorted that allopathists give more poisons and in greater
quantities than homoeopathists.
The Coroner said this discussion would not assist him at all; and
questions were then put by several gentlemen to Dr. Galloway, who said
it was his opinion that the child had lost its teeth before he saw him, and
his question to the mother showed that he himself had not given mercury.
Mr. Piper thought it would be well to explain the difference between
salivation and gangrene of the month. Salivation produced by mercury
* A celebrated allopathic authority, Rust of Berlin, recommends from
experience, the internal employment of Bichloride of Mercury in cancrum
oris, (Aufsatze a. d. Geb. der Med., Bd. I, p. 350, Berlin, 1834). We have never
heard it said that he was less “ in his senses ” than other eminent allopaths.
IEds.]
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would begin, s this did, in the bone, and then destroy the soft parts;
whereas spontaneous cancrum oris would commence in the soft parts, and
afterwards attack the bone.
The Coroner remarked that it was not quite clear whether the first or
the second medicine had been found to contain mercury on analysis.
Mr. Piper and Dr. Henzell explained that they had taken great care in
marking the boxes—one of which (as containing the first box of medicine)
was given to Mr. Piper by the mother, and the second he took from the
mantel-piece. It was in the first that mercury was found.
Mrs. Armstrong was re-called, and stated that until the Monday nightshe
had not looked into the child’s mouth, but her firm belief was that his
teeth were good when he fell ill. She also said that the second medicine
consisted of pills and powders (which Dr. Galloway denied, he only gave
pills), and that some powders given by him for her other child she did not
use; the child got well without any medicine.
The Coroner asked if Dr. Galloway would like to have an opportunity
of producing Dr. Gregory’s analysis ?
Dr. Galloway said, an analysis would show what amount of mercury
he had given, but the important thing would be to show that he gave
mercury before the disease was discovered. This he denied, and on this
the whole thing hinged, but he could not possibly produce any evidence
to support his statement.
The Coroner (to Mr. Piper): Assuming that mercurial pills were given,
how far will it carry you ? You do not fay those pills caused death.
Mr. Piper: I say that mercury had no business to be given in a bi¬
chloride form.
After some further conversation, the medical gentlemen declining to
go further than their evidence already given, the room was cleared of all
but the coroner and jury. A consultation took place, of the character of
which we know nothing, but in a short time the coroner left, and a jury¬
man informed the gentlemen who were waiting outside that the inquest
would stand adjourned until Tuesday next, if Mr. Trotter, who was
obliged to leave, should succeed in catching the twelve o’clock train.
The inquiry into the death of the child named Armstrong was resumed
on Tuesday at the Wheat-sheaf public-house, Darlington, before W.
Trotter, Esq. coroner.
Thos. Armstrong, father of the child, deposed: I am a carpet-weaver;
on the 8th February we sent for Dr. Galloway to see my boy, and he came
in the evening and saw him ; my wife went to his house for medicine; he
sent powders and pills, saying as he was so ill he was to have a powder
that night, another in the morning, and a pill next night; he took the
medicine till Monday the 12th; on that day my wife called my attention
to the child’s teeth being gone, and I sent her to fetch Dr. Galloway; he
came down at night and wanted to know if we had not been giving other
medicine j I stud “ no,—only a penn’orth of saffron teathen he asked
if he had ever had a bat over the chin, and I said “ not to my know-
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ledge ” ; there was a pimple on his chin at the time; he told os to send
for some more medicine, as he would change it; he sent another box of
pills, but whether there were powders I can't say; by Tuesday the pim¬
ple on the chin had become a hole, which increased till Wednesday or
Thursday, when my wife went for Dr. Fothergill; he called next day,
and recommended us to get a dispensary ticket, as it was a very serious
case; Mr. Piper came on Friday; the child continued getting worse,
until his death ; after his first visit, Mr. Piper returned in company with
Dr. Henzell, and met Dr. Galloway there ; Dr. Henzell said the case was
most like salivation that he had ever seen, and Dr. Galloway denied two
or three times most positively that there was mercury in his pills; he didn't
say anything about not giving mercury till he observed the teeth were
gone; he spoke distinctly, and positively said he bad given no mercury at
all; Mr. Jackson and Dr. Hazlewood afterwards saw the child; on
Thursday the 8th, when giving the boy the powder sent by Dr. Galloway,
1 saw that ali bis bottom teeth were in; I don’t know whether one at the
top was gone or not; on the Monday night all the lower teeth were out;
there were written directions, but I have lost them; the first lot of pow¬
ders were all taken; but not all the pills, which were put into the press
when Dr. Galloway said the child was to have no more of them; I was
present when the pills were given to Mr. Piper, and he took the others
off the shelf; I did not see him take them.
A Juror (Mr. Oliver): Who told you that the pills were taken off the
mantel-piece P
Witness, who gave confused and contradictory answers, at length said
that his wife told him that she saw. Mr. Piper take them, but he could not
say exactly when; he was sure she had not told him since the first day of
the inquest.
The Coroner: When Dr.’Galloway came on the Monday and wished to
change the medicine, did he ask to see what was left of the first lot ?
Witness thought not; the first lot of pills were in the “ press,” and the
second on the mantel-piece.
The Coroner: If you had no medical assistance whilst the child was in
the measles, why did you fetch Dr. Galloway after the eruption had gone
in?
Witness: Because he was very poorly.
Coroner: What medicines had you given him ?
Witness: Nothing but saffron. *
Mr. Oliver: Did Dr. Galloway ask if you had been giving him mer¬
cury ?
Witness: No, he only asked it we had been giving him other medicine.
Coroner: Did you attend to the child much after the medicine was sent ?
Witness : No, I was out during the day, and only gave him the first
powder.
In answer to further questions, Armstrong said he had not seen the
dysenteric symptoms spoken of, though his wife told him of them ; the
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child took three of the first box of pills; they were very small ones; the
box was not full.
Mr. Oliver thought it rather singular that the loss of the teeth should
not have been noticed till they were all gone, though some one must have
fed and given medicine to the child.
Mr. Piper said this might be explained by the fact that the fangs were
very short, and their loss might not be noticed without close attention;
and Dr. Henzell remarked that the very palpability of an object sometimes
causes its absence not to be noticed.
Maria Armstrong, mother of the child, again presented herself to give
evidence, and said she saw something in the newspapere that was not
correct. Dr. Galloway (as reported) stated that he asked her if she had
given the child mercury. This was not true, for he never asked her any
such question. He only asked if they had given the child any other
medicine, and if it had had a blow on the chin, to which they answered
“ no.”
Mr. Oliver: Dr. Galloway did say so at the first hearing.
Witness repeated that it was not true, and then in reply to further ques¬
tions stated that on Sunday, before the medicine was changed, she noticed
that the evacuations were tinged with blood ; there were written direc¬
tions sent with the medicine, but she did not know what had become of
the paper; the first box of pills was placed in a press in a room where
the child was.
The Coroner said he must see the written directions if they could be
found.
Witness accordingly went to seek the paper, but returned without it.
She could only find that sent with the last lot of medicine. In the course
of her previous evidence she had mentioned the name of Miss Proctor as
having called upon her since the first enquiry, but had been stopped. A
juryman now suggested that it would be well to hear what passed, and Mrs.
Armstrong proceeded to state that Miss Proctor asked her if it was true
she had said what was in the paper, and told her she ought not to say Dr.
Galloway had poisoned the child.
The Coroner: Well, no doubt she meant that you might have used a
milder word. There was no attempt to induce you to state what was not
true.
Witness: Oh, no; but she offered to give me a ticket for my other
child, but I said she shouldn’t—I wouldn’t have another poisoned.
Dr. Galloway: Was that all that passed in the interview with Miss
Proctor?
Witness: Yes, for anything I know.
The Coroner: Well this is not evidence. Does Dr. Galloway wish to
give any further evidence ?
Dr. Galloway: I wish to re-state that I gave no mercury before dis¬
covering that there was something the matter with the child’s mouth; I
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gave nothing but bryonia alba ; the pilules consisted of nothing but sugar of
milk; with regard to the boxes, there was no mark on the box first
sent, nor on the powders; a paper, partly printed and partly written,
was sent along with them ; the pills sent on the Monday were likewise
not marked, therefore, so far as appearance is concerned it would be im¬
possible to swear to them if they had been removed or exchanged; with
regard to the analysis, I think it would be only fair to state how the
analysis was conducted, and how much mercury was found in each pilule,
because that is of the greatest importance; I can prove that the smallest
quantity known to have poisoned any one is three grains, and I am cer¬
tain that, even supposing I had given corrosive sublimate, there is not that
quantity in any of my pilules. To prove that these pilules have done all
this mischief, they must prove that the quantity given was a poisonous
dose. There is another thing. I object to the analysis on the ground
that the parties who conducted it were not disinterested persons, and not
professed analytical chemists. I stated on the former occasion that I had
sent some pilules taken from the same bottle to Professor Gregory, of
Edinburgh, for analysis.
The Coroner: We can’t receive that as evidence, but you may state it
to the jury. To make it legal evidence, Professor Gregory must be here
himself.
Dr. Galloway: The fact was stated at the first inquiry, and you said
you would wait for the analysis.
The Coroner: Yes, the case was presented as a charge against you, and
I thought it only proper that you should have a fair opportunity of re¬
butting any such charge or insinuation.
Dr. Galloway : will you allow me to read what I have received 1
A Juryman said he should like to hear it.
The Coroner: It can be read as an explanation made by you before the
jury. I wish to give you lair play, but I cannot take it down as part of
the evidence on which the jury are to give their verdict.
Dr. Galloway then stated that he had this morning received a telegraphic
message from Professor Gregory, acknowledging his letters and stating that,
owing to an attack of influenza, he had not been able to make the analysis.
Fearing that, this being the middle of the session, Professor Gregory
might not be able under any circumstances to spare time, he had also com¬
municated with Mr. James Cooke, a gentleman who was formerly a tutor in
the family of Mr. Pease, and who after analyzing some of the globules
assured him that he had not found mercury in them in any form,_if
present it was soluble, and he could confidently state that in any globule
there was not the twenty.thousandth part of a grain. All these globules
were taken from the same stock.
The Coroner : Then you mean to say that you did not make these pills
purposely for the case in question, but took them out of a bottle.
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' Dr. Galloway: Yes that is the fact. I had the globules in Stock, and
many parties had taken them before.
A Juror: Are they your own manufacture ?
Dr. Galloway: No. They would take too much time. I receive them
from a duly qualified chemist. The medicines come from London and
Edinburgh. Now, perhaps, I may be allowed to make some remarks
with regard to the disease itself. I have here an allopathic work, a “ half-
yearly abstract of the medical sciences, by Dr. Ranking,” in which there
is a chapter on ulcerative gangrenous stomatitis by Dr. West. The
writer says:—
“ Gangrene of the mouth seldom comes on, except in children whose
health has been already much impaired by previous disease, and especially
by those diseases which are connected with important changes in the
circulating fluid. Of 29 cases which MM. Rilliet and Barthez either
observed themselves, or of which they found mention in the writings of
other physicians, only one appeared to be an instance of idiopathic gan¬
grene of the mouth, while in 12 cases the disease followed an attack of
measles. Of the 6 cases which Dr. West has observed, and 3 of which he
examined after death, 2 succeeded to typhoid fever, 2 to measles, and 1
supervened in a tuberculous child, who had been affected for many weeks
with ulcerative stomatitis in a severe form. Though not confined to any
one period of childhood, gangrene of the mouth is more frequent between
the ages of 2 and 3 than either earlier or later. Of the 29 cases mentioned
by MM. Rilliet and Barthez, 19 occurred between 2 and 5; 10 between
6 and 12. Of the 5 cases that came under Dr. West’s own observation, 1
was in a child aged 2} years, 1 in a child aged 3,1 between 4 and 5, 1 at
6J and 1 at 8 years of age.
“ Although all the tissues of the cheek become involved in the course of
this affection, yet difference of opinion has existed with reference to the
part in which it commences; some observers conceiving that it generally
begins in the substance of the cheek, while others regard the mucous
membrane as being the part which is invariably the first attacked. So
far as his own observation enables Dr. West to judge, he is disposed to
regard this latter view, which is that of MM. Rilliet and Barthez, and of
M. Baron, as correct.
“ The early stages of the affection are attended by scarcely any suffering,
owing to which, as well as to the circumstance that the children in whom
it supervenes are almost always labouring under some other disease, or in
the course of convalescence from it, it is probably due that the malady is
often not discovered until after it has made considerable progress. There
may for a day or two have been an unusual fetor of the breath, and a
profuse secretion of offensive saliva, but the appearance of swelling of the
cheek is frequently the first symptom that leads to a careful examination
of the state of the mouth. The characters of the swelling of the cheek are
almost pathognomonic of the gangrene of the mouth. It is not a mere puffi-
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Miscellaneous.
ness of the integument, unaccompanied with any change of its colour, such
as is sometimes observed in ulcerative stomatitis, but the cheek is tense, and
red, and shining: it looks as if its surface had been besmeared with oil,
and in the centre of the swollen part there is generally a spot of a brighter
red than that around. The cheek feels hard, and is often so unyielding that
the mouth cannot be opened wide enough to get a good view of its interior.
The disease is almost always limited to one side, and generally to one
cheek. Sometimes, however, it extends to the lower lip, and occasionally
it begins in that situation. The upper lip is now and then reached by the
progress of the disease, but is never its primary seat. Whatever be the
situation of the external swelling, there will generally be found within the
mouth, at a point corresponding to the bright red central spot, a deep ex¬
cavated ulcer, with irregular jagged edges, and a surface covered by a
dark brown shreddy slough. The gums opposite to the ulcer are of a dark
colour, covered with the putrilage from its surface, and in part destroyed,
leaving the teeth loose, and the alveole denuded. Sometimes, especially
if the disease be further advanced, no single spot of ulceration is recogniz¬
able, but the whole inside of the cheek is occupied by a dirty putrilage, in
the midst of which there are large shreds of dead mucous membrane
hanging down. As the disease extends within the cheek, a similar
process of destruction goes on upon the gum, and the loosened teeth drop
out one by one. The saliva continues to be secreted properly, but shows
by the changes which take place in its character, the progress of the
disease. At first, though remarkable for its fetor, it was otherwise un¬
altered, but now it is no longer a transparent flnid, but receives from the
putrifying tissues over which it passes, a dirty, greenish, or brownish
colour, and at the same time acquires a still more repulsive odour.”
With reference to the influence of mercury in producing the disease Dr.
West observes:—
“ There can be no doubt but that this preparation, even when given
in small doses, has in a few instances produced severe ptyalism, inflamma¬
tion of the mouth, loss of the teeth, and necrosis, more or less extensive,
of the lower jaw. In some cases, too, the inflammation has terminated in
gangrene of the cheek, which has presented many of the characters that
we have just been noticing; and under such circumstances inquests have
sometimes been held, and blame has been attached to the medical atten¬
dant for alleged want of caution in the administration of so powerful an
agent as mercury. Now although mercury should never be given with¬
out necessity, nor its administration continued without watching its
effects most carefully, yet I cannot but regard the supervention of
gangrene of the mouth during its use as merely an accidental coincidence,
or else as the result of some idiosyncrasy of the patient, such as has been
observed in the adult as well as the child. During the past nine years
more than 15,000 children of all ages have come under my care, and
I have administered mercury to any of them who seemed to require it,
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Coroner 8 Inquest at Darlington .
but have hardly ever seen salivation follow its employment before the
completion of the first dentition, and have never observed that medicine,
at any age, produce an affection of the mouth sufficiently serious to
occasion me a moment’s delay.” **
Mr. Piper: I gave Dr. Galloway the benefit of all this at the former
inquiry. What he has read is perfectly true; but I should like to know
what is his soluble mercury P
Dr. Galloway: It is a preparation of Hahnemann’s,—a nitrate of
mercury.
Dr. Henzell: Is it the protoxide or the peroxide?
Dr. Galloway: It is a Hahnemannic preparation.
Mr. Piper: Do you consider your attendance as useless as your medi¬
cines? You found the child very ill, and with difficulty of breathing, and
yet never went again for three days.
Dr. Galloway: I expected to hear from the parents. My own opinion
was that the child would not get better; but this has nothing to do with
the enquiry.
Mr. Piper: Yes it has. A man is not to give medicines, and to care
nothing as to their effect. In ordinary practice I grant that your
homoeopathic medicines are harmless; you do nothing, and you are very
right. We all more or less attend to ventilation, nursing, and diet, and
you give small doses of things that can be of no avail whatever. What
I complain of is that you sail under false colours. You call yourself a
homoeopathist, and very often practise as an allopathist, with this diffe¬
rence, that you give bi-chloride of mercury, and we give calomel.
Dr. Galloway: I deny that I have given the bi-chloride, and you
have no proof of it.
Mr. Piper: I pledge my honour that the pills were kept separate, and
fairly analysed.
Dr. Galloway: Why was I not asked to be present ? If that was the
object of your analysis, would it not have been gentlemanly to ask me
and some friend to attend it? I think you would have liked such a
course to be taken with regard to yourself. So long as I have been here
I have not given the slightest offence to any medical man, and why
should I be hounded in this manner?
The Coroner here interposed. He had allowed great latitude for ex¬
planations, hut gentlemen were going to all sorts of lengths.
Dr. Henzell wished to state that to explain the process of analysis, it
would he necessary to enter with great prolixity into chemical tests, and
would detain the coroner and jury to little purpose. He would suggest,
however, that his own analysis had to do with the globules he received
from Mr. Piper, and not those sent to professor Gregory. He now held
in his hand a solution of the globules, and in a test tube he had a solution
of iodide of potassium. Should the former contain the suspected mercu¬
rial poison, a yellowish red precipitate would he produced on pouring one
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Miscellaneous.
into the other. (The experiment was here shown, to the satisfaction of
Dr. Haslewood and Mr. Piper.)
Dr. Galloway: Is there a poisonous quantity present?
Dr. Henzell: No, a very minute quantity. In four of the seven
globules that I analyzed I could not detect a trace, but in one I should
say there could not be less than the 32nd of a grain.
Dr. Galloway: I have here an extract from a medical work, in which
it is laid down that a proper dose is from 3-16ths to l-6th of a grain.
Dr. Henzell: Yes, for an adult.
The Coroner then proceeded to sum up: He admitted that the evidence
given seemed to lay good ground for a public investigation; but a
coroner’s jury could not balance between conflicting systems of medical
treatment. AH they could do was to say whether any person had been
guilty of neglect, which would amount to the crime of manslaughter,—
whether any medical man had not brought to bear that ordinary degree
of skiU and attention which is required of the profession. Of this the
jury must judge from the evidence before them. Any person who prac¬
tises in medicine is of course expected to bring an ordinary degree of skill
and attention to every case which he attends; and if he fails to do so,
that is a case in which the crime may amount to manslaughter. Still, as
he had said, a coroner’s jury could not be expected to go into disputes on
medical practice. One man will be positive in giving one opinion,
and another as positive in giving the contrary; but if a man of
ordinary skill administers what in his judgment will be best, he is not
answerable for the effect, or there would be no end to such inquiries, and
parents of children would never be satisfied. It might be worth remark¬
ing that Mr. Piper and Dr. Henzell did not think a post mortem examina¬
tion necessary, and none was made; yet he (the Coroner) thought, had
the evidence carried the case further, he should have considered a post
mortem examination indispensable, for though it might be said that the
cause of death was palpable, yet it must be shewn that it was impossible
the child should have died by other means or from another disease. The
medical gentlemen would only go to the extent of saying that the child’s
death was accelerated by the administration of mercury. Acceleration
of death might certainly be carried to great length. A person who
,lingers in disease is not to have his life shortened by improper treatment.
With regard to this child’s death, it had been stated on the one hand
that there were symptoms of salivation, and that the medicines contained
mercury, which, on the other hand, Dr. Galloway denied; and it ap¬
peared from the evidence on both sides that there is a disease called
gangrene of the mouth which children are subject to, particularly after
measles. Therefore, all the doctors could say was that mercury had been
the exciting but not the predisposing cause of death. Here was the
difficulty. If the jury were to come to a conclusion directly adverse
to any practitioner it would be satisfactory to know the state of the child
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349
when Dr. Galloway waa first called in. Mr. Trotter proceeded to read
from reports of cases in which the judges had laid down the law as to a
medical man’s liability, confirmatory of his own statement; and then,
having reminded the jury that they had nothing to do with disputes in
practice, left them to say whether they were satisfied that the predisposing
cause of death was not in the child, but that Dr. Galloway, failing to
bring an ordinary degree of skill and attention to the case, administered
a medicine which, by inducing salivation, caused the death of the child.
The jury deliberated privately for a short time, and then found that
Thomas Armstrong died from natural causes,—viz., gangrene of the
mouth; and that no blame attaches to Dr. Galloway or any other
person.
Who hilled the Czar f
It is thought in professional circles that there is nothing, per se, at
all improbable in the account given forth of the last illness of the
Emperor Nicholas. On all hands it has been remarked, that during the
winter, unexpected deaths after short illnesses have been more than
ordinarily common. In not a few instances, the occurrence of severe
pulmonary complications during influenza, has proved rapidly fatal.
Such complications require, as is well known, resort to vigorous measures,
and these, as the Czar’s physician is a homoeopath, were probably
omitted. Most of our readers will have seen Dr. Granville’s letter in the
Times on this subject. It is a clever letter; but the Dr.’s claims of
credit for prognosis cannot be considered so great as he appears to deem
them. There is an important difference between death from madness or
apoplexy, and death from influenza .—Medical Times and Gazette.
In the above, our contemporary seems to hint that homoeopathy was
the cause of the Czar Nicholas’s sudden death. Were such the case, we
should be somewhat at a loss whether to hide our diminished heads in
confusion at the ill success of our treatment, or to claim the especial
favour of our Government on behalf of homoeopathy for the service ren¬
dered to the state by the destruction of the national foe. But as it hap¬
pens, we believe it will be found that homoeopathy has not been accessory
to the death of Nicholas in the slightest degree, and consequently we are
unable to put upon our system either the disgrace or the merit of his
decease. A friend of ours who was very intimate with Dr. Mandt, the
late Emperor’s physician, was informed by him that the Czar could never
be persuaded to take a particle of medicine, allopathic or homoeopathic,
that it was as impossible to induce him to take a globule of the latter, as
to swallow a pill or a draught of the former. He had as great a horror
of the tiny globule as of the “ vigorous measures ” of Dr. Granville and the
Medical Times. Dr. Mandt was, properly speaking, the medical atten¬
dant of the Empress, though rejoicing in the title of physician to the
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Miscellaneous .
Emperor, who had in point of fact no physician. Dr. Mandt called him¬
self a homoeopathist, but the account we gave in last number (p. 170)
of his practice, shows that his homoeopathy was not that of Hahnemann,
nor of any of Hahnemann’s disciples, but something peculiarly his own—
neither homoeopathy nor allopathy, but a tertium quid savouring of both.
Homoeopathic Hospital for our Sick Troops engaged in the War .
The " horrible and heartrending” accounts of the sufferings of our
troops in the East, the acknowledged insufficiency of the Military Medical
Staff, the dreadful inefficacy of the method of treatment pursued in the
hospitals already established, as shown by the long lists of mortality pub*
lished, and the fact that many of those engaged in the campaign prefer
the homoeopathic method of treatment—all these circumstances led a
number of the believers in homoeopathy to wish that some method could
be devised to provide our soldiers and sailors with an opportunity of
availing themselves of homoeopathic treatment in the East. Lord Robert
Grosvenor, who is always warmly interested in every thing relating to
homoeopathy, summoned a meeting of the principal practitioners and influ¬
ential supporters of homoeopathy at the end of February last, for the purpose
of considering what steps should be taken in order to bring homoeopathy
within reach of our countrymen at the seat of war. It was determined to
memorialize the Minister of War on the subject, and a Committee was
appointed to draw up a memorial and carry out the wishes of the meeting,
while at the same time a deputation of noblemen and gentlemen was
named to present the memorial to Lord Panmure when it should have
received a sufficient number of important signatures.
In a few days the memorial was very extensively signed, and Thursday
the 29th March was appointed by Lord Panmure for receiving the depu¬
tation. At the time of going to press we are not informed of the result of
the interview with the Minister of War, but trust to be able to give a full
account of the proceedings in our next, should they not have already made
their appearance in another form.
Homoeopathic Life Assurance .
Two Life Insurance Companies have recently been started on the
principle of offering peculiar advantages to insurers who habitually employ
homoeopathy for the cure of their maladies. The highly respectable
business names connected with both these schemes is a proof of the progress
of homoeopathy among the public, and a testimony of the most practical
kind in favour of a belief in the life-preserving power of homoeopathic
treatment. Though we might wish to see the influence of these two
societies united, we heartily wish success to both, as we believe nothing
could more powerfully tend to advance homoeopathy among this “ nation
of shopkeepers” than a demonstration of the pecuniary advantage it
offers to those who employ it.
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Correspondence.
351
To the 'Editors of the British Journal of Homoeopathy .
In the British Journal for January (No, LI), your reviewer of the
report of the Brooklyn Inquest has made a singular and mischievous
mistake, to which I wish to call your attention. He infers from the
report, that I refused to meet Dr. Gray in consultation—refused too on
the ground that Dr. Gray's habit is to use lower dilutions in practice
than I use. Now, to any one who knows the respective ages of Dr,
Gray and myself, and our opportunities for experience as well as our
relative positions in the scale of professional consideration, such a charge
would appear too ridiculous to be noticed were it not that the uncontra¬
dicted assertion of such a fact is apt to work as much mischief as the
fact itself would work, if true. I wish therefore to explain the matter
of the suggested consultation, and to contradict this charge, which, I
believe, has entered nobody's head in the wide world, save your reporter's,
Mr. Edey, a rampant allopath, with whom I held the conversation
about the consultation, is not regarded as a member of the family of
the child whom we were attending, and his opinion and wishes were
consulted by us only when he acted by express authority of the child's
parents. Hence when he said he was going for Dr. Gray, my first
question was, u Is this the wish of the child's father ? " (I had seen the
father an hour before, and he had said nothing about it.) This question
not being affirmatively answered, I expressly consented to his going
for any physician whom the parents might desire to call in, but gave
him to understand that I would not meet even Dr. Gray if called in by
himself without the authority of the parents, and without the consent of
Dr. Wells and myself previously obtained. I added that I saw no
immediate necessity for a consultation, and that if, in case of a consulta¬
tion being held, the choice were left to us, “ we might perhaps not select
Dr. Gray." (The reporter did not correctly quote me.) My sole object
in this was to preserve from outside interference that liberty in the choice
of a consulting physician, which the parents seemed disposed to accord u*.
No mention was ever made of dilutions or doses.
As to the anxiety of the father to call in Dr. Gray, it was all felt
during the single night which was the critical period of the meningitis,
and it had disappeared in the morning (as he himself says) along with the
symptoms of imminent danger. It was consequently never mentioned to
Dr. Wells or myself.
Instead, therefore, of declining to meet Dr. Gray at all, on any grounds,
I simply, in a circuitous method, requested Mr. Edey to mind his own
business, and the event justified me, for the child recovered of the
meningitis, and my attendance on her at that time ceased.
I have never declined to meet any physician, when the consultation
has been suggested or requested from the proper quarter, but the inter-
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Correspondence .
ference of allopathic outsiders, whose only desire is to do me a mischief,
is always repelled as impertinent.
As for Dr. Gray, I need not eulogize his abilities and attainments.
They are known to homaopathists everywhere. It has been my good
fortune, on many occasions, to admire his wonderful practical tact, and
to draw lessons of wisdom from his experience even in the matter of
doses.
Moreover, I am not at all willing to be set apart from Dr. Gray with
regard to dilutions and doses. In the case in question, the Jury were led
into error in their statement that the 30th dilutions were the only ones
prescribed. Some remedies were used in the 30th, others in the 6th, 3rd,
and even in the mother tincture. The latter prescriptions were, for
obvious reasons, overlooked by the coroner, and the 30th were selected
as the express objects of his attack. We were content to meet him on
this ground of his own selection, and to fall there if a jury could be made
to condemn ns, for it occurred to us that if, in Hahnemann’s time, dog¬
matism on the subject of the 30th dilution was necessary,* since all allo-
pathists scouted the notion, so is it, at present, a fortiori , necessary, since
even homoeopathists, who are supposed to have experimental knowledge
of the matter, are found, who deny that the 30th dilution is ever efficient
in disease.
As for my own practice, I presume it would be found not to differ
materially, as to dilution, from that of very many British practitioners.
Giving often the 30th, especially of the so-called antipsoric remedies,
I give more frequently in acute affections the 12th, 6th, 3rd, or lower
dilutions, and I have at present under successful treatment with mother
tinctures, a case of rheumatic pericarditis which appeared, at first, to be
almost desperate.
Carroll Dunham.
Brooklyn, March 1, 1855.
* See Brit. Journal, No. LI, page 104, also Dudgeon’s Lectures on Homoeo¬
pathy, passim.
BOOKS RECEIVED.
Journal de la Socibte Gallicane .
Summary Outline of the Water Cure , by Dr. Walter Johnson.
Report of the Hastings Homoeopathic dispensary.
A Brief Review of Sampson on Homoeopathy.
Second Annual Report of the St. James's Hospital, Doncaster.
To Correspondents.
In reply to his letter Mr. Phillips is referred to Dr. Madden, who, we doubt
not, will be able to satisfy him that his fears are groundless; were it otherwise,
the Editors would have had the greatest pleasure in acceding to Mr. Phillips's
request.
Dr. Mb’s letter and essay received.
W. Davy & Son, Printers, 8 Gilbert-street, Oxford-street, London.
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THE
BRITISH JOURNAL
OP
HOMOEOPATHY.
ON DIET.
By Dr. Rutherfurd Russell.
Whether it be true, as some historians affirm, that Napoleon
lost the battle of Leipzic owing to bis having eaten a bad dinner,
may well be a matter of doubt; but there can be no doubt
whatever that bad dinners and bad food generally are at the
bottom of very much both domestic and national misery and
disaster. And it seems to me that there is no subject which
more imperatively demands our special attention as Homceopa-
thists, than the one I have chosen to offer a few observations
upon. For from the promulgation of the system founded and
taught by Hahnemann, numerous specialities in diet have been
inculcated with more or less rigour by himself and his followers,
and so prominent have these innovations become to the eye both
of the public and the medical profession, that while the former
frequently seem to suppose that if they only consume a sufficient
quantity of homoeopathic cocoa, they will be entitled to all the
benefits of the new system of medicine, the latter discovers with
its usual sagacity, that although the success of our treatment is
beyond dispute in very many cases, yet that we owe our
superiority, not to the total difference of the principle according
to which we select our remedies, but to our better judgment in
the regulation of the diet of our patients, although the subject
of diet has been one carefully studied and ably handled, since
the time of Hippocrates, and although by this assumption our
VOL. XIII, NO. LIII.—JULY, 1855. 2 A
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On Diet,
opponents pay us the highest possible compliment, by yielding
us the palm of victory in the field common to us and them. In
fact if they are right in this explanation, it would he tantamount
to saying, that as there is no law by which we profess to be
guided in our choice of food analogous to that which directs us
in the choice of the proper medicine, each individual who
practises homoeopathy displays a higher amount of intelligence
than his allopathic brethren, and is in their sense of the term
the better physician of the two. This is a fatal argument for
young physic, which professes rather to cure diseases by diet
and regimen, than by medicines. They acknowledge themselves
thrown in their own ring: how strange is their inconsistency !
It is considered disgraceful to admit the superiority of homoeo¬
pathic medicine, a novelty which old physicians might pardona¬
bly plead ignorance of, and they prefer to proclaim their
inferiority in the only branch of the physicians’ art on which
they build their reputation; while on the other hand we find
among ourselves a pertinacious adherence to certain dietetic
formulas, which rest on no authority hut that of accidental
prejudice, and which derive no support from the enlarged
experience that we have now within our reach.
There are hut two methods by which we can hope to arrive at
anything like unanimity in our dietetic creed; the one is to
assume Hahnemann’s writings as our Leviticus, and to ban all
he banned, and admit all he admitted, or to enquire into the
principles by which he was directed in the rules he lays down,
and to follow out these principles, if they he sound, into their
full development by all the lights which modern science and
observation have shed upon the subject.
As Hahnemann did not assume the infallibility of inspiration;
we may safely decline accepting any Leviticus at his hands, and
examine with that care and respect which all his writings deserve,
what they contain upon the subject of diet, and we shall be
satisfied that if in some instances he was led into extravagance
and error, yet that the principles of his doctrine are eminently
sound and sagacious.
In endeavouring to form a just valuation of Hahnemann’s
dietetic rules, we must beaT in mind that before he had discovered
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by Dr. Rutherfurd Russell.
355
his grand formula for the selection of medicines, he had already
written extensively upon various topics connected with diet and
regimen, and that he carried over into the new province of
homoeopathy where he so long ruled supreme, some of the old
adopted notions which he had already too vehemently expressed
to admit of his recanting them. The most striking illustration
of this was his antipathy to the use of Coffee. "The cold con¬
siderate earnestness of our forefathers,” such are Hahnemann's
words, “the firm steadfastness of will, of resolve and of judgment,
the endurance of continued and yet powerful exertions of the
body, adapted to the object in view, that used to constitute the
original national character of the Germans, the whole sublime
stamp of our descent disappears before this medicinal beverage,
and changes into over-hasty disclosures, hurried resolves,
immature judgments, frivolity, changeableness, talkativeness,
irresolution, too easy mobility of the muscles without any
endurable result, and theatrical behaviour.” The extravagance
of this p&ssage makes it read like a temperance lecture. In fact
what truth is in it is certainly applicable to the abuse not the
use of coffee. It would be interesting if we could discover the
origin of this excessive hostility to coffee, which belongs to the
family of narcotics, and is a sort of foster brother of tobacco, that
" foul and loathesome weed,” as an irreverent lecturer calls it,
which Hahnemann is said to have loved, if not wisely, at least
too well. It may have been an idiosnycratic dislike, or more
probably he fell into a common opinion of the time in which he
wrote, and which was strongly shared by the philosopher Kant,*
and by many French physicians, that coffee was an injurious
beverage, and he afterwards rested his opinion upon the basis of
unsound experiment. That it was an unsound deduction from
the effects which follow the use of coffee when taken in a way to
produce derangements in the system, to forbid its use in all cir¬
cumstances, is obvious, if we reflect that we could all make
ourselves as ill as any of our patients, if we were only to take
dinner at time of breakfast and tea at dinner time for a few
days.
We cannot however dismiss the subject of experiments in diet,
* Sec De Quincy’s Last Days of Kant,
2 a 2
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On Diet ,
without some further remarks. And the first is, that although
in the particular example we have quoted, Hahnemann committed
a great mistake, yet that on the whole he is perfectly sound, and
does not seek to lay down any positive rules about diet, hut
acknowledges that food must he regulated by the special appetites
and instincts, as well as circumstances of those who take it; and
he gives in his “Friend of Health” several illustrations of the
superiority of the popular over the scientific judgment upon this
point.
In the whole of his intellectual career he seems to have been
looking for some law of relation between diseases and their
curative specifics, but nowhere does he hint that there can be any
such law to guide us in the choice of food; and as an obvious
corollary to this tacit conviction, while he from the first insists
upon the necessity of instituting a series of rigid experiments to
discover the effects of a drug upon the animal economy, he no¬
where suggests that similar experiments should be made in regard
to food. He seems to have recognized the important difference
between that kind of knowledge which we reach by experiment,
as in chemistry, and that other kind which we gain by observa¬
tion, as in geology, where nature has made the experiments for
us, extending over incalculable surfaces of space and periods of
time. The feeding of the human race has been going on in
every conceivable circumstance for many thousand years. In
the language of Schleiden “The Gaucho who in the wild pampas
of Buenos Ayres, managing his half-wild horse with incredible
dexterity, throws the lasso or bolus to oatch the ostrich, the
guanacho or the wild bull, consumes daily from ten to twelve
pounds of meat, and regards it as a high feast day, when in any
hacienda he gains a variety in the shape of a morsel of pumpkin.
The word bread does not exist in his vocabulary. The Irishman
on the other hand regales himself in careless mirth on his
potatoes and point, after a day of painful labour—he who cannot
help making a joke even of the name he gives to his scanty
meal. Meat is a strange idea to him, and he is happy indeed,
if four times a year he can add a herring to season the mealy
tubers. The hunter of the prairies lays low the buffalo with
sure bullet, and its juicy, fat-streaked hump, roasted between two
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hot stones, is to him the greatest of delicacies: meanwhile the
industrious Chinese carries to market his carefully fattened rats,
delicately arranged upon white sticks, certain to find a good
customer among the epicures of Pekin; and in his hot smokey
hut, fast buried beneath the snow and the ice, the Greenlander
consumes his fat, which he has just carved, rejoicing over the
costly prize, from a stranded whale. Here the black slave sucks
the sugar cane and eats his banana—there the African merchant
fills* his wallet with sweet dates, his whole sustenance in the long
desert joumey-^-and there the Siamese crams himself with a
quantity of rice, from wbioh a European would shrink appalled.
And wheresoever over the whole inhabited earth we approach
and demand hospitality, in almost every little spot a different
kind of food is set before ns, and the daily bread offered in
another form.”*
After perusing such a passage as this, we naturally ask, what
conceivable advantage could the world derive from the experi¬
ments of Dr. Stark, who contrived to kill himself in about six
months, by a succession of simple dishes ?
Before his promulgation of homoeopathy, Hahnemann, with
the exception of his disapproval of coffee, did not differ in his
views on diet from other writers of his age and country. “ There
is not," he says, “ and cannot be anything, which, as a general
rule, is absolutely wholesome or unwholesome, * * * * None
of the general maxims of the dietist can be accounted good:
such as, veal is the most wholesome butcher’s meat, &o. * * * *
There is a time for everything, says Solomon, and to my mind
he speaks much more sensibly than most of the dietists.” (Les¬
ser Writings, page 227.) There is much more to the same effect
in his early writings.
It is a very striking fact, that whereas, before he had discovered
and taught the great law of healing, his position in regard to
medicine, was very similar to that of young physic of the
present day, and he relied much upon sanitary and dietetio rules;
after he had made good his grand discovery that the obstacles
to certainty in medicine were not insuperable, the power of diet
* The Plant—a biography, in a series of popular lectures, by M. J. Schleiden,
Professor of Botany in the University of Jena, &c.
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as a method of core, and its general importance seems to have
assumed a very insignificant value in his eyes. What before had
occupied whole treatises, now shrinks into this solitary observa¬
tion in the Organon, (p. 308.) :—“ Considering the minuteness
of the doses necessary and proper in homoeopathic treatment, we
may easily understand, that during the treatment everything must
be removed from the diet and regimen which can have any
medicinal action, in order that the small dose may not be over-
whelmed and extinguished, or disturbed by any foreign medi¬
cinal irritant.” In a note he adds, “ Coffee, fine Chinese and
other herb teas, and many other things ought to be avoided by
patients, as they should avoid excesses in eating and drinking,
sitting up long at night, damp rooms, penurious living, and so
forth.” The note concludes with the following remark. “ Some
of my disciples seem needlessly to increase the difficulties of a
patient’s dietary, by forbidding the use of many more tolerably
indifferent things, which is not to be commended." Here we
have the common-sense rule laid down, that patients are to
avoid things hurtful to themselves, and likely to interfere with
the operation of a minute dose of medicine.
On this note of things to be avoided, have been built with a
somewhat slavish adherence to the text instead of the spirit, the
majority of those homoeopathio diet tables, whioh are in such
large circulation, although some of the most acknowledged
authorities have expressed an opinion in favour of a more liberal
interpretation of Hahnemann’s doctrines upon this subject.
Thus Hartmann remarks,* “Every intelligent physician will at
once perceive, that every patient cannot be subjected to such
a rigorous diet, and that a man of sixty years old, for instance,
who had been in the daily habit of taking coffee, tea, wine,
brandy, or of smoking tobacco and using snuff, cannot be
suddenly deprived of those things without detriment to his
organism. Hahnemann allowed smoking and snuff ; he forbade
wine, brandy, and coffee with great severity. This seems
inconsistent, and leads to suppose that in a more advanced age
we may except some other things from the general rule of
abstinence.” While in this countryf there is undoubtedly a
* p. 82, Acute diseases, vol i. f See Laurie, Chepmell, and others.
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disposition to enlarge the table of our patients, in America our
energetio friend Dr. Hempel seems inclined to transcend Hahne¬
mann in the rigour of his rules of life—one of his golden rules,
as he styles them, running thus:—“ Avoid all stimulating drinks,
brandy, beer, wine, and content yourself with cold water, milk,
light and unspiced chocolate, weak black tea, and syrups made of
eorrants, raspberries, strawberries, or other kinds of wholesome
and unmedioinal fruits. Never use tobacco in any shape, except
for medicinal purposes.”* We suspect that beyond the confines
of the State of Maine Dr. Hempel’s gospel will hardly find
believers in the land of liberty and tobacco. Setting aside all
extravagances, the subject assumes a very simple form, and may
be divided into two questions.
1st.—Is it possible for our patients to avoid all medicinal
substances in their diet; and
2nd.—Is it conducive to the better aotion of the medicine, to
enforce a very rigorous diet.
At present, let us observe, we are considering the question
solely in the view of its relation to homoeopathic medicine, not
to general health.
1st.—Is it possible to confine our patients to a non-medicinal
diet ? Suppose we restrict them to a prison fare, and desire
them to drink a tumbler of water, and eat four ounces of bread
for a meal, and repeat this three times a day. This would
appear simple enough with a vengeance. We shall suppose the
scene London, and just enquire into the character of the bread
and water diet we had prescribed. To begin with the water, it
is an incontestible faot, that in the words of Dr. Hassall, “ The
waters at present in use in this metropolis are all hard, and have
all the disadvantages of hard water; they, are moreover river
waters, and for the most part contaminated to a great extent
with organic matter, dead and living; add to these points the
fact of their further deterioration by contact with lead cisterns,
and by the accumulation and growth of animal and vegetable
productions, which take place in these receptacles, and the case
is proved against the whole present supply of the metropolis.”+
* Hempel’s Organon, p. 31.
f Food and its Adulterations, by Arthur Hill Hassall, M.D., p. 52, ct seq.
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On Diet.
It is indeed impossible to contemplate the world of monsters
oontained in a drop of London water, without being satisfied that
a score of globules would go but a little way in affording them a
satisfactory repast. Besides these (living impediments to the
action of our globules, and besides the lead derived from the
pipes and cisterns, which will be a stronger dose of Plumbum
than our rigorous dietists ever employ, there are no less than from
20 to 30 grains of inorganic matter, carbonate of lime, of mag¬
nesia, &c., in every gallon of London water.*
So much for our patient’s morning draught of pure water—
now for his slice of bread.
Dr. Hassail examined twenty-four samples of bread, obtained
indiscriminately in various parts of London: his verdict is,
that the whole twenty-four samples were adulterated with alum.
But perhaps it may be said, the quantity is trifling; on the
contrary, according to another observer, Mr. Mitchel, in ten
loaves there were no less than 8194 grains of alum discovered.
And the reason for the presence of alum heightens the enor¬
mity of the pollution. It is put there to enable spoilt flour to
be mixed with sound flour!
With such facts staring us in the face, would it not be
absurd to insist upon bread and water as a simple diet for any
unhappy patient who has the misfortune to fall into our hands.
Unless we could keep our patients in a conservatory, and
prepare by artificial means the air they breathe, the water they
drink, and the food they eat, it would be absolutely impossible
to prevent them being assailed by so-called medicinal influences
every hour in their lives. In fact, all nature would be in a
conspiracy against them, to avenge the sentence of outlawry
we should thus have pronounced upon her. This is the answer
to the second question. For if we strive to attain as near as
possible a supernatural immunity from the influences at all
times powerfully acting upon the human organism by any
method of isolation or abstinence, we thereby intensify in
a corresponding degree the sensitiveness of the frame, and our
patients reared in a conservatory fade away before the first
breeze, which had they been of out-door growth, would have
invigorated instead of destroying their tender, natures.
* Johnston’s Chemistry of Common Life, p. 38.
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Is there then to be nothing peculiar in homoeopathio diet,
and ore there no rules to he enforced ? The only rule, and
we may enforce it with peculiar rigour, that I can conceive as
universal, is, that every one should eat and drink what his own
experience has taught hire agrees best with him, and we on
our part need not be at all afraid of the efficacy of our medi¬
cines being seriously impaired by what contributes to the well¬
being of the individual. It may seem very strange to order a
dose of Capsicum to a man who dines upon curry. But is it
more strange than ordering a dose of Calcarea to a man who
drinks a thousand times the amount of the dose in every glass
of water ? These are both strange, but life is stranger still,
and we are utterly unable to unravel the complex influences on
which its integrity depends, and we therefore cannot understand
how powerfully substances act in their curative sphere of
operation which are quite inert in their nutritive. If we were
to throw out a conjecture, it would be that the medicinal
action of a substance resembles a distinct impulse upon tbe
nervous system like a note of music, and as an impulse, that
is purely dynamically, takes effect, whereas the same substance
conveyed through the system for the purposes of nutrition,
does not secure the attention of the nervous system at all.
Be the explanation what it may, fortunately for the possibility
of our method of practice, the faot admits of no doubt, that
infinitely minute quantities of a body produce important effects,
while at the same time large masses of the same are quite
inoperative, and therefore it is not necessary on the theoretical
ground, to insist upon abstinence from all stimulants and con¬
diments as the indispensible initiative to a successful course
of homoeopathio treatment. I am aware that these views will
be considered by many as somewhat heretical, and perhaps as
too speculative, but although I would now rest them upon the
reason of the thing, they were forced upon me slowly by my
own observations in practice. It is now some twelve years
ago since I had a curious illustration of the possibility of a
minute dose succeeding, even although the system was at the
time being stormed at by massive ones. A patient of mine
who had long been subject to megrim, was always cured by a
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On Diet,
few globules of Pulsatilla. She was also subject to ague, im¬
ported from India, which I could not cure. So she was put
under the old system, and ordered full doses of the Sulphate
of Quinine. While taking this, she had an attack of her old
headache, and took a few globules of Pulsatilla, but expecting
nothing from it; for I had told her, so long as she was taking
her Quinine it was impossible homoeopathy could do her any
good. Homoeopathy, however, shewed itself more liberal than
its practitioner, and after a single dose of Pulsatilla she got
better. This case made a deep impression on my mind, and I
often thought from that period that perhaps our diet code was
too rigorous. Then during a long course of observation,
extending over some eighteen thousand cases treated at the
Edinburgh dispensary, I found that it was on the whole
impossible to interdict successfully the use of tea and spirits,
and that notwithstanding these infractions, and a thousand
other disadvantages, the proper medicine produced its expected
result with so much exactitude as to reduce to an insignificant
point the deranging influence of these condemned enjoyments.
And quite lately I had under my care a gentleman who took
a wineglassful of Laudanum daily, and yet was as speedily
relieved by the proper medicine when attacked by pain and
spasms of the heart, from which he suffered in consequence of
organic cardiac disease, as if he had been an absolute tee¬
totaller.
These facts, and many more such could be adduoed, ought
at least to make us pause before we lay down any imperative
rule against the use of coffee, tea, tobacco, and other exciseable
articles, as being necessarily destructive to the efficacy of
homoeopathic medicines. For my own part I seldom now
make any change in a patient’s diet out of respect to homoeo¬
pathy. And with these observations we may pass on to the
more general part of our subject, and consider the principles
by whioh we are likely to be assisted in advising our patients
in reference to the most difficult affair of regulating their food
and drink so as best to lead a long, healthy, and happy life.
The difficulty that meets us at the very threshold of our
investigation, and which we cannot get rid of throughout its
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whole ootirse, and which seems to be strangely overlooked by
most professed writers on the subject of the food of man, is,
that man occupies an exceptional position in the animal king¬
dom, although in it, he is not of it. The fundamental instinct
of animals is the preservation of their life, and the escape from
death. The idea of manliness is contempt of death. The preser¬
vation of life is frequently a secondary feeling in man. The reason
is, that upon the animal life of man is erected a life of senti¬
ment, emotion and imagination, which always modifies his
animal instincts, and sometimes entirely supersedes them.
Hence come the long fasts and vigils of the saints of old, and
of the modern Fakirs in the east. Fasts implying a continuance
of abstinence from all food, which modem physiologists,
deriving their knowledge from the effects of starving dogs and
birds, and from the enforced abstinence of shipwreoked mari¬
ners and buried miners, insist upon ignoring, as they are so
opposed to the conclusions of their experiments and observa¬
tions. But the testimony in favour of these long spontaneous
fasts is as trustworthy as any in favour of the other class, and
certainly deserves attention, especially as it shows us a little
farther into an every-day occurrence, that is, the power of
abstract thinking, or very strong emotion, to arrest more or less
the animal functions. It is the most common observation, that
thought is incompatible with violent muscular exertion. Who
ever heard of a mathematician trying to solve a problem in the
hunting field ? If he were found there at all, it would be to
escape from thought. When thought is both very prolonged
and very intense, and confined to one object, it may induce a
kind of trance, in which there is an entire cessation of all other
vital action; but long short of this, there can be no doubt that
the over-active brain monopolizes the vital energy, and paralyze^
to a greater or less extent, the other portions of the nervous
system, and cuts off the supply of cerebral stimulus required,
for the nutrition of the body. That is, whioh enables the
capillary vessels to exercise their elective affinities as to what
they shall absorb, and what they shall reject.
Nutrition then, or the continual action and reaction of the
external chemical world upon the living world, which clothes
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On Diet,
the spirit of man, depends upon two factors, the one the nature
of the materials presented to the body to be incorporated into
it, to increase its bulk by growth, or to repair its decay, and
the other the reception given by the body to these substances
presented by the hand of external nature. The character of
this reception depends, among other modifying circumstances,
upon the state of the mind, and the whole doctrine of the
fitness of aliments for their proposed end, must begin by
assuming that end to he known. Hence the grand difficulty
of laying down laws upon the subject, for the ends of life are
so dissimilar in different men. The scale runs from the
sensualist, whose avowed end is corporeal enjoyment, to the
ascetic, whose object is bodily mortification. And it is the
duty of a physician to appreciate all these varieties, and to
administer advice, not according to his preconceived notions of
the proper ends of life, hut the most healthful, or least inju¬
rious method of securing them. If we were practising in the
millennial times, we might tell men to avoid all excess, of
eating, drinking, loving, hating, sleeping, waking, working,
talking, &c.; perhaps when such advice can be followed, it will
not he needed; certainly to talk so to men as they are now,
would he in many cases simply an impertinence, or an affront.
What would beoome of a popular preacher if he could not fill a
large ohurch with his voice for an hour together, or a popular
alderman, if we forbade him to taste turtle ? In short we must
make the best of our materials, accommodating our rigging to
the state of our vessel, and sometimes too thankful if we can
secure a jurymast to save our ship from impending wreck.
After these preliminary remarks, let us consider how our bodies
are built up from day to day, and of what materials the struc¬
tures consist.
“According to Quetelet, a full grown man weighs on an
average 154 lbs., and if we subtract the great quantity of
water which runs through all parts of our body, keeping them
supple and pliant, some 88 lbs.; 14 lbs. of this comes from the
hones, and 24 lbs. from all the remaining parts. The former
contains about 66 per cent., the latter 3 per cent, of earthy
constituents which are left behind after combustion. Man
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consists> therefore, in more than a third part, of inorganic sub¬
stances which are necessary to his existence, and which he
mast therefore receive with his food. He must in fact as the
evil spirit says in Faust, ‘ feed upon dust.’ ”*
It is to supply this dust for the stony skeleton of the fabric,
that birds instinctively swallow sand and gravel, and not to
assist the comminution of their food merely. Chossat found
that birds deprived of sand, and fed upon grain, died in seven
or eight months, and the bones became so brittle, that they
broke with the slightest touch. Total abstinence from salt, the
constituents of which enter largely into the composition of the
blood, is productive of various evils, among which, according
to Woodward, scurvy is one of the most remarkable, and Dyer
ascribes the frequency of tapeworm in the negroes, who eat but
little or no salt, to the same cause. The necessity of salt is
greater if the food be of vegetables, as less is contained in
them than in animal diet. In strange contradiction to these
well authenticated facts, accepted by so cautious and critical a
writer as Moleschott,t stands the extravagant nonsense of one
of the apostles of abstinence, Mr. Sylvester Graham,J that
“ salt is a mineral substance, and is wholly innutritious and
indigestible.” Does this gentleman, and do those who crusade
with him against the traditional symbol of hospitality, ignore
the fact that bones are necessary, and that without mineral and
innutritious articles of food we cannot have them ? It is well,
perhaps, that by such monstrous statements, he reveals the
unscrupulous character of his mind, for otherwise his earnest
denunciation of other dietetic articles of more questionable
value might have undue weight.
Besides the salt we take with our food, we obtain a large
quantity of mineral substances from the water we use so
copiously in all articles of consumption, even if we do not
indulge in libations of the limpid element. And it has been
♦ Sohleiden, op. cit
f Die Physiologic der Nahrungsmittel, ein Handbuch der Dietetik, von
Dr. J. Moleschott.
% Lectures on the Science of Human Life, by Sylvester Graham, people’s
edition, p. 270.
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On Diet,
observed that waters artificially deprived of their saline ingre¬
dients are unfit for domestic purposes. The phosphates,
however, we must get either from animal food, or from grains,
in which they exist in considerable quantity, and Mulder
ascribes the frequent fractures he observed in a poor-house,
to the exclusive potatoe diet. This disposition was rectified
by giving the inmates rye-bread and butcher’s meat, and the
hint may be useful in dealing with various conditions met with
among our own poor.
There is no great difficulty in comprehending how the inor¬
ganic materials are used in building up the body, for they
undergo no other changes in it than those ordinary chemical
de- and recompositions we are familiar with in the labora¬
tory. The component mineral matters of the bones and other
parts are all found in the blood, into which they are conveyed
by the chyle the product of the food, and out of the blood they
are selected by the capillaries of the bones acoording to laws of
vital affinities of whioh we are totally ignorant. But this we
do know, that it is now an ascertained faGt, that there are no
transmutations of elements in the body, that if phosphorus and
iron are found in the blood, they must be previously discover¬
able in the food, and that there is not a tittle of evidence for
the assumption that out of silicea, iron can be made> or out of
oxygen, phosphorus.
So much for the inorganic components of our frame. A
much more difficult task is the description of the organic
remainder. This has been divided into those substances whioh
contain nitrogen and those which contain none. The nitro¬
genous elements (using the word element in a larger sense) of
food are chiefly albumen in its simplest form, as it presents
itself in the white of egg, and in its modified form of gelatine—>
for the most advanced chemistry identifies the two. The non-
nitrogenous elements are chiefly starch, sugar, and fat, in their
various forms. Let us then proceed to consider how we obtain
these substances, and what changes they undergo during their
strange metamorphosis—we might almost say, without irrever¬
ence, their miraculous transubstantiation—from dead dry bread
into living juicy flesh.
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Before doing so, however, it may be well to point out the
enormous importance of the facts just mentioned, that the
body imperatively demandb for its health a supply of certain
mineral substances, among which soda and phosphorus hold
an important place, and that various forms of disease, such
as scurvy and softening of the bones, are the consequence of
starving it in this direction. The obvious deduction for us is
that to cure such unsound states of body, it is as essential to
feed it with what it wants, as it is to give food to a famished
man. Here we touch upon one of the limits of the application
of the homoeopathic or any possible therapeutic formula. Dis¬
eases arising from insufficient supply of any of the constituents
of the frame, cannot be cured by any medicine whatever, and
can only be cured by giving in some form or other the re¬
quired aliment. This holds true, as was first demonstrated by
Boussingault, * for the vegetable kingdom, and upon this
fundamental law of nutrition the whole modern system of
Agriculture is based; and in consequence of the violation of
this law, and growing potatoes upon a soil richly manured,
arose the potato-disease, so eventful in its social and political
consequences, t
Let us resume the previous enquiry as to the means by which
the body gets its supply of nitrogenous ingredients. The
answer will be sufficient if we can trace them into the blood,
for the blood is the body in a fluid state; nothing is found in
any part of the animal frame which does not exist, in some
form or other, in the blood. We must begin with an analysis
of this- all-important fluid.
The nitrogenous constituents of the blood are:
1st. Albumen, of which, according to Becquerel and Bhodier,
there are from 71 to 87 parts in a thousand. Salts of phos¬
phate of lime, of sulphate of potash and soda, and chloride of
sodium, are intimately mixed with this albumen, which, ac¬
cording to the formula of Mulder, consists of N 89 C 989 O 290
S 8 I™.
2nd. Fibrine, which differs chemically from albumen, chiefly
* Rural Economy in its relations with Chemistry, &c. by J. Boussingault.
f See Johnston, Op. cit
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On Diet,
in containing mote oxygen and lees sulphur. Mulder's formula
for it is N 88 C 671 H 583 O 831 S T P. The quantity of fibrine varies
from 2*1 to 2*8 parts in a thousand.
3rd. Caseine. A substance of a very complicated chemical
nature, and found in a very small quantity in the blood.
4th. Globuline. A very important constituent, forming the
white membrane of the blood globules. It differs in many of
its chemical aspects from the albumen, fibrine, and caseine, and
according to Le Oann, amounts to 125* 6 parts in a thousand.
Mulder’s formula for it is N 84 G m H 588 S 6 .
5th. Hamatin, on which the colour of the blood globules de¬
pends. It amounts to about 2*3 parts in a thousand, and its most
interesting feature is its peculiar chemical nature, for it contains
neither Sulphur nor Phosphorus, but consists of N 3 C 44 H 28 Fe.
Hence the necessity of iron for the proper nourishment of the
body, and especially for the ruddy glow of health produced by
the rich red blood.
Such, then, are the nitrogenous constituents of the body,
which we must supply it with to preserve life and health, and
we shall now consider whence the supply is derived, and in
what form, and what changes it has to undergo before it is con¬
verted into this liquid flesh and bone.
The supply must come from either the vegetable or animal
kingdom, for although we read of tribes who consume as their
chief food large quantities of clay, yet it is now a recognised
fact, that unless the clay contain animal or vegetable matter in
some form, it may be merely as a multitude of those infusoria
Ehrenberg describes, it is in itself qua clay, or mountain meal,
or any other merely mineral substance, incapable of sustaining
life, although for a time it may appease the cravings of hunger.
Let us turn then to the vegetable and animal kingdom,, and
set out with this important observation of Mulder, “that those
who feed on flesh, and those who feed on vegetables, partake of
the same nutriment; they have both their albumen, the one
derived from plants the other from animals, but for both the
albumen is the same.” *
* G. J. Mulder en W. Wenckenbach, Natur-en Scheikundig Archief. 1838,
s. 128, quoted by Moleschott
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It is obvious that the albumen, and its modification gelatine,
•which we derive from our animal food, requires less transforma¬
tion to prepare it for returning to a condition almost precisely
similar from that which it previously held, than the vegetable
albumen does to enter for the first time the portals of animal
life. Indeed, all that it needs is to be dissolved, and this is
done, first by the processes it undergoes in the kitchen, which
holds to man somewhat the same relation that the first stomach
> or paunch does to ruminating animals; next by the mastication
and insalivation it is subjected to in the mouth; and lastly by
the solvent action of the gastric juice, which according to the
observations of Beaumont on the Canadian, Alexis St. Martin,
the operations of whose stomach were open to inspection by an
accidental perforation, takes from two to three hours to dissolve
an egg.
Albumen is first coagulated, and then dissolved by the
gastric juice; gelatine is simply dissolved, and thus passed
onwards, as chyme, to be absorbed into the blood. The nutri¬
tiousness of animal food is generally calculated by the quantity
of albumen it contains, and hitherto there has been a dis¬
position to -consider that gelatine only afforded material for
cartilage and bone and not for muscles. This opinion rested
upon some experiments of the French commissioners ap¬
pointed to investigate the qualities of different aliments, who
succeeded in starving dogs -by giving them nothing but pure
gelatine to eat. However, these experiments, at once unphiloi
sophical in their conception and cruel in their execution, are
entirely refuted by the fact, that dogq not only lived, but throve
and fattened upon a diet consisting of nothing but bones; a
fact corroborated by the history of every convalescent who is
nourished by arrowroot and pure soup, as Mulder remarks.
Why do^s thrive upon bones, and starve upon the pure aliment
the bones contain, is a problem of which there are many
examples, some of the most curious of which, are several in¬
stances where horses on a voyage pined away under the ex¬
clusive use of grain as food, and, impelled by the instinctive
requirements of their organism, tore and eat all the dry wood
within their reach; on this hint they got chips of wood, and very
VOL. XIII, NO. LIII.—JULY 1805. 2 B
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soon recovered their flesh and spirits.* From this we gather,
that the vital processes, as well as the chemical products, are
necessary for the maintenance of health, and it should make us
hesitate before we subscribe to any diet-table submitted to us
by the chemist, unless it he in accordance with the findings
of popular experience. It may be that hereafter the chemist
shall discover the value of some of those substances, such as
kreatine, which exists in very small quantity in animal food,
but which, as its name implies, is supposed to be a sort of
incarnation of flesh—if the phrase be allowable; and it may be,
that as the slight chemical difference in the amount of sulphur
and oxygen makes the distinction in the laboratory between
fibrine and albumen, so equally minute portions of chemical
ingredients may induce totally different forms of the aggrega¬
tion of the atoms from which the various tissues are evolved;
and it is impossible not to recognize here how very small
quantities of medicinal agents, properly administered, may ex¬
ercise an enormous effect upon the development of the organism.
How great may be the effect of Sulphur, of Phosphorus, of
Silica, for example ?
While the nutritiousness of food depends upon the quantity
of albumen and gelatine it contains; its digestibility seems to
depend upon the form in which they are presented to the sys¬
tem. Various attempts have been made to classify the ordinary
articles of animal diet, and some writers, such as Kobertson,t
give a regular schedule, beginning with mutton and ending
with pork. It is enough to observe upon such schemes, that
they rest upon purely arbitrary assumptions, or upon the
fallacious experiments of Beaumont; “who, when he saw
mutton-suet dissolve in his Canadian’s stomach in five hours
and a half, must evidently have mistaken,’’ as Moleschott ob¬
serves, “mechanical division for ch'emical solution.” What
vitiates his conclusions most, however, is, that he employed
mixed substances in his experiments, and also that with him
solution, or rather, reduction into a homogeneous mass, was
equivalent to digestion. A more recent case of a similar con¬
veniently perforated stomach, taken advantage of by Grunewald
* Graham's Lectures, &c, f Robertson on Diet and Regimen.
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and Schroeder, gave results diametrically opposed to Beaumont.*
The Germans found raw meat and veal more rapidly digested
than boiled beef! In the absence of all satisfactory experi¬
ments, we must rely upon popular experience, and yet not
place ourselves in the ridiculous position of Dr. Robertson,
who translates the language of an old wife into the sesquipe-
dalion phraseology of an old pedant, and utters it with the
assurance of an auctioneer.f It is certainly better to tell those
who ask our advice upon the point, that although it may not
be true, that after years of maturity every man should be his
own doctor, yet certainly every man may have discovered what
agrees and what disagrees in the ordinary articles of animal
food; and to stigmatise as unlawful the eating of the flesh of
hogs, in a country which was never either Jewish or Mahom-
medan, is what may be called an infraction of Christian liberty.
Pork is the cheapest animal food, and therefore the only attain¬
able form for many, and because it does not agree with some,
there is no reason to ban it with such Levitical austerity.
Much depends, in this as in most things, on the form in which
it is prepared, and we must take a peep into the kitchen before
we dilate further upon what is digestible. On this matter we
cannot do better than quote the sensible observation of Professor
Johnston.
“ In cooking animal food, plain boiling, roasting, and baking,
are in most general favour in our islands. During these opera¬
tions, fresh beef and mutton, when moderately fat, lose on an
average, about—
In boiling. In baking. In roasting.
4 lbs. beef lose .... 1 lb. 1 lb. 3 oz. 1 lb. 5 oz.
4 lbs. mutton lose 14 oz. 1 lb. 4 oz. 1 lb. 6 oz.
“ The greater loss in baking and roasting arises chiefly from
the greater quantity of water which is evaporated, and of fat
which is melted out during these two methods of cooking. Two
circumstances, however, to which it has not hitherto been
necessary to advert, have much influence upon the successful
result of these and some other modes of cooking.
* Brit, and For. Med. Chirurg. Rev. Jan. 1855. f Op. cit. p. 143.
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“ If we put moist flesh into a press and squeeze it, a red liquid
will flow’ out; this is water coloured by blood, and holding
various saline and other substances in solution. Or, if after
being cut very thin, or chopped very fine, the flesh be put into
a limited quantity of clean water, the juices of the meat will be
gradually extracted, and by subsequent pressure will be more
completely removed from it than when pressure is applied to it
in the natural state, and without any such mincing and steep¬
ing. The removal of these juices renders the beef or mutton
nearly tasteless.
“ When the juice of the meat, extracted in either way, is
heated nearly to boiling, it thickens, or becomes muddy, and
flakes of whitish matter separate, which resemble boiled white
of egg. They are, in fact, white of egg, or albumen, and they
show that the juice of flesh contains a certain quantity of this
substance, in the same liquid and soluble state as it exists in
the unboiled egg. Now, the presence of this albumen in the
juice of butchers’ meat, is of much importance, in connection
with the skilful preparation of it for the table. The first effect
of the application of a quick heat to a piece of fresh meat, is to
cause the fibres to contract, to squeeze out a little of the juice,
and, to a certain extent, to close up the pores, so as to prevent
the escape of the remainder. The second is to coagulate the.
albumen contained in the juice, and thus [effectually and com¬
pletely to plug up the pores, and to retain within the meat the
whole of the internal juice. Thereafter the cooking goes on
through the agency of the natural moisture of the flesh. Con¬
verted into vapour by the heat, a kind of steaming takes place
within the piece of meat; so that, whether in the oven, or on
the spit, or in the midst of boiling water, it is in reality, when
skilfully done, cooked by its own steam.
“ A well-cooked piece of meat should be full of its own juice
or natural gravy. In roasting, therefore, it should be exposed
to a quick fire, that the external surface may be made to
contract at once, and the albumen to coagulate before the juice
has had time to escape from within. And so in boiling : when
a piece of beef or mutton is plunged into boiling water, the
outer part contracts, the albumen which is near the surface
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coagulates, and the internal juice is prevented either from es¬
caping into the water by which it is surrounded, or from being
diluted and weakened by the admission of water among if.
When cut up, therefore, the meat yields much gravy, and is rich
in flavour. Hence a beef-steak or a mutton-chop is done
quickly, and over a quick fire, that the' natural juices may be
retained.
On the other hand, if the meat be exposed to a slow fire,
its pores remain open, the juice continues to flow from within
as it is dried from the surface, and the flesh pines, becomes
dry, hard and unsavoury. Or if it be put into cold or tepid
water, which is afterwards gradually brought to a boil, much
of the albumen is extracted before it coagulates, the natural
juices for the most part flow out, and the meat is served in a
nearly tasteless state. Hence to prepare good boiled meat,
it should be put at once into water already brought t6 a boil.
But to make beef-tea, mutton-broth, or other meat soups, the
flesh should he put into cold water, and this afterwards very
slowly warmed, and finally boiled. The advantage derived
from simmering, a term not unfrequent in cookery hooks,
depends very much upon the effects of slow boiling, as above
explained.”
This passage contains the whole theory of the art of cooking
meat. If we want to give our patients the full richness of the
flesh, we must order a chop or steak, or something of that sort;
if we want the flavour chiefly, and not the strength, we give
beef-tea; if we want hulk rather than either flavour or strength,
we can order the meat to be boiled to rags. This knowledge
gives us all the command of the kitchen we can expect to
have.
So much for animal food; let us now consider what the
vegetable world affords in the shape of albumen, and how it is
to be prepared for the table.
1st. Soluble Vegetable Albumen exists in a greater or less
quantity in the juices of all plants, and in greatest abundance
in the so-called grains. In its proportion of nitrogen, carbon,
oxygen, and hydrogen, it is exactly the same as animal albu-
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On Diet,
men, but differs somewhat in the amount of Sulphur and
Phosphorus. It is soluble in water and various acids.
2nd. In the seeds of leguminous and corn plants, besides
the vegetable albumen, is formed a substance called kleber, by
Beccaria, by Liebig, vegetable fibrine. It is insoluble in
water, but soluble in alkalies and acids.
3rd. A modification of this is vegetable gelatine, which like
kleber is insoluble in water, and soluble in alkalies and water.
4th. The last and most recently discovered albuminous
ingredient in vegetables, has so close a resemblance to caseine,
as to be called by Liebig, vegetable caseine. This name is now
rejected, for though like, it is essentially different from the
caseine.found in milk, and the name it now goes by is legumin.
It is found only in small quantities, and is confined to a few of
our esculents. It is soluble in water, and is precipitated by
all acids. From these chemical facts, we are now able to infer
the digestibility of vegetables, as well as their nutritive pro¬
perty, for as a general rule, while their power to nourish the
body is in direct ratio to the total amount of their albuminous
contents, the facility with which they are reduced to a state fit
for assimilation depends upon the relative quantity of the
soluble and insoluble form of this albumen. Besides this
important explanation, chemistry also suggests the reason of
dressing some vegetables with vinegar; for all forms of cab¬
bage contain a large quantity of insoluble albumen, which
is rendered soluble by the addition of this acid. It is probable
that in the preparation of vegetables for the table, we have
yet much to learn, and no doubt the indefatigable efforts of
the vegetarians will be of use.
The comparative amount of nutriment contained in the most
nutritious form of animal and vegetable food, is, according to
Professor Johnston, about 3 to 1.* “ Or a pound of beef¬
steak is as nutritive as three pounds of wheaten bread, in so
far as the nutritive value depends upon this one ingredient,"
i.e. albumen. Thus we find that as Coleridge defined a rogue
to be a fool with a circumbendibus, so we may consider a man
* Op. cit. p. 128.
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who lives on vegetables alone, to be a roundabout flesh eater;
for by a circuitous route he gets the same albumen as the beef¬
eater gets directly. Whether it is well to live solely on vege¬
tables, or solely on animal food, or on a mixture of both, is a
question to be decided by the whole circumstances of the eater.
The appeal to nature made by the vegetarian propagandists, is
manifestly futile; for man’s nature is progress, and as one
generation succeeds another, man alone of all creatures that
dwell upon earth, inherits the accumulated acquisitions of those
who lived before, and every child bom stands in a new relation
to the external world to what its parents did. Man is “ the heir
of all the ages,” as such he accepts on his birth new duties in
a new sphere of action from those who went before him. Is he
to be denied the right of innovation, perpetual innovation and
general progress in the food which is so essential to his life ?
His nature is himself. He alone can resolve the problem of
his duties for himself. If he finds that for their fulfilment he
requires to abstain from flesh, let him abstain; but let him not
insist upon putting a straight jacket upon his neighbour who is
under no such necessity, and who on the other hand finds he
can do his work better if he live on meat. Above all, it is
lamentable that the apostles of this vegetable creed should be
so carried away by their fanatical exclusiveness, as to convert
the board of hospitality, where the bread, the meat, and the-
salt, are spread to satisfy the various instincts of our bodily
requirements, and to express the oneness of our origin, our
progress, and our destiny, into a conspirator's meal, at which
each guest pledges himself against the common food of his
fellow-men. In former times, when men fasted, they went
some days’ journey into the wilderness, not to annoy their
neighbours with their lugubrious faces. Might not all exclu-
sionists in diet do well to follow this example ? But we have
said enough, perhaps too much, upon this head, and we must
conclude with the saying of Goethe—“ That is good which does
us good.” Newton wrote his treatise on optics living upon wine
and water, biscuits and tobacco. That was good for him. We
might have injured his labours if we had insisted upon his
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On Diet ,
eating a mutton chop. But it does not follow, that if we con¬
fine ourselves to biscuits and sherry, in process of time we
shall he transformed into Newtons. In short, the reason of
every man is, or ought to be, the absolute lawgiver upon this
matter to himself, only the reason should be enlightened by
the fullest knowledge of how he can best secure the ends it
seeks. But as these ends vary infinitely, so should the means
also vary, and the whole dispute between the vegetarians and
non-vegetarians is terminated by the old proverb—“ One man’s
meat is another man’s poison.”
Having thus briefly described the inorganic and nitrogenous
ingredients of food out of which the bony skeleton with its
ligaments, and the muscular fibres of the body are procured, let
us proceed to investigate the character of the materials which
furnish the non-nitrogenous remainder of the animal frame,
and the complex series of transmutations which they undergo,
before their final adjustment to the parts they play in the living
organism.
The starch group is the first we here encounter, and the
most important. It consists of—
1st. Starch or fecula. A substance found generally in those
parts of a plant to which light does not penetrate. It exists in
the greatest abundance in the potato, and forms above sixty
per cent, of most grains. Its formula is C 18 H 10 O 10 . It is
soluble in warm water, and readily transformed into a substance
called dextrine, of similar atomic constitution, hut of different
physical and chemical properties, by the contact of saliva and
various organic substances. . r
2nd. Cellulose. Of the same atomic constitution as starch,
and like it, by long exposure to the action of acids, being con¬
verted into dextrine, but insoluble in water. It abounds in
green vegetables, especially cabbage.
3rd. Pectin. Of tbe same atomic constitution as the former
two. It is imperfectly soluble in water, but if exposed to the
' action of acids at a higher temperature, it passes into a sub¬
stance called metapectic acid, which is soluble. Pectin is met
with in large quantities in various roots, such as carrot, turnip,
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&c., and still more in the fleshy traits, such as raspberries and
apples. The gelatinous-looking substance so abundant in Carr-
hageen moss, is nothing more than a modification of Pectin.
4th. Dextrine, or gum. These are essentially alike, but the
term gum has a more limited application. Dextrine may be
called tbe father of all the gums. It exists in large measure in
all ripe fruits, and is the transition form of the metamorphosis
of all feculent bodies into sugar. It derives its name from its
action on light; the polarized ray is thrown by it to the right;
probably the ray thrown to the left, acting upon similar ele¬
ments, forms true gum.
5th. Orape sugar and glucose, are closely allied, and only
distinguishable by the difference of their action on the polarized
light, and the crystallizable character of grape sugar, which
glucose cannot attain. Besides being readily produced by the
action of various substances upon other forms of fecula, it
exists naturally in figs, apricots, and many other sweet fruits,
as well as the grape. It is readily soluble in water, and if any
nitrogenous body he present it undergoes fermentation as it is
called, and is converted.into alcohol. It is also changed by
the action of caseine and of bile, according to Van den Brock, into
sugar of milk and buttric acid. Sugar of milk has the same
composition as grape sugar, but cannot pass spontaneously into
alcohol; it requires first to be changed into grape sugar, a
transformation readily effected by the action of an acid.
Cane sugar differs atomically from all the other sugars, its
formula being C 13 H 11 O 11 ; or, as there is probably one atom
of water in this, the truer formula will be C 13 H 10 O 10 . Like
sugar of milk, it is incapable of direct fermentation, and to
acquire the useful property it has to become grape sugar,
through the action of an acid.
Thus we see that all the varieties of starch may be promoted
into grape sugar, that highest point of advancement of the
class, at which it undergoes the astonishing transformation
from a sweet and harmless material for the nourishment of the
body, into a fiery stimulant called alcohol, the most fertile
. source of every human crime, the great author of madness and
suicides.
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The second non-nitrogenoos group 'consists of substances
from which fat is derived; for although grape sugar may be
converted into fat, yet this transformation is made more easily
if ready made fat be present, and it exists in large quantities
in various forms of food. The most widely distributed form of
fat is elain, which constitutes nearly eighty per cent, of olive
oil. Its formula is calculated at C 36 H 35 O 4 , It is generally
met with as elaic acid, and as suoh, or as a soap, is received
into the blood. Next in abundance to elain is margarin,
which constitutes sixty-eight per cent, of butter, and enters
largely into the composition of all solid fats. Its formula is
C 35 H 35 O 4 .
Stearine is much more rarely met with; it is found in mut¬
ton suet and cocoa. Its formula is C 37 H 37 O 4 .
The last member of this group which is of any importance in
a dietetic point of view, is Butyrine, which is a constant con*
stituent of milk, although it is iu the small proportion of two
-per cent. It is readily decomposed. Its formula is C u H 11 O 4 .
The above group, as will be perceived, abounds in carbon,
and yet the demand for this element is so large, both for the
purposes of respiration, and to form the many carbonates that
exist in the body, that besides the contributions derived from
the various forms of fat, a considerable amount is afforded by
various acids, which constitute the third and last non-nitrogen-
ous group.
The most important of these, are the oxalic, malio, citric,
tartaric, acetic, and lactic. All these acids are very similar
in atomic constitution, consisting generally of four atoms of
carbon, two of hydrogen, and from three to five of oxygen.
The formula of lactic aoid deserves more specific attention, for
it is readily formed from grape sugar, it stands thus: C 6 H 5 O 5 .
As this acid is found, in combination with alkalies, in the
muscles, it is probable that it passes unchanged into the blood.
As also the acetic, for it is met with in the perspiration, al¬
though in small quantities, and, no doubt, much the largest
quantity of the acetic acid we use, is changed into carbonic
acid and water. All the acids we have enumerated are readily
decomposed, and form new combinations with the various com-
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plex bodies they encounter in the blood. It would be out of
place here, to attempt to follow their chemical progress, and we
shall now proceed to the more interesting task, of describing
the process by which the most important members of the non-
nitrogenous groups are adapted for the various offices they have
to fulfil in the state corporeal.
Let us first pursue the history of starch, which enters so
largely into most vegetable diet, from its entrance into the
mouth, to the transformed existence it presents in the blood.
When food is taken into the mouth, there is, or ought to be,
an immediate flow of saliva from tbe various glands connected
with that cavity. The action of this saliva upon starch is very
remarkable, as it gradually converts it first into dextrine, and
then into sugar. Digestion then begins in the mouth, and
from this important fact, too much lost sight of, we may
deduce several dietetio rules. The first that occurs is an old
adage, that food “ well chatted is half digesteda curious ex¬
ample of the popular instinct anticipating the scientific disco¬
very, for it is literally true, the chatting during a meal prolongs
the process of mastication, and has also the effect of conveying
the requisite amount of nervous influence to the salivary glands.
No part of the system is more under the influence of the
emotions than these organs. “ The mouth waters for dainties,” is
a literal fact. The sight and smell of food make the mouth
weep in pleasurable anticipation of the “sweet morsel” it will soon
“ roll under its tongue." How exact is this description! While
gaiety thus improves what we may call the oral digestion, fear
and anxiety exercise as powerful an effect in the opposite direc¬
tion. The dryness of the mouth is a symptom of terror, sug¬
gesting the expression, “ vox fauoibus heeret,” or, " the tongue
cleaves to the roof of the mouth.” In India a thief is detected
by desiring him to chew rice in his master’s presence; the
saliva will not flow from fear, for “ conscience doth make
cowards of us all,” and the thief is unable to make any impres¬
sion upon the dry hard grain. So muoh for ihe importance
of recommending social meals, and the obvious risk of throwing
an undue amount of labour upon the stomach by bolting food.
Is it not possible, that this habit, which is said to be so
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common in America, is one of the causes of the remarkable
leanness of the people ? For, as we shall see afterwards, the
ultimate destination of this starch and sugar is to supply fat to
the frame.
/
Another question of great practical importance to us as
homceopathists here suggests itself, viz.—whether we do wisely
in restraining our patients from all spices. The action of
mustard and pepper, and of seasoning generally, is very power¬
ful upon the salivary glands; and it is a remarkable fact, that
while the taste for sweet things is the characteristic of child¬
hood and boyhood, the love of tarts and sugar-plums, as a rule,
entirely gives place to a relish for spices in maturer years. If
we condemn our patients to eat tasteless farinaceous food, shall
we not incur the risk of subjecting them to the punishment
of the thieving Hindoo, and will they not be too glad to get
rid of the insipid stuff as expeditiously as possible, that is, little
digested in the mouth, and gulp it down, “ unhouseled, un¬
anointed, unannealed,” to the sepulchre of their stomach, where
it can hardly expect a proper welcome, coming in so unman¬
nerly a fashion. If this is in any measure true of mature
manhood, it will be much more so of advancing years, when
the apparatus for disintegrating food, so that it may be well
kneaded with saliya, is all broken and useless, and at the same
time the sense of enjoyment is diminished, and there is less
lively participation of the cerebral functions in those of nutri¬
tion. To insist upon an old man eating his heef and bread
without mustard^ is almost as cruel as to give him mustard
without bread and beef. The mustard to him, at least, is an
essential; without it he could not instigate the glands of his
mouth to pour out their contribution to the first act of di¬
gestion.
The staroh, then, on its arrival at the stomach, has already
undergone a partial transformation into sugar, the process is
there completed hy the action of the pancreatio fluid, which
bears a close resemblance to saliva, and by the secretions of the
stomach itself, the most important of which, is the complex
substance called pepsin, whose characteristic peculiarity is, its
power of inducing active molecular changes in all organic
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matters susceptible of its influence. It is, in abort, the diges¬
tive principle in its purest form. Besides converting the un¬
reduced remnant into sugar, it acts upon the sugar in suoh
a way, as to transform a portion of it into lactic acid. This is also
done by the bile, but the full action of the bile upon the chyme
is yet unknpwn, and how sugar is converted into fat is still
an unsolved problem—possibly an insoluble one, for it is the
step out of chemistry into vitality. This first act of vital gene¬
ration, by which the hard and angular chemical sugar is trans¬
formed into the soft and globular vital oil, by which the lamp
of life is fed at the lungs, and the whole bodily machine kept
pliant and warm, seems to be in some way or other under the
direct control of the brain. The nervous system, the differen¬
tial between what is vital and what is chemical, here asserts its
claim for the first time over the contribution to the recon¬
struction of the living body presented by external nature. This
important fact has come to light during the investigations into
the cause of the curious disease known by the name of diabetes
mellitus, which seems to result from the incapacity of the brain
to discharge its requisite office, and transform the sugar, pre¬
sented to the organs of assimilation, into fat, so that, as
sugar it enters the blood, and as sugar leaves the body by
various emunctories,' and thus the body is starved of its fat,
and extreme emaciation, going on generally to death, is the
consequence.
For the important discovery, which, like the appearance of a
point of rock in a plain, suggests a series of hitherto undis¬
covered analogous facts, we are indebted to Dr. Claude Bernard.
He found, that on puncturing a particular spot of the fourth
ventricle of the brain close to the origin of the eighth pair of
nerves, one of Sir Charles Bell’s respiratory system, in an hour
or so, evidences of an excessive quantity of sugar were observed.
The blood and all the secretions were loaded with it. In one
instance a cat with kitten was the subject of experiments, apd
even the foetuses were all sugared through. The artificial
diabetes mellitus lasted for about a week, and then disappeared
spontaneously. Besides obtaining this result as a constant
consequence of irritating the brain at the particular point men-
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On Diet,
tioned, he observed it to occur after any violent pertubation
or lesion of the nervous system. No doubt a portion of sugar,
and a large portion, may continue unchanged in the blood,
till it passes through the lungs, where it may be oxydized and
converted into carbonic acid and water; but there is as little
doubt, that what we consume as sugar is largely converted into
fat; and hence the fattening effect of a purely sugar diet upon
the negroes who work at the sugar-cane plantations. The facts
which seem to me of such immense importance to us practically,
are these two, that we are now on the road to discover what
substances yield the elements of fat to the body, and what the
condition of the body is which enables it to turn its opportunities
to account; and what the bodily states are, on the other hand,
which debar it from the privilege of converting the bounties
of nature into that ductile element, which rounds the harsh
masculine features of bone and muscle into feminine beauty,
and tends to mollify the temper and tranquillize the mind.
Besides the fat we obtain from the starch and sugar we
consume, there is a considerable quantity of it in the principal
grains employed in making the various kinds of bread, or the
cakes and other forms in which meal is prepared for use. And
it is of consequence to know the proportion in which it exists in
the different varieties of these bread-stuffs, for upon the amount
of fat seems to depend the laxative or binding action of these
articles of diet upon the alimentary canal. Professor Johnston,
in the book we have before so often alluded to, gives the
following proportions:—
In fine English wheaten flour. 2 per cent.
In bran of English wheat. 6 „
In Scotch oatmeal . 6 „
In Indian com. 8 „
From this table we leam that fine wheaten bread contains
only one-third the quantity of oil contained in oat-cake or
bread made from bran, and that we may derive a useful hint
from this in the management of cases attended with constipa¬
tion. It was generally supposed, that the bran acted as a
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foreign body upon tbe mucous membrane, and that from the
irritation it produced, tbe peristaltic action was increased.
This may be partly true, but the presence of the oil is
undoubtedly highly conducive to tbe greater activity of the
bowels. Rice contains very little fat, and hence its binding
tendency upon the bowels. Indian corn on the other hand, is
very rich in fat, and might probably be more extensively used
in this country, with great advantage. All travellers in America
dwell with much gusto on the delicious cakes of Indian com
that are there served up at breakfast.
Although we derive the elements of the fat, which enters into
the composition of every tissue of the body except the enamel
of the teeth, and constitutes the bulk of the brain and nerves
from various forms of fat that present themselves both in the
animal and the vegetable kingdom, yet the modifications these
endure before they take their new place in our frame, is much
greater than any which the other primary constituents undergo.
In the brain it is found in the form of two acids, the one called
cerebric, the other oleophosphoric ; the latter posseses the inter¬
esting property of being resolved by heat and water into Elaine
and Phosphoric acid. This fact may throw a light upon the
important observations recently made by Dr. Bence Jones, upon
the amount of phosphates in the urine being the measure of the
waste of the nervous system.
It does seem strange that with such facts as this one and
many others staring us in the face, to shew the immense value
of fat as a source of nourishment to all parts of the body, and
chiefly to the most noble part of all the brain, it should be the
fashion of chemical physiologists to speak of fat as if it served
no other purpose than to be burned at the lungs to warm the
rest of the body. Surely the curious fact of hibernation alone
might teach us that fat went far to sustain life, for from the
store accumulated in themselves during summer and autumn,
must the beasts and other animals which pass the winter in sleep,
without food, draw the whole nourishment during the months
of their retirement from active life. To deny the name of
nourishment to that which sustains the life of an animfel,
involves a paradox; and in this instance the paradox results
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On Diet,
from an exclusive application of the term nourishment to
substances which supply the materials for constructing the fleshy
parts of our tabernacle, and ignoring the existence of the
earth and fat, which are essential to the formation of the
organs of sensation and locomotion.
The sophism implied in this paradox lies at the root of the
entire misrepresentation of the effects of alcohol, by those who
deny to them any nutritive qualities; and as the subject is one
of unsurpassed importance and interest to us as physicians, it
will be right to enquire fully into the properties of alcohilic
drinks, regarded, not as medicinal stimulants, hut as articles of
strictly dietetic or nutritious use.
The ground we are now entering on, demands from us a most
dispassionate investigation, for it is beset with difficulties on all
sides, and requires that we should at the outset clearly define
what are our special duties in this matter, as contradistinguished
from those who are most prominent in leading public opinion
upon it.
To those who devote themselves to the arrest or mitigation
of the frightful evils produced by intoxication, whether by
popular lectures, or by addresses from the pulpit, or by the
organization of societies, we wish to express the deep sense of
our obligations, for their noble and patriotic efforts, and in so
far as it is in our power to advance the great cause of temper¬
ance, in our capacity of citizens, it is surely our bounden duty
to do so. But the restraint of excess is a wholly different
question from the proper use of any article of food; and if out
of dread of offering an obstruction to the promoters of a great
philanthrophic movement, we shirk a candid investigation of the
alleged benefits to be derived from a temperate indulgence in all
the drinks they find it expedient to condemn, we should be
abdicating our position as advisers to those who consult us as
to what is best for them, and be betraying their interest and our
duty for the promotion of a remote and hypothetical good.
We have no right to sacrifice our patients upon 'the altar of
temperance. There is no more inconsistence, in promoting the
cause of temperance, and recommending the use of wine, than
in doing all we can to advance a Fire-Insurance office, with all
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its machinery for extinguishing a conflagration, and each of ns
at the same time making these very efforts by the comfortable
warmth of his “ ain fire side.” Temperance is the law of life;
the torrid and the frigid zones are equally inimical to man, nor
less so probably would be found the universal abstinence from
wine and all its kindred. Nay, we do not take up a merely
negative position in reference to temperance, while thus claiming
a fair hearing for what its sot disant advocates condemn, we go
further, and maintain, that if it be shown that the use of wine,
spirits, and beer, he conducive to health in certain circumstances,
by recommending their use, we are really doing more for the
ultimate triumph of. temperance, than by passing no end of
Maine-liquor laws; for it is a fact beyond all denial, that one
of the most fertile causes of intemperate indulgence is traceable
to some bodily infirmity or depravity, and that intoxication is
hardly possible for those whose bodily and mental conditions
are in the highest state of vigour and refinement.
I have been thus free in the expression of my opinion,
because I find myself opposed to the views of many, whose
opinions deserve the highest attention and consideration at our
hands, and with none more than Dr. H. Madden, who in an
article published in 1846, in the British Journal of Homoeopathy,
makes the following observation. “ Alcohol when acting not
as a stimulus, but substantially, is not and cannot be a pabulum
to any organ, and for the following reasons '.—first, its chemical
composition disqualifies it from taking any share in the forma¬
tion of muscular fibre, or other azotized compound, since it
possesses no azote; and it has now been proved that the higher
orders of animals have no power to compound their proximate
principles, but must obtain them ready formed: second, although
its chemical constitution has some approximative relationship
to nervous matter, we have no proof that it is or can be trans¬
formed into that substance, while numerous arguments may be
drawn from transcendental chemistry, to show its extreme
improbability.”
In opposition to this statement, we think we shall be able
to shew that alcohol may supply a pabulum to every organ
by affording it the materials whence to derive its fat which
VOL. XIII, NO. LIII.—JCJLV 1855. 2 C
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On Diet,
is essential to its healthy action, and also that there is every
probability of its nourishing as well as cherishing the nervous
system. Human fat, according to Chevreul, contains 79 per
cent, of carbon, while alcohol contains 53 per cent, of the
same element, and the conversion of alcohol into fat, rendered
thus probable by their similarity of atomic constitution, is put
beyond a doubt by the examination of the blood of persons
who have imbibed alcohol in large quantities, in whom this
fluid has been observed to be of a whitish, milky appearance,
from the quantity of fat globules that float there.* So great
indeed may be the transformation of alcohol into fat, that there
is a case on record in which all the organs of the chest and
abdomen, and even the muscles in the body of a drunkard,
were found converted in a great measure into a fatty substance.f
So much for the first proposition, that alcohol goes to make
fat in the body. As to the second, that alcohol by loading the
blood with fat, probably affords special nourishment to the
nervous system, which consists in a great measure qf this
substance, it seems highly probable, not only from the fact of
the chemical composition of the two, but from its physiological
action as a narcotic. We know indeed, as a positive fact, that
the brain is nourished during sleep, and we also know that, as
a general rule, the tendency to sleep is in direct proportion to
the quantity of fat in the body. Fatness and somnolence are
mutual cause and effect, as we see in the example before referred
to, of hibernating animals who do not go to sleep till they have
laid in a great store of fat, and who then pass their whole time
in this condition, and the converse we see in the effects of
sleeplessness producing all the evils of insufficient nutrition on
the brain. “ All the causes,” says Dr. Bucknell, in a recent
article in the British and Foreign Medico- Ghirurgical Review,
“even of the acute forms of insanity, point to an interference
with the due nutrition of the brain. Starvation causes raving
delirium, mortification produces muttering delirium. * * *
If anything is positively known of the brain and its functions,
it is that it expends its powers during the waking state; and
* Wilson on the Pathology of Drunkenness,
f Rosch, Der Misbrauch geistiger Getranke, p. 93.
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that it is nourished and its powers are recruited by cell-growth,
or otherwise, during sleep, * * * and during the prodromic
period of threatened insanity, opiates often act like a charm." *
That alcohol does act narcotically, especially if combined with
another narcotio, such as that of hop, requires no proof. It
is an admitted fact, and now we are in a position to perceive
how it is that the English and the Germans are a fat race,
while the French and the Scotch are lean. The former drink
beer, which contains about the same amount of alcohol as the
light French wines, but in combination with a narcotic and
nutritive extract to the extent of from 4 to 8 per cent. While
in milk, the model food, the nutritive matter is about 12 per
cent. So that a pint and half of good beer is equal, in respect
of solid nourishment aloqe, to a pint of milk. But it has this
immense advantage over milk, that it soothes the over-active
nervous system at the very instant that it presents to it its
means of nourishment. It cherishes and nourishes at once.
Shall we then, misled by the crude speculations of modem
chemists, reject the evidence of all history in favour of the
mighty boon conferred by Bacchus on our race? When we
reflect that in the present age the work is done more with the
brain and the nerves, than with the muscles and the bones,
that we have now bones of iron and muscles of steam, which
relieve to a great extent those of the human frame, and that
this substitution is daily progressing; while, on the other hand,
the strain upon the mental and cerebral system is proportionally
increased, for we cannot multiply brains by any process of
machinery yet invented, and that this very liberation from the
toil of the hands begets greater and greater competition in the
race of mental achievement; when we reflect on all this, is
there not something very presumptuous in venturing against
the most advanced investigations of physiology, to enforce
more than monastic ascetism upon those who instead of the
dawdling life of the monastery, with the trifling expenditure of
its hibernating existence, have daily to undergo a waste of
cerebral and nervous matter in the furnace of a city, to an
amount hitherto unknown in the annals of our race ? If we
* Brit, and Foreign Med. Chirurg. Rev., Jan. 1855.
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On Diet,
forbid alcohol in all its forms, is there not a danger of our
starving the brains and the nerves ? May not a portion of
this substance be absolutely necessary for those who like
pleaders have to go through a work of intense cerebration, so
to speak, for hours together ? Certainly in my own practice
I have met with many instances where the health was kept in a
state of deterioration by abstaining from alcoholic drink, and
where the addition of a glass of ale or a glass of wine perma¬
nently improved the health and comfort of the persons; and I
believe, notwithstanding all the averments of the teetotallers,
will contribute to the prolongation of a life it has already made
happier. There is wisdom in the adage that wine is the old
man’s milk.
Before considering the comparative value of different forms
of alcoholic drinks, let me observe that the cases in which
marked benefit was derived from their administration as articles
of regular diet, not occasional stimulants, were all charac¬
terized by the feebleness of the pulse, and a difficulty of
obtaining a sufficient quantity of sleep. This entirely cor¬
responds with what our physiological investigations might
have led us to expect. In such instances, alcohol in its
proper form at once propitiated the appetite of the nervous
system, and presented to it its most appropriate aliment. At
the same time it is right to state, that the greatest caution is
required in deciding on the class of cases which are suitable
for this method of treatment, for it certainly is extremely in¬
jurious in many cases characterized by a feeble pulse, if there
is preter-natural general irritability present. In such cases it
acts not as a sedative, but as a stimulant, and increases instead
of mitigating the evil. I have known immediate improvement
to follow the withdrawal of all stimulants, in cases where the
heart is at once feeble and irritable. Indeed I do not believe
there is any matter connected with the management of those
who consult us that requires so much care, and about which,
with all our caution, we shall so often commit errors in giving
a reply to the question : what must I drink ? Perhaps it may
be well to give Dr. Bence Jones’ resum6 of the various qualities
of different alcoholic drinks, as it may afford us some guide
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in the solution of this intricate and perplexing problem.*
“ Generally then, it may be said, that beer contains much
saline matter, wines contain very little, and spirits contain none
at all. Each year our knowledge of the chemical composition
of these fluids will increase, and with advancing knowledge we
shall obtain more clearness regarding the dietetic and medicinal
properties of all fermented liquids. At present the answer to
the question which is - the best wine, cannot be given, because
of the imperfect knowledge which we possess of the chemical
composition of different wines. But even when full knowledge
is obtained, no universal answer can be given, for that wine
which is best in one state, or for one person, may be the worst
in a different state, or for another person. Generally however
it may be said, that that wine is best wbich contains least
alcohol, least acid, least sugar, and highest flavour. This is
the best for a person in health, while for a person in a state of
low fever, that wine which contains least salts, most sugar,
most astringent acid, and most alcohol, will cause least irrita¬
tion of the bowels, will furnish most nutriment, be most
febrifuge, and most supporting. Where there is much irritation
and much depression, brandy will be better than wine. In
some states in which diuretic action is desirable, Moselle wine,
by the excess of salts it contains, may prove almost as ener¬
getic and far less heating than the essential oil in gin or
whiskey. The difference in action being that between cream
of tartar and oil of turpentine. In diabetes, ale and porter,
which contain much sugar, cannot on rational grounds be
advised, while claret, which is free from sugar, and contains
perhaps much tannic acid, is highly beneficial. While cider,
though free from sugar, contains much malic acid, and is
diuretic. In dyspepsia and gout, the wine which is freest from
ultimate acidity, and which is least stimulating, is best. The
least acid claret wines, first, and then some sherry, and even
perfectly dry champagne, when very free from excess of acid,
are not unsuitable. When a taste is acquired for good Man-
sanilla, it answers all the requirements, and .is obtained at a
far cheaper rate than first rate Amontillado sherry, which may
* Medical Times and Gazette for Sept. 1854.
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On Diet,
be procured free from all sugar, and with little acid, and
scarcely stronger than Mansanilla, and so far surpasses it in
flavour, that the difference in expense is almost forgotten.
But by adding water to hrandy, or other spirit, a fluid is
obtained which is far less acid than any wine, and which may
he made of any strength, and be free from all sugar. Theory
then, as well as practice, leads to the belief that if any stimu¬
lant is taken in dyspepsia, the best is brandy and water. With
regard to porter and stout, these containing little acid, have
much sugar, and hence give rise to much more acidity than
some pale ale. [But at the same time are pro ianto 'more
fattening if they agree.] Some pale ale may be found more
sweet and acid than ordinary sherry, but generally pale ale
is more acid than sherry, and less stimulating. Yet for this,
compensation is made in the greater quantity of ale drank.
The larger quantity of salts also in^ malt liquors must always be
borne in mind. Such ■ is the meagre information which at
present is the best I can bring before you to enable you to
answer the question: what may I drink ?”
The question of how much, must also receive answers as
various as are the habits and capacities of those who ask it.
One man’s extremest idea of temperance conveying to another
the horror of a debauch. I recollect a celebrated writer, who
is now far advanced in years, remarking to me in reply to
my question of whether he took much wine, “I drink very
little now, he said in the quietest tone, I seldom take more
than eight or perhaps ten glasses of sherry at dinner.” A limit
of indulgence which would have entitled him to be enrolled on
the books of a temperance society instituted, towards the close
of the 14 th century by the Landgrave of Hesse, the rules of
which restricted its members to seven bumpers of wine along
with each meal, which at three meals a day, and allowing six
bumpers to a quart, would give each man his three daily
bottles.
We should here have considered the effects of the other
sources of fat, and especially of cod-liver oil, but that the
subject has been ably handled by so many writers, as to make
it a work of supererogation. There is one observation, how-
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ever, it may be right to make, in order to prevent disappoint-
ment from the results of this fashionable remedy, and it is this:
In cases of phthisis it may fatten the patient to such a degree
as to give a delusive appearance of restored health, while all
the time the mortal malady is making rapid progress to its
unerring end. As to the value of inunction, a still more
fashionable mode of introducing fat with the body, I confess
myself to be very dubious, from the few trials I have made
of it I have found, in several instances, unspiced turtle soup
one of the most digestible forms of presenting fat to patients in
a state of extreme emaciation. Of the dietetic value of cocoa,
in this point of view, I shall speak presently, when considering
its claims as a beverage, along with those of tea and coffee.
Before doing so, it may be right to state, that however
important fat is to the economy, yet both oil and sugar are so
readily decomposed and converted into a variety of acids, some
of which are of a highly indigestible character, that, practically,
they are usually found unsafe articles of diet, unless presented
in circumstances well adapted to. secure their admission without
decomposition.
Sugar is safest in the form of grape sugar, and it is owing to
this that the grape-cure owes its efficiency probably, in cases to
whioh it is suited. It is said to be specific in certain forms of
diarrhoea or dysentery, but I am not aware of any trustworthy
details of the way in which it is used. Milk thickened with
mutton suet, has an excellent effect upon children who are
weak and lean from long-continued diarrhoea. And broiled
bacon is found by many to be a useful substitute for butter at
breakfast No doubt in this, as in other forms of aliment,
individual peculiarities of taste and disposition, impossible to
specify by anticipation, must be taken into account.
The importance of coffee, tea, and cocoa, as articles of diet,
requires no enforcement. Of coffee alone, the consumption in
the United Kingdom, amounted, in 1853, to thirty-seven
millions of pounds; and yet coffee is of comparatively recent
introduction into Europe.
According to Abd Alkader Ebn-Mohammed, who wrote a
treatise in 1566, entitled, “The Prop of Innocence, in Refer-
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On Diet,
ence to the Lawfulness of Coffee,” a very learned and pious
sheikh became acquainted with this beverage in Abyssinia,
and introduced it into Aden about the beginning of the fifteenth
century, under the name of kahwa. In the year 1554, an
alarming tumult arose in Constantinople, no less than an ,
emeute of the priests against the sultan, because the opening
of coffee-houses had been attended with such irresistible attrac¬
tions to the true believers, that they had all deserted the mosques.
With the sagacity of one horn to rule, the sultan settled the
matter by heavily taxing the coffee-houses, thus religating to
the mosques the poorer portion of those who frequented them,
satisfying the priesthood, and enriching himself. In 1652 a
Greek, of the name of Pasqua, opened the first London coffee¬
house, in George Yard, Lombard Street; and in 1671 the
first was opened in France, at Marseilles; it was not till 1721
the first coffee-house was opened in Berlin.
Thus began the second Byzantine empire, which is likely to
be more enduring and fruitful of great political results than the
first. For it is hardly too much to say, that if there had been
no cafes in Paris, there would have been no French revolution,
or, at all events, its history would have been very different.
The most important chemical ingredients of roasted coffee
(for, except in the Crimea, it is always roasted before it is used)
are: 1st, a volatile oil produced during roasting; 2nd, a variety
of tannic" acid, modified by this process; and 3rd, a substance,
called caffeine, similar to the theine and theobromine of tea
and cocoa.
The physiological effects of the infusion or decoction of
coffee are very peculiar. It seems to act especially upon the
spinal and respiratory system of nerves, rather than on the
cerebral, as alcohol does, It is well worthy of consideration,
that while wine induces sleep, coffee and tea prevent it. And
it may be, that the increasing number of spinal affections,
which are undoubtedly met with now, are, in some measure,
due to the much larger quantities of tea and coffee con¬
sumed. It has, besides, a most remarkable effect in retarding
the waste of the tissues, and thus, is indirectly nutritious; it
husbands the strength of the person who drinks it, and so
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increases his wealth: as a man’s riches depend upon the excess
of his revenue over his expenditure, and what diminishes the
latter, augments the former. Some interesting experiments
have been made upon this subject, and the result was to prove,
in the instances recorded, that by the use of 1 \ ounce of coffee
daily, the absolute quantity of urea and phosphoric acid voided
from the system in a day was diminished one-third, while the
absolute quantity of urine was increased by a fifth. If this
experiment be confirmed, it shews that coffee, to some extent,
gives us the control of the waste of our bodies, and when we
recollect that life is an incessant stream, the rapidity of which,
in a great measure, determines the amount of health and
strength; that the rapid exhaustion of fever is the acceleration
of the river of life in the body, and, that the arrest of decay
implies increased energy and prolonged vigour, there is no ,
wonder that those who are exposed to great wear and tear
of the body, especially of the nervous ingredients of it, should
cling with desperate tenacity to those beverages, which experi¬
ence, now ratified by scientific observation, tells them, tends
to reduce to a minimum the expenditure of substance, during
the efforts they are obliged to make. And, while to deprive
a man of his wine, may be to starve his brain and his nerves,
by withholding from them their requisite sources of food, to
deprive a man of his tea and coffee, may operate with equally
disastrous consequences, by involving him in an expenditure
to which his means are inadequate.
The quantity of tea consumed in the United Kingdom in
1853, amounted to fifty-eight millions of pounds, while in
Germany, with a population of four millions more than the
British, it was only one million and a half, and in France only
half a million. This accounts for the ghastly parody of the
refreshing beverage which goes by that name the traveller in
these countries is generally mocked with, and displays the
absurdity of homoeopathists transferring Hahnemann’s inhibi¬
tion against coffee to this country, while tea, which takes the
same place here held by coffee there, is allowed to be used
with certain faint admonitions against its excess. For the
* physiological effects of the two are very similar, depending, in
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On Diet,
a great measure, upon the presence of the peouliar highly
nitrogenous principle, called theine or caffeine. The difference
between black and green tea depends entirely, according to
Mr. Fortune, our great authority in this matter, upon the mode
of preparation. Green tea is dried rapidly, while the leaves
are fresh; while blaok tea is exposed for some time to heat
and air, which induce various unknown chemical changes in
their substance, and mitigate its sleep-destroying properties.
It is usual in China to prepare the green tea for the foreign
market with a small quantity of copper to intensify its colour,
and to the deleterious action of this substance, some of the
evils of green tea are ascribed. However, recent investigations
have proved, that the amount of copper employed is so minute,
as hardly to be of any consequence—at least, so it is maintained.
All that has been said of the action of coffee upon the nervous
system, is equally applicable to tea, and does not require to be
re-stated. I believe its moderate use to be perfectly harmless,
and that it in no way interferes with the action of homoeopathic
medicines.
The quantity of cocoa consumed in this country, although
still greatly inferior to that of tea or coffee, is rapidly on the
increase, being no less, in 1853, than 4,126,000 pounds, while
in 1832, it was only 1,150,000. Like tea and coffee, it con¬
tains a peculiar highly azotized principle, called theobromine;
the composition of this is, N 4 C 14 H 8 O 4 ; while that of theine
is N 2 C 8 H 5 O 2 . And if cocoa were prepared and used in the
same way as ooffee, it is probable the effects would be much
the same, This, however, is not the case; it is not roasted
and infused, and the infusion drank, but boiled, and eaten in
substance; and besides various ingredients in common with tea
and coffee, it has a much larger proportion of oil, amounting
to between fifty and sixty per cent, while in coffee there is only
ten per cent, and in tea none at all. It is to this difference the
fattening properties of cocoa are due, and this too is the reason
why it is found to be indigestible by many. In Spain, and
other countries where it is much used, it is not the practice
to use bread and butter with it, but generally a species of rusk
or roll of biscuit. In a chemical point of view, there is not much
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difference between a breakfast consisting of tea and bread and
butter and one of coooa, and the attribute homoeopathic, applied
to the latter, seems to be somewhat arbitrary, if not clap-trap.
The so-called homoeopathic cocoas are no way different from
the other cocoas, except in being mixed with various propor¬
tions of sugar and arrowroot, or potato-flour, which lessens the
proportions of oil, and improves their flavour to most palates,
and their digestibility to most stomaohs. On this admixture
Dr. Hassall has made some very severe strictures, denouncing
it as a fraudulent adulteration, on the ground that the only
design the ohemists who prepare the cocoa can have in view,
is to increase their gains, by selling a cheaply prepared article
at a high price. With his condemnation of those—and I am
sorry to say they are a considerable number—who adulterate
their cocoas with earths, it is impossible not to concur in the
fullest extent, but I do not see that those who prepare a whole¬
some and nutritious article of food, the basis of which is cocoa,
are to be blamed for selling it under the name of homoeopathic,
or dietetic, or any other catch-penny title they fancy; as to the
price, that is their affair and the public’s. The whole idea of
trade is gain. To buy in tbe cheapest market, and sell in the
dearest, is the fundamental principle of commerce. Shall we
blame tradesmen for obtaining the highest price for their wares?
Shall we not rather say, if the price be too great, let it be
brought down by competition. There is no monopoly except
that obtained by superior skill, capital, and reputation. If
Dr. Hassall can bring down the price, not only of cocoa, but of
coffee, of beer, of hats, of coats, and of every other article
advertised by Moses & Son, why, we shall look upon him as a
benefactor of the nation, especially during the seven per cent,
income tax. But let him be just, and not make tirades against
enterprising tradesmen, for catering to tbe wants of the public,
and fixing the price they please npon the article they supply.
A few words about milk, and then I have done.
This is called the model food, because it oontains in niee
proportions, albumen, gelatine, and fat. In a dietetic point of
view, the chief point of interest is, to determine the kind of
milk best suited to various purposes. The modification of milk
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On Diet ,
called colostrum, on which the first days of the infant’s life are
sustained, differs from the after-milk, in containing a consider¬
ably larger quantity of all the solid parts. Thus, at birth, the
caseine amounts to 40 parts in 1000, while at the end of the
fourth day, it is only 35 or 36 parts, the sugar is as high
as 70 instead of 41, and the butter 50 instead of 35. This is an
important fact to bear in mind, when we are required to supply
an artificial substitute for the natural aliment of a new-born
infant. In the course of lactation, there is a gradual tendency
to an increase of caseine, and a diminution of milk and butter;
at the fourth month, the relative quantities of these ingredients,
as compared to the first fortnight, are, caseine 40 instead of
22; sugar 45, instead of 56; and butter 23, instead of 27.
There is also a marked difference in the quality of the milk of
fair and dark women. This observation, which is a popular
notion, has been scientifically corroborated by ’ Heretier, who
subjected the milk of fair aDd dark nurses, of the same age, to
chemical analysis, and found, that while in the fair the amount
of solids varied [from 108 to 118 parts in 1000, in the dark
nurse’s milk they amounted to 146 and 147 parts in 1000.
The milk of the cow is nearer in chemical constitution than
that of any other animal, to the human milk. By the addition
of one third part of water and some milk-sugar, the resem¬
blance is made nearly as perfect as we can expect. The milk
of the ass contains much less butter than that of the cow, and
-for this reason it is preferred for many delicate persons.
The effects of disease upon the secretion of milk have not
been much investigated, but Labillardiere has made the very
important observation, that the phosphate of lime is increased
no less than seven-fold, in the milk of cows suffering from a
tuberculous affection of the lungs. This fact should put us on
our guard, when we give an opinion as to the propriety of a
mother suckling her child, and we must not allow ourselves to
to be induced, by the laudable efforts which are now fashion¬
able, in favour of the mother being nurse to her own offspring,
to endanger the future constitution of the infant, by supplying
it with improper food at an age when growth is so much more
rapid than at any future period of its life, and when, conse-
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quentJy, any imperfection in the elements on which it lives, is
most likely to be attended with important results.
Such, gentlemen, are all the observations I have to make
upon the subject of diet, for I find, after a careful perusal of
the best authorities, that the materials for attempting anything
like a specification of the diet suited to particular diseases, are
altogether insufficient for a successful achievement of this
highly desirable aim.
ON OPHTHALMIA,
By Dr. Henriques.
(Read before the Hahnemann Medical Society , 1st May, 1865.)
The apparatus of vision is usually divided by anatomists into
-the orbits, the facial and orbital appendages, and the globe of
the eye. In virtue of the structural differences of these import¬
ant parts, the eye, as you will readily understand from its
almost incessant activity, and its naturally exposed situation, is
subject to a great variety of diseases, the pathology and treatment
of which has constituted from a very remote period of antiquity,
till this day, a separate, special, and highly important branch of
the healing art. I purpose to-night to demonstrate the effici¬
ency of the homoeopathic treatment, in that most common, ever
varying, extremely dangerous, and ofttimes rebellious class, that
has received the generio name of ophthalmia, or inflammatory
diseases of the eye. Like every other part of the organism, the
organ of vision may become the seat of preternatural redness,
increased heat, swelling and pain, arising from almost innumer¬
able direct or indirect causes: these phenomena are the primary
characteristic symptoms of the first stage of an inflammatory
attack. Should they not spontaneously subside, or gradually
diminish through the means employed for their cure, the
inflammation will go on increasing with greater or less rapidity,
till the tissue inflamed ultimately sets up one or other of the
^following morbid processes, namely, effusion, adhesion, suppura¬
tion, ulceration, mortification, granulation, or cicatrization. It
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On Ophthalmia,
is familiar knowledge that the part inflamed may pass through
several of these states in succession—or several of them may
co-exist—and that the functions of the eye may he completely
or incompletely destroyed hy them.
The physical and vital properties peculiar to each of the
textures composing the organ of vision, peculiarities of temper¬
ament, constitutional predispositions, and certain artificial states
of the constitution, are the principal circumstances which modify
the inflammatory affections of the eye, and upon which we must
mainly establish their diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment.
The relations of the eye to the surrounding structures of the
nostril, the frontal, maxillary, and sphenoid sinuses, and the
cranium, produce in inflammatory affections of the eye,
innumerable combinations of morbid phenomena, which we must
accurately analyze, and justly estimate, in order to arrive at a
correct method of treatment.
Ophthalmia is seldom or never confined to one texture of the
eye: if not speedily arrested, the inflammation is soon propagated
hy the influence of looal sympathy, or contiguity of surface, to
several other textures, and thus sometimes the whole organ may
become involved. It is also seldom confined to one eye ; if one
should at first be attacked, the other soon becomes affected
also—sometimes simultaneously, sometimes successively.
In the examination of inflammatory diseases of the eye,
it is necessary to consider four things.
1st, the tissue affected; 2nd, the peculiar nature of the
affection; 3rd, the local and general symptoms; and 4th, the
> stage of the attack.
The conjunctiva, sclerotica, cornea, iris, crystalline capsule
and retina, may be the primary seat of the attack, and each will
produce different groups of phenomena, or separate series of the
modifications of the inflammatory action; and hence our method
of treatment will vary according to the tissue affected. Ocu¬
lists have consequently based a classification of ophthalmia
according to the differences of texture, which they have denomi¬
nated as follows:—
1st, Conjunctivitis; 2nd, sclerotitis; 3rd, corneitis; 4th, iritis;
5th, crystallinitis; 6th, aquo-capsulitis; 7th, retinitis.
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By conjunctivitis is meant an inflammation of that muco¬
cutaneous membrane, which lines the internal surface of the
eyelids, covers the anterior third of the eyeball, forms the
valvula semilunaris, invests the cornea, the excretory ducts of
the lachrymal gland, the caruncula lachrymalis, and Meibomian
follicles; then enters the puncta, leaves the lachrymal sac, and
at the nasal extremity of the duct, is continuous with the
common mucous membrane of the nostrils, fauces and alimentary
canal. Like the other parts of the muoous system, the
conjunotiva is subject to inflammation of a puro-muoous
blenhorrheal, or catarrhal character, to eruptions and ulcera¬
tions. The distinguishing characteristics of this kind of inflam¬
mation, are th#scarlet red, and tortuous condition of the vessels
of the conjunctiva, which by anastamosing freely with each other,
form a sort of shifting net work over the white of the eye.
Pathologists admit four distinct kinds of conjunctivitis, viz.—
1st, The catarrhal; 2nd, the contagious or Egyptian; 3rd,
ophthalmia of new bom children; 4th, the gonorrhoeal.
The following is an example of the catarrhal.
Sarah Adams, aged 25, a strong, healthy looking woman,
having never previously suffered with inflamed eyes, consulted
me on the 20th of March, and stated that for two days before,
she had been troubled with an intolerable dryness and itching
in both eyes, which she attributed to the presenoe of some
foreign substances. On examination I could not deteot any
extraneous body, but there was ohemosis, redness, copious
secretion of an opaque, thick, and puriform matter, from
the conjunctiva and Meibomian follicles, the eyelids were very
much inflamed, and bound together during the night: the
cornea was perfectly transparent, and the sclerotica remained
unaltered. She complained of heat of the skin, frontal
cephalalgia, and intolerance of light. She was ordered Vs dilu¬
tion of Tr. Aconite, in 4 doses, one to be taken every four
hours. The following day the patient felt great relief; the
chemosis, redness and secretion, were much diminished, and the
heat of the skin was quite gone. I then ordered Nux Vomica,
6 /u in 6 doses, one to be taken every four hours, and on the
25th the patient was discharged perfectly cured.
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On Ophthalmia ,
This was a case of simple catarrhal ophthalmia. Of all the
ophthalmia, this affection is the most common ; and some per¬
sons are particularly subject to such attacks, periodically
returning every three or four months : the exciting causes are
sudden changes of temperature, and exposure to cold and wet.
Its treatment in general is very simple, and when our remedies
are promptly and judiciously selected, the affection is always
cured in three to five days; but if it be neglected, or treated
with improper local applications, it will cause a great deal
of constitutional and local disturbance. In these cases it
frequently happens that the conjunctiva of the superior palpabra
becomes sarcomotous and rugged, and by friction in this state
against the qornea, it eventually destroys the transparency of the
cornea. This patient having applied for advice at the com¬
mencement, she was cured in five days, by means of Aconite
and Nux Vomica, rest and spare diet; compresses of tepid
water were applied locally, from which she experienced great
relief. I sometimes apply cold water; with some patients cold
is far more grateful than warm water; this depends however
entirely upon the idiosyncrasy of individuals. It is our duty
therefore, to consult the feelings of the patients, and adopt that
which is most agreeable to them.
Aconite, Chamomilla, Pulsatilla, and Nux vomica, are the
remedies which have proved most successful in my practice.
The next case I shall call your attention to, is that of puru¬
lent ophthalmia in an infant, complicated with hooping cough.
Infants are frequently born with, or soon after birth, are
subject to, a puro-mucous inflammation of the conjunctiva,
which has been denominated ophthalmia neonatorum. This
affection is attributed by Mackenzie and others, to the inocula¬
tion of the conjunctiva by leucorrhceal fluid during parturition.
This in my opinion, is a purely gratuitous hypothesis. It
appears to me to arise entirely from premature exposure to too
strong a light, to draughts of air,- or to the heat of a fierce fire,
near which nurses are in the habit of sitting with the infant in
their lap, for hours after birth, and sometimes it may be traced
to constitutional causes.
Robert Ireland, an infant, 30 days old, was brought to the
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Hahnemann Hospital, on 4th November, with purulent ophthal¬
mia of both eyes. The mother who was a strong healthy
looking woman, and was never affected with leucorrhcea, stated,
that the infant has been suffering ever since his birth, with
inflammation and purulent discharge fijom both eyes. About
seven days ago he was seized with hooping cough, for which she
had given him several doses of castor oil. The child was of a
delicate frame, and feeble constitution; has frequent and violent
paroxysms of convulsive cough during the day, as well as at
night, with wheezing, great anguish, and face injected of a bluish
hue during the attacks; the conjunctiva is very red; the
eyelids are extremely vascular, considerably swollen, and glued
together every morning; there is copious secretion of a
yellowish purulent matter: with the exception of a slight
haziness of the cornea, the transparent part of the eye is not
affected.
He was ordered to take Ipecacuanha and Spongia, 3 /i* of
each to be dissolved in 12 tea-spoonfuls of water; one
tea-spoonful to be taken every second hour, alternately; the eyes
to be injected every two hours, with cold water.
On the 11th the cough was all but gone, but there was
little or no alteration in the ophthalmic affection. I then
ordered Sulphur and Calc. carb. 2 /», to he taken dry on his
tongue, alternately every fifth day; at the end of two months
•with these two remedies, the ophthalmia was completely cured,
and the child became fat and healthy.
After hearing the history of this little patient, and before
cleansing and examining the eyes, I was apprehensive that
vision was entirely destroyed; for it is very rare that this disease
lasts as long as 80 days, without disorganizing the structures;
but to my joy, and great astonishment, I was agreeably
disappointed, in only detecting a slight opacity of the cornea,
which rapidly disappeared under treatment.
The purulent ophthalmia of infants, is always a dangerous
affeotion, requiring prompt medical means; for it runs its
course frequently in so very rapid a manner, as to destroy
vision in a few days. It usually begins about the third day
after birth, when the eyelids of the infant are observed sticking
VOL. XIII, NO. LIII.—JULY, 1855. 2 D
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I
On Ophthalmia ,
together, and swollen, from which ooze some drops of purulent
matter when they are opened, and the mucous suface is
extremely vascular. At this first stage it is generally very easy
to arrest the progress of the disease, but if neglected or mis¬
managed, as is frequently the case, the conjunctiva becomes
more and more swollen, the purulent discharge increases,
and the lids present a dark red appearance: this is the second
stage, and usually lasts from 8 to 10 days, without affecting the
transparent tissues. The third stage is that in which we find the
cornea hazy, infiltrated with pus, ulcerated, or completely
destroyed, with the iris and humours protruding.
Our prognosis must be based upon the state of the organ;
when therefore we are consulted, our first business is to remove
the purulent discharge, and examine the globe of the eyes
carefully. In the two first stages our prognosis may be favour¬
able, for then the come® are intact, and the disease is generally
under the controul of judicious treatment; but in the third
stage we must promise nothing; for vision may be impaired, or
totally lost, from the disorganization which sooner or later takes
place in the cornea, the consequent protusion of the iris and
humours, and ultimate irremediable loss of sight. The
remedies you will find most useful in' the first stage, when it
does not originate from syphilitic contagion, are. Aconite,
Calcarea Carb. and Sulphur. Aconite is indicated especially
at the very onset of the disease, When the child is only irritable
and sleepless, with a hot dry skin, slight redness and tumefaction
of the lower lids, and little or no discharge during the day.
The eyes must also be syringed repeatedly, with a lotion
composed of equal parts of rose water, and the mucilage of
quince seeds, especially at nights, when it ought to be done
every two hours; for it is during the night the secretion
becomes more copious, concretes on the internal surface of the
lids, and irritates the come®. Although existing thirty days, '
contrary to the usual march of the affection, there were no
organic changes of the transparent tissues in the case under
consideration; indeed it might be said to be in the first stage.
Calcarea carb. and Sulph.,were therefore administered alternately,
and with such decided advantage, that in two months the
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infant was cured without leaving the slightest trace of the oph¬
thalmia, and the constitution very much improved.
When the purulent ophthalmia of infants can he traced to
syphilitic contagion, which we must never neglect to inquire into,
the specific remedy, Mercurius, must be administered immedi¬
ately, and the eyes, in the manner and by the means previously
suggested, must he frequently cleansed of the purulent dis¬
charge.
The other remedies that you will find most suitable to this
species of ophthalmia, in its first and second stages, are,
Chamomilla, followed by Belladonna, and Nux Vomica, Pulsa¬
tilla, Bryonia, Calcarea carb., and Sulphur.
When there is ulceration of the cornea, you must apply the
extract of Belladonna, diluted with some white ointment, as a
means of preventing protusion of the iris; and the remedies
you will find most efficacious are, Arsenicum, Calcarea carb.,
Silicea, and Sulphur.
When specks or opacity of the cornea exist, the principal
remedies are. Cannabis, Euphrasia, Carbo veget, Cina, Senega,
and Nitric Acid.
Should Hypopium exist, either alone or in conjunction with
either of the previous morbid alterations of structure, Hepar
sulph. and Silicea will be more especially indicated.
The two following cases are examples of what is called
strumo-catarrhal ophthalmia; a disease which implies inflam¬
mation of the conjunctiva, complicated with scrofulous diathesis
or dyscrasia. This species of ophthalmia usually attacks
children from the time of weaning till ten years of age, and
its distinguishing characteristics are, a slight degree of redness,
great intolerance of light, small pustules on the conjunctiva,
and specks on the cornea, resulting from these pustules.
Two sisters, Mary and Juliet Kellevon, the former 9 and the
latter 7 years of age, came to consult me on 25th January.
Mary has been suffering with ophthalmia of both eyes since
May last, Juliet has been affected in both eyes also, but it is
only two months ago since she began to complain. They are
of the lymphatic temperament, hut they are plump and healthy
looking children. With the exception of the uneasiness arising
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On Ophthalmia,
from the inflammatory state of the eye, they state that they
feel themselves perfectly well. In both cases, the intolerance
of light is very acute—granular conjunctiva—the redness of
the conjunctiva is considerable; its palpebral portion is also
very much thickened, and there is copious secretion of muco¬
purulent matter. Slight opacity of the cornea; tumefaction
and tenderness of the cervical glands. The only difference
between the affection of these two patients was in the intensity
of the inflammatory action, which was greater in Juliet’s case.
Belladonna 2 /3 in 4 oz. of water was ordered, a tablespoonful
to be given to each every four hours.
On the 27th, the acute inflammatory state had subsided,
but the photophobia was still considerable; they were therefore
ordered Calcarea carbonica 5 /» in six doses, one night and
morning.
On the 81st, the redness of the conjunctiva was very much
less, but the secretion from the Meibomian follicles is the same,
the eyelids being very much glued together every morning, and
there is still considerable photophobia. Sulphur was ordered
5 /w to be mixed in six doses, one to be taken twice a day.
Both these patients continued taking alternately Calcarea
carb. and Sulph. for nearly seven weeks with decided advantage,
for on 7 th March, Juliet was quite well, and Mary, although
better, is not quite as well as her sister. After a suspen¬
sion of all remedies for a fortnight, these patients began again
with the Sulphur and'Calcarea, which they continued taking
alternately in the same manner as previously, for three weeks,
at the expiration of which time they were discharged cured.
The conjunctiva of the inferior palpebra, however, in the case of
Juliet, being still somewhat thicker than it ought to be, and in
both patients the eyelids being still occasionally glued together,
for which a prolonged sojourn at the sea-side or in the country
was recommended, which would also improve the general tone
of the organism, and so prevent a relapse.
A cartarrhal ophthalmia occuring in a scrofulous constitution
is a compound affection called the strumo-catarrhal, which is
of frequent occurrence, and of all the ophthalmias there is
none more difficult to be cured. The treatment in these cases
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must cohsist of the remedies suitable to each of the morbid
conditions of which the disease is composed. Thus our first
care must be to subdue the inflammatory state by the remedies
especially recommended for ordinary conjunctivitis, and when
this object has been accomplished, our next duty is to oombat
the strumous constitution by such remedies as I shall hereafter
recommend when treating of the scrofulous ophthalmia. For the
present it suffices to observe, that I know of no remedies more
useful in curing every kind of strumous affection than Sulphur
and Calcarea, repeated for a long time, at longer or shorter in¬
tervals, according to the urgency of the case. Their good effects
are amply testified by the foregoing oases.
The distinguishing characteristics of scrofulous ophthalmia
are—1st Slight redness of the conjunotiva and sclerotica.
2nd. Pain more or less intense, particularly at night. 3rd.
Photophobia or intolerance of light. 4th. Epiphora, or gushes
of tears. 5. Blepharospasmus, or spasms of the orbicularis
palpebrarum. This kind of ophthalmia is often the first
manifestion of a strumous dyscrasia, and it is of such frequent
occurrence that Beer and Mackenzie assert, that out of the 100,
90 cases of inflammation of the eyes in young subjects are of
this kind.
The first oase of strumous ophthalmia is that of Emily
Gadman, 12 years of age, who has had bad eyes ever since she
was three years of age. This girl is of a delicate, spare habit,
with blue eyes, and enlarged cervioal glands. She complains
of a sensation of intolerable glare and dazzling, with itchings,
and a feeling of sand in the eyes. The redness of the eyes
was not very great, but there were several spots of opacity on
the cornea; the eyelids were rugged and swollen; inability
to face the light; tears constantly flowing; and a few red
vessels were observed running over the sclerotica. I first
ordered her Aconite, after whioh she took successively Bella¬
donna, Calcarea carb., Euphrasia, Sulphur and Silicea, and
was discharged cured in ten weeks, without any outward
application..
The next case is that of Isaac Bobinson, 9 years of age, who
stated that when he was 2 vears old, he had an attack of
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On Ophthalmia,
scarlet fever, of which he recovered; hut ever since he has
had inflammation of the eyes, for which he has been attended
allopathically several times, by different practitioners, but had
not received any permanent benefit. This patient, of unques *
tionable scrofulous diathesis, had enlargement of the cervical
and mesenteric glands, and was subject to diarrhoea. Both
eyes were slightly inflamed, hut the intolerance of light was
considerable. There were no ulcers, but the opacity of the
coroese was so great that he could scarcely distinguish objects
or colours; there were several red vessels running over the
sclerotica, and the inferior palpebr© were granular, and very
much thickened inside; little or no appetite; restlessness at
nights, and is extremely irritable. This patient first took
Belladonna, after which he took alternately Calcarea carb..
Sulphur and Baryta carbonica, for six months; leaving a week’s
interval between each remedy, and at the end of this time he
was discharged cured.
There is nothing that is either very remarkable or unusual in
the foregoing cases, but they are interesting in demonstrating
the efficiency of the homoeopathic practice in a class of diseases
which certainly do not originate in the imagination, and rela¬
tive to the diagnosis of which no doubt can exist. The first
was nine years standing, and was cured in ten weeks; the
second was only seven years standing, but it required six
months' treatment before the patient was completely restored
to health. The reason of this difference was in the complica¬
tion of the ophthalmia with diseased cervical and mesenteric
glands—diseases, the cure of which is at all times tedious
and protracted even when they exist alone.
Aconite, Belladonna, Calcarea carb., Euphrasia, Sulphur and
Silicea, were the remedies employed in the case of Emily
Cadman. And Belladonna, Calcarea, Sulphur, and Baryta
carbonica, were the remedies administered in the case of Isaac
Bobinson.
In the ordinary cases of scrofulous ophthalmia, I consider
Belladonna, Calcarea carb., and Sulphur, the chief remedies;
but they require to be repeated once or twice a week alternately,
till some sensible amelioration takes place, when it will be
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advisable to discontinue their use till the improvement ceases*
and then recommence the same. course. A great number of
remedies have been employed, and recommended by authors, in
this affection, but I know of none so efficacious and certain in
their effects, as the three I have previously indicated.
The most distressing symptoms in this affection are photo*
phobia and ophthalmospasmus. Should Belladonna, Calcarea
and Sulphur fail to modify immediately the photophobia, you
might give with advantage, as intercurrent remedies, Arsenicum,
Aconite, Cina, Conium, Ignatia, Phosphorus, Mercurius, and
Staphisagria, according to their symptomatic indications. For
the same reason, and in the same manner, Chamomilla, Hyos-
cyamus, and Stramonium, may prove beneficial against the
ophthalmospasmus. But, however judicious the selection of
remedial agents may be, you will never succeed in curing
strumous ophthalmia unless you pay particular attention at the
same time to the mode of living of your patient, and make
him adopt, conformably to his means, an appropriate hygienic
plan; for there is no doubt, that a vast amount of this affection
is the result of improper diet, want of air and exersise, un¬
cleanliness, unsalubrious habitations, and insufficient clothing.
The basis of the hygienic plan consists in, 1st, let your patient
be well clothed from head to foot—he should wear flannel next
his skin covering his chest, arm-pits, and abdomen completely;
2nd, if he inhabits an insalubrious locality, it must be changed,
but if this cannot be altered, he must live as much as possible
in our public parks and fields; 3rd, he should be bathed daily
in tepid water on rising every morning for five minutes; and
4th, plain but nutritious food.
The next case I shall relate to you is one of traumatic oph¬
thalmia. John Martin, aged 38, consulted me as an out¬
patient at the Hahnemann Hospital, and stated that he has
been suffering with ophthalmia of the left eye for eleven years,
caused by a blow. It occasionally subsides, but he is never
free from redness, photophobia, pain and lachrymation. Vision
in the affected organ very imperfect. He has been repeatedly
bled, leeched, cupped, blistered, and mercurialised, without
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On Ophthalmia,
any permanent relief. Has been attended till now, 1 for three
months,' by Dr. Quain, of the North London Hospital. This
patient is thin, pale faced, of a nervous temperament, and
scrofulous disposition. The characteristic^ symptoms present
were, scarlet redness of the left eye; extreme intolerance of
light; lids very red and swollen; shooting and sharp pricking
pains in the globe of the eye; profuse and constant lachryma-
tion, with pressive pains extending from the ocular region to
the whole left side of the cranium; opacity and ulceration of
the cornea in the axis of vision; diseased eye is smaller than
the other T>'indistinct vision of objects ; pupils discoloured and
contracted; loss of transparency of the humours; and granular
lids.
John Martin attended the hospital as an out-patient for
twelve months, at the end of which tipae he was discharged
perfectly cured. The remedies employed during the treatment
were Arnica, Mercurius, Euphrasia, Conium, Ignatia, Cannabis,
Hyoscyamus, Sulphur, Calcarea, and Arsenicum.
Traumatic ophthalmia designates all those inflammatory
affections of the eyes, that arise from mechanical or chemical
injury. This species of ophthalmia is always extremely dan¬
gerous, very obstinate, and unless properly treated at the com¬
mencement it leads sooner or later to cataract, glaucoma or
amaurosis, and consequently the loss of vision. One, many or
all tKe textures of the eye may suffer in traumatic inflammation,
hence you must be prepared to meet with a great variety of
symptoms corresponding with the kind of tissue affected espe¬
cially, in any given case.
It not unfrequently happens, that complete disbrganization
of the interior textures of the organ occurs after an apparently
trifling and superficial injury. When called to a case of trau¬
matic ophthalmia, therefore, we must ever be miodful of these
probable effects; and although we may not detect any present
mischief, we should always adopt such prophylactic means as
experience teaches us to be most efficacious in preventing these
formidable consequences. We ought, therefore, from the
moment of an injury to the eye, however insignificant it may at
first sight appear, to eDjoin absolute rest, and a spare diet for
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by Dr. Henriques.
409
twenty-four hours. Bathe the injured organ frequently with
Arnica lotion, and give internally some doses of the same
remedy. If at the expiration of this time, there is neither pain,
redness, nor swelling of the eye, it will be advisable to give a
a dose of Nux vomica, as a means of relieving the organ from
internal congestion. If, on the contrary, the patient complains
of circumorbital pains, and there exi$t the slightest traces of
inflammation or congestion, we must not hesitate to apply
Belladonna around the orbits; let him be placed in a dark
room, enjoin absolute rest and diet, and give Belladonna inter¬
nally, or such other remedy as may be most suitable to the
case; continuing the treatment till every marked symptom has
disappeared.
The sclerotic, like the conjunctiva, may be the primary seat
of inflammation. The sclerotic is a strong, opaque, fibrous
membrane, extending from the optic nerve to the cornea, which
preserves the globular figure of the eye, defends the soft, internal
structures, and gives insertion to the ocular muscles. This tissue
frequently becomes the seat of inflammation, from exposure to
atmospherical influences, and is called sclerotitis, or rheumatic
ophthalmia. It has been observed that children are not sub¬
ject to it, and that it prevails more frequently when there is
a cold north-easterly wind. It is distinguished from conjunc¬
tivitis:—
1st. By the primary seat of the inflammatory action being
in the sclerotica.
2nd. By the pulsative and deep seated pain, which is felt
principally around the orbit, eyebrow, temple, cheek, and side
of the nose, whilst the pain in conjunctivitis is felt occasionally
on the surface of the conjunctiva, and is described as a rough¬
ness, or feeling of sand under the eyelids.
3rd. The redness, whioh is reticular in conjunctivitis, is radi¬
ated or zonular in sclerotitis; in the former the congested
vessels evidently occupy the conjunctiva, whilst in the latter
they are manifestly seated under the conjunctiva.
And lastly. By the absence of any morbid secretion, whilst
oonjuntivitis is always attended by a muco-purulent secretion
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410
On Ophthalmia,
from the surface of the eye. Pure sclerotitis is a much rarer
disease than conjunctivitis; the proportion is estimated as one
to ten. We more frequently meet them combined, giving rise
to a kind of ophthalmia that is called generally the catarrho-
rheumatic, the character and treatment of which the following
case will illustrate.
1st Case. Jane Pitts, aged 27, was admitted in the Hahne¬
mann Hospital on the 4th February. She states that for three
months past she has felt general debility. Naturally of a pale
and delicate appearance, she is subject every winter to a very
severe cough, and has several times been ill with inflammation
of the bowels. Catamenia appeared for the first time at sixteen
years of age, ever since it has continued, with some trifling irregu¬
larities, till now. About a fortnight ago, she was suddenly seized
with aching pains in her right eye, and could not distinguish*
clearly the surrounding objects; they seemed to be enveloped'
in a halo; for which she took some Senna and Salts, and the
pain increased, particularly during the night. On examina¬
tion, the following symptoms were observed:—loose cough,
with occasional shooting pains in the chest and between the
shoulders; sleeplessness and agitation from pain in the eye and
head; constipation; loss of appetite; acute darting pains in
the right side of the head ; smarting and burning pains in the
right eye; sclerotica of the right eye very much injected,
of a bright red colour, radiating in concentric fasciculi towards
the edge of the cornea; dimness of vision; haziness of the
cornea; sluggishness of the pupil, and considerable epiphora;
both the upper and lower lids are swollen; and the conjunc¬
tival lining is red, and secreting a thin whitish matter; she felt
hot and feverish at nights. She was ordered low diet, and
Belladonna 8 /s, 1 /«th every third hour.
On the 5th there was a decided aggravation of the inflamma¬
tion and cephalalgia, with increased susceptibility to light;
frequency of pulse and heat of skin, I therefore substituted
Aconite for Belladonna.
The following day she was seized with very violent colic;
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411
cramp-like pains, and profuse and loose evacuations, of a very
offensive character, to combat which she was ordered Colocyn-
this, ofVhich she took £ drop, 3rd dilution, every third hour.
On the 7th, the bowel complaint was better, but there was
no amelioration in the condition of the eye, on the contrary, it
seemed worse, for she complained of intense burning pain in it,
and a feeling as if it was coming out. # Considering that Bella¬
donna was the most suitable remedy, notwithstanding it pro¬
duced no effect when first administered, I ordered again Y«th
drop, Belladonna, 3rd dilution, to be taken every 4 hours.
On the 15th the ophthalmia was quite gone, but she com¬
plained of face-ache; there were constant spasmodic and tear¬
ing-like pains in the bones of the face. 8 /*> Sepia was ordered,
of which she took l /ath part three times a day, in water, which
she continued till 17th, on which day she is reported quite well,
and on 19th was discharged cured.
The following is a case of pure rheumatic ophthalmia, ex-
teding to the iris.
Joseph Piper, a cabman, 32 years of age, consulted me on
3rd January, for inflammation of the right eye, which he has
had for twelve years, for which he has been repeatedly blistered,
cupped, and had a seton inserted, without any effectual relief.
He was last attended by Mr. Alexander, the oculist, but did
not receive any benefit. He attributes the disease to the damp
and night air to which his occupation exposed him. It began
with a slight redness of the white of the eye, and severe pain
in the eye and around the eyebrow, which generally increased
at night. It gradually increased without affecting vision, till
two years ago, when, after a violent paroxysm of pain from a
fresh cold, he discovered that he could not see well from the
affected eye; since then he has been gradually losing the sight,
and he can now scarcely distinguish objects. On examination
I could not discover any constitutional symptoms: he appeared
in good health; complained of pulsating circumorbital pain,
varying in intensity; the right eye was smaller than the left,
and he experienced constant deep-seated pulsations in the
globe of the eye; several red vessels were observed running
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412
On Ophthalmia,
along the sclerotica, which was slightly red; the cornea was
hazy; and the pupil was discoloured, contracted, moveable, and
very hazy. Considering the cause of the affection to f>e expo¬
sure to wet, I ordered him V 3 Dulcamara, in three doses, 1 to
be taken every 4 hours.
On 7th he was very much better; he had suffered much less,
and the redness of the^ sclerotica was diminished. He was
ordered Dulcamara and Belladonna, the l /« of a drop of 3rd
dilution, to be taken every 4 hours alternately.
On 15th, there was no pain nor inflammation, and vision
was more distinct. In order to remove the effusion of coagulable
lymph within the pupil, I ordered him Sulphur and Calcarea
alternately, s /so of each to he taken every fifth day, and on 1st
April he was discharged cured. The inflammation and pain
had quite left him for upwards of two months, but, owing to
the irreparable change of colour and structure, with the conse-
quent imperfect function of the iris, the vision was incomplete;
he could distinguish objects, but they appeared to him as if
enveloped in a clear mist.
As it usually occurs in sclerotitis, only the right eye was
affected, and although the disease was twelve years' standing,
never did the left participate in the disease, nor had he ever
suffered from rheumatism in any other part of the body. It
has been remarked, that rheumatic sclerotitis is never metas¬
tatic, but an individual who has previously suffered from it,
becomes Susceptible to future attacks; hence it is advisable, to
warn the patient of this fact, and give him such hygienical
instruction that may protect him from the exciting causes,
which may be traced always to exposure of the eye to currents
of cold air, when over-heated or in a state of perspiration,
or sudden changes of temperature—from a crowded room into
the cold air of the street, or from getting wet, and other
similar imprudences.
Amaurosis.
I shall now conclude my observations by relating to you a
case of incipient amaurosis, or obscurity of vision. This is an
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413
affection of the very delicate membranous expansion of the
nerve of vision or some other parts of the optic apparatus.
Like all the other tissues of the eye, the nervous system is apt
to become the primary focus of a morbid action, brought on
either by the over-stimulation of intense light, over-action of
the organs of vision, or from sympathy with' affections origin¬
ating in some other remote organ.
William Bennett, a sickly-looking man, 36 years of age, silver
watch-case maker, consulted me, on 31st March 1852, for weak¬
ness of sight and appearance of floating bodies constantly dancing
before the left eye. He states that he has been suffering for two
years with dyspepsia, and that it was about the same time he
began to lose his sight. Qn examination, the only objective
symptoms appreciable were in the left eye; a slight strabismus,
with the pupiLdilated and sluggish; he complains of perceiving
constantly black streaks and spots floating before the left eye;
lowness of spirits; frontal cephalalgia two or three times a
week, of a dull pressive character, which usually begins in the
morning, and ends at 4 p.m. ; vision is obscured by a greyish
cloud ; diminished sensibility of the retina; throbbing pain in
the globe of the eye; sleeplessness; pyrosis; tongue furred;
a sense of weight and tenderness in the epigastrium after eating,
and constipation.
To correct the characteristic symptoms of gastric derange¬
ment, was the obvious primary indication in this case; he was
therefore ordered Nux vomica 6 / w, in six doses, one to be taken
night and morning. This remedy was continued for seven days
with marked improvement; his digestive functions were better,
but the loss of vision and the cephalalgia remained unaltered.
Chamomilla was then ordered, after which he took, at intervals
of ten days, Pulsatilla, China, and Sulphur. Under this treat¬
ment the patient daily improved, and at the end of four months,
vision was completely restored, the head and eyes were free
from pain, and the digestive organs were in perfect order.
Thus, gentlemen, I have endeavoured, in this paper, to com¬
pass as extensive a field of observation on the homoeopathic
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414 On the Prophylactic power of Belladonna.
treatment of diseases of the eye, as th6 short duration of our
meeting would allow. The cases I have selected to illustrate
the subject of our discussion to-night, are highly interesting,
in demonstrating the efficiency of our remedial means in a class
of diseases, which no sophism of the old school can contest, for
ophthalmias are neither imaginary nor mistakeable affections.
It is also evident, from the prompt action and positive results
of our method of treatment, which succeeded, in many cases,
after allopathy had failed, that the new is far superior to the
old system, and that in addition to such absolute results,
homoeopathy is also preferable, by avoiding a great deal of
unnecessary annoyances, and additional pain from the leeching,
bleeding, blistering, setons, and mercurialization, which are so
common in the practice of allopathy.
ON THE PROPHYLACTIC POWER OF BELLADONNA
IN SCARLET FEVER.
By Dr. Elb, of Dresden.
In the preface to Belladonna in the first volume of the Materia
Medica, Hahnemann expressly states, that a dose of this
remedy administered every six or seven days is a perfect
prophylactic for the common scarlet fever, scarlatina laevigata.
Let us examine whether this dictum is worthy of the implicit
faith which Hahnemann demands of us.
If we ask, how he came to this conclusion, we find from an
essay, published in 1801, “On the Prevention of Scarlet Fever,’’
that a lucky accident gave him the first idea, and, his sagacity
soon guessing the hidden truth, at the first opportunity he
tried Belladonna as a prophylactio, though he had never as yet
used that medicine as a curative.
Finding the first few trials successful, he at once laid it
down as a law, that Belladonna under any and every circum¬
stance was a prophylactic for scarlet fever; thus in his zeal for
the benefit of his fellow-creatures allowing his fancy to super¬
sede his great and acute powers of observation.
He who on other occasions, as for instance in the selection
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415
of remedies, specialized so minutely 1 , forgot that many things
must he considered before he could be justified in thus enun¬
ciating a law so general, and of such extensive bearing.
But in this it happened to him as on some later occasions,
when that which he found occurring in some cases, he decided
would do so with mathematical certainty in all'similar ones.
The most striking example of this is his psora theory, to
which every unprejudiced medical man will agree so far as
this, that many chronio affections have as their origin and
feeder sometimes suppressed skin diseases, sometimes an inherited
disposition to those diseases; and that further, such complaints
can only he cured by recalling or producing the eruption; but
no scientific practitioner will or can accept this theory to the
extent that Hahnemann did. So it seems to be with the
infallible prophylactic power of Belladonna in scarlet fever.
Hahnemann himself restricted this power to the scarlatina
of Sydenham, and in his essay prescribes a dofce every three
days, but where a greater danger of infection exists, as in
delicate and weakly children, or during violent epidemics, at
first one dose daily, and afterwards at longer intervals; the
dose being for a child two years old, two drops, and for every
year an additional drop. Two drops of the dilution Hahnemann
used, corresponding to about one drop of our seventh decimal '
dilution. And this practice he recommends to he followed
during the whole time of the epidemy, and for four or five
weeks afterwards.
But as scarlet fever epidemics sometimes last from six to
twelve months, jt does not seem advisable to continue the
administration of Belladonna for v so long a time, as very
unpleasant primary effects might he produced, not likely to he
beneficial to the children, who were thus sought to he protected
from scarlet fever.
So long a course of Belladonna could only be justified, if the
prophylactic power lasted for life, or a series of years, as is the
case with vaccination.
Apart from all this, it is always a difficult task to ascribe
prophylactic -powers to any remedy, and any statement of the
kind is but a hypothesis, let there be as many.corroborative
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41G On the "Prophylactic power of Belladonna.
facts as you trill, and can only be made with regard to a par¬
ticular epidemy, and not all future ones.
Hahnemann himself seems to have gone no further, his ex¬
periments having been confined to the epidemy then prevailing.
We demand of every remedy, to which we ascribe a prophy¬
lactic power for any disease, that it shall stand in a specified
relation to the complaint, and that it must he capable of curing
such complaint, when frilly developed.
According to the Materia Medica, Belladonna is said to
produce the scarlatina laevigata only, and therefore to he a
prophylactic for it; the latter being an assertion we can neither
confirm nor deny, as during eighteen years of homoeopathic
practice, we have never seen this species of scarlet fever in its
pure form, the fever, which appears in Dresden, being invariably
either scarlatina miliaris, or mixed with that of Sydenham,
against neither of which, according to Hahnemann, can Bella¬
donna be of any avail, he not having found it produce in
healthy persons the exanthem peculiar to them.
But as in both species the concomitant symptoms are alike,
and from our own experience we are quite convinced of the
power of Belladonna to produce in healthy persons a miliary
eruption, resembling that of scarlatina, of which everybody may
convince himself by applying Belladonna externally in sufficient
quantity, this remedy ought to be prophylactic and curative for
both species.
That it is curative in the miliary species, we have a thousand
cases to prove; but as it is no prophylactic for it, we may
conclude that its boasted prophylactic power in the common
scarlet fever might be found to fail.
Perfectly true is it, that many children, to whom Belladonna
is administered as a prophylactic during an epidemy, remain
free from scarlet fever; but whether this happens in conse¬
quence thereof, or from there not being any tendency to the
disease, must remain undecided as long as it is observed just as
frequently that no prophylaxis takes place; the children, not¬
withstanding the administration of Belladonna, becoming in¬
fected, and the disease itself not even being made milder.
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417
These apparently contradictory facts, which every practitioner
will frequently meet with, may easily be explained. .
When we consider the physiological effects of Belladonna,
as regards scarlet fever, we find beside the eruption a strong
erethic fever, with burning heat, full pulse, angina tonsillarum
et faucium, delirium and sopor; the two latter symptoms, how¬
ever, being caused by congestion to, or inflammation of the
the brain, and not constituting a separate primary affection of
the substance of the brain.
This kind of scarlet fever is cured by Belladonna * given
alternately with Aconite, if the fever is violent, and to
epidemics of this erethic character, which are comparatively
little dangerous, the prophylactic power of Belladonna seems to
be confined.
To this category doubtless belongs the epidemy in which
Hahnemann made his first successful trials, for although he
describes it as a virulent one, the only symptoms he adduces
are such as we observe in all cases not of the mildest cha¬
racter, while those symptoms which indicate virulence are
entirely wanting, even the pulse cannot have shown any pecu¬
liarity, or Hahnemann, with the accuracy with which he has
described all the other symptoms, would certainly not have
failed to mention it.
But in other epidemics, in which a predisposition to paraly¬
sis of the brain and lungs prevails, where the pulse is not hard
and full, but at first somewhat soft and undulating, not unlike
the “ pulsus dicrotus,” and becoming small at a later period,
Belladonna is injurious, because its pathogenetic effects are
diametrically opposed to the disease, and therefore impending
paralysis, resulting from direct weakness in the respective
* The concomitant symptoms only, but not the exanthem, which runs its
regular course; as measles, with or without Puls, or Aeon., will go through
its different stages; and in our opinion the natural course of an eruption
cannot be altered except by poisons.
[This is not very intelligible. We apprehend Aeon, and Puls, are poisons
if given in sufficient dose, and nothing else is a poison if not given in
sufficient dose. Does Dr. Elb mean that nothing short of a fatal dose will
modify an eruption ? But if any thing short of a fatal dose will alter the course
of an eruption, may it not he made use of in therapeutics?— Eds.]
VOL. XIII., NO. LIII.—JULY, 1855 . 2 E
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418 On the Prophylactic power of Belladonna,
organs, can never he averted by it, and in selecting a remedy
we cannot decide from the mere form of the exanthem, hut the
more essential characteristics of the disease should be con¬
sidered.
Now Belladonna cannot be a prophylactic for a disease
which it is not capable of curing, and in this case it certainly is
not the medicine indicated; those which best answer to the
symptoms being calc. carb. and zinc., which however are not
themselves prophylactics.
For the same reason Belladonna is not to be used either as a
prophylactic or curative in those forms of scarlet fever which
incline to the putrid or typhoid character, where muriat. acid.,
ammon. carb., carbo-veg., rhus. tow., arsen. and staphisagria,
would be more suitable.
The question now remains, would it he judicious in the less
dangerous epidemics, where Belladonna, according to its patho-
genesy, may be expected to be prophylactic, to administer it as
such to healthy children
The demand for such a prophylactic can arise only from too
great an anxiety; and its advisability seems very doubtful,
when we consider that it would he better for children to he
seized with scarlet fever during a mild epidemy, and thus be
protected for life, than that they should be carefully preserved
from it, only perhaps to be the victims of a future and more
dangerous epidemy, for which we have at present no prophy¬
lactic.
We recommend, therefore, that Belladonna should be used
as a prophylactic in the case of those children only, whose
debilitated state of health might not he able to support the
attack of even a mild scarlet fever.
These opinions rest not upon empty speculations, but are
founded upon great experience.
The “jurare in verba magistri ” loses its value, as soon as
science is concerned.
Our master, Hahnemann himself, exhorts us not blindfolded
to follow authority, but to examine for ourselves, and if we
have here ventured to question one of his dicta, homoeopathy
will not suffer, as the prophylactic power of Belladonna affects
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by Dr. Elb.
419
in no way the fundamental principle of the system; while our
objections and attempted explanations are all based upon the
principle of “ similia similibus.”*
HOMOEOPATHIC CLINICAL STUDIES,
By Drs. Wurmb and Caspar.
('Continuedfrom Vol. XII, page 394. ^
Intermittent Fever.
As to the remaining ten remedies, we have always obtained the
best and quickest results from those capable of producing a
similar disease in a healthy person; it was exclusively with
these that the worst and most obstinate forms of intermittents
were cured; on the other hand, the remedies were more uncer¬
tain in proportion to their want of agreement with the law of
similarity.
The following table will present us, at one view, the number
of cases of intermittent fever, the time required for their treat¬
ment, as well as the remedies employed.
After the employment of the following remedies, no paroxysm
appeared in 19 cases, for example—
After Nux
in
5 cases.
99
Arsen.
4 „
iy
Veratrum
99
4 „
99
Pulsatilla
99
3 „
99
Ipecac.
99
2 „
99
China
. 99
1 oase
paroxysm appeared in 16 cases—
After Nux
in
5 cases.
99
Arsen.
99
4 „
99
Pulsatilla
99
3 „
99
Ignatia
99
2 „
99
Ipecac.
99
1 case
99
Cina
*.99
1 „
* [We gladly give a place to the communication of so able and practical a
physician as Dr. Elb, but, of course, do not hold ourselves as at all committed
to the views expressed in this article, in any respect in which they differ from
those we have already maintained.— Eds.]
2 E 2
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420
Homoeopathic Clinical Studies.
Two paroxysms appeared in 14 cases—
After Nux
in
2 cases
„ Arsen.
»
4 „
„ Pulsatilla
99
5 „
„ Vera tram
99
1 case
„ China
99
1 „
„ Bryonia
99
1 „
Three paroxysms appeared in 13 cases—
After Nux
in
1 case
„ Arsen.
99
4 cases
„ Veratrum
99
3 „
„ Pulsatilla
99
2 „
„ Ipecac.
99
1 case
„ China
99
1 „
„ Ignatia
99
1 „
Four paroxysms appeared in 7
cases
—
After Nux
in
1 case
„ Arsen.
»
2 cases
„ Veratrum
99
1 case
„ Pulsatilla
99
3 cases
Five paroxysms appeared in 1
case—
After Arsen.
in
1 case
Six paroxysms appeared in 3 cases-
-
After Veratrum
in
1 case
„ Ipecac.
99
1 „
„ Ignatia
99
1 „
Eight paroxysms appeared in 1 case
—
After Arsen.
in
1 case
Nine paroxysms appeared in 1 case—
After Ipecac.
in
1 case
Ten paroxysms appeared in 2 cases-
—
After Natr. mur.
in
1 case
„ Pulsatilla
99
1 „
Total .... 77 cases
It is evident that in speaking of the quickness of the cure,
we must not pass over in silence the length of time the disease
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Interpriitent Feiwr.
431
had existed previous to oar aid being ■■■retpured; os well as the
relation subsisting between the duration ofthe disease and the
remedies. The following table wili give us some information
on these points.
mm
f.S, ’• l ZS. JC-, S' ^ : Z
»a''.
•sV..^
1 ••
5
• ^ * * * Jz. ^/*t.**c f \t _■
r
' , \ <». * w - ' v . • ; V§r§
W<
§S
mz
m
.
\-&:s v
Sx 1 -
rs 1 .
.§•
si
r
|
- * - . Y * ■ :f ; V
til
f#.
ml
r#j
-
S'
l
-w
Pf:
fH
fen
•,ir'
i *
■Z>
~ fir* •
22.
Interim ttenm oj
* i : ' - -*■’
gydvj
•W
■S:
■n
; 0
3
U d+lVS dQii
itiyU
were curv'd ....
1
....
•
o(> .1
i-o ur
•j - ' M»V
v«f,
h>Kv
■d:
T.
.2
i
i
i
i
1
S'' months
v-.- ’ ;•• *,
If
m
id:
»•■
<4 « «
i
2
n»»«
*♦»(
4 0i
: >;
% ; «* ■ • .
i
[■-3:!
i;
--
tv? •
....
KA;|
,.4.
....
*;-/ «jr.‘ •
#»
y
'* t ,
i
i.
51
• •*-»
....
18 i; „
M
[
[
'0Z-
,r
i>V« :
’MVij
Mibv
.«,► >'<■
I :
' :
' ‘ 7
. .
Total
j§$
iTirdUti
**»»*^-
mm
*h*>* ■tVwi>y»
■TU:
.i
From the above statement it is evident, that in the larger
number of eases, wo have bad to treat maladies of long strtBdmg,
this fiietj they were cured homcfeopaUiid'
•.ally in s shorter timei;
The remarks %e are about to make upon the htioU^yj the
ohafaGteri, course* and termination of intermitterits, as well as
upon the iadicutious flu* the choice of remedies, may indeed
contain nothing now, though they may, nevertheless, be'not.
unacceptable to many of our tefiders, beeauso there is nethmg
similar in lionimopathic literature.
Each morbid process may present a dihorent degree of ac¬
tivity, and hence becomes more ox lees amenable to treatment.
This is more eKpeouiiiy the ease in miermittents, which are
known to originate from Snoh. varied; Chases,', and arc greatly
influenced by so many attend ant circumstances.
■-,• ^ a >-i.iJ 'tr tisO j>^>0^- . ... ,J
want or ebriety, or. even .than married men. and foreigners.
Intermittent* originating from errors of diet, and mental
emotions, are more readily removed than those, resulting from
bad food or water, of from the .action of marsh miasmata.
Goggle
~y
422
Homoeopathic Clinical Studies.
The longer the individual has been subjected to the last-
named noxious influences, so much the longer will the cure be
delayed.
According to the duration of an intermittent, so will be the
degree of disturbance in the vegetative sphere, as well as the
length of time required for its removal.
The more allopathic remedies have been employed, especially
Quinine, so much the more obstinate will the intermittent
prove, because it has become associated with a new and arti¬
ficial morbid process, and is no longer a simple malady.
The general condition, which we will term intermittent fever
cachexia, or for shortness, simply cachexia, merits the first
consideration; it offers the surest indication in the choice of
the remedy. The violence and peculiarity of the paroxysm
demands the second consideration.
If, during the employment of a remedy, the cachectic state
should remain unchanged, while the paroxysm decreases in
force, the medicine should be continued for some time, then
another should be chosen, even if the former one should have
entirely subdued the paroxysm.
The diminution of the cachectic state is the most certain
sign that the most suitable remedy has been chosen, and its
use should not be discontinued, even if there should be a more
frequent recurrence of the paroxysms; the cure is certain if the
remedy is not changed.
The general improvement is first indicated by apyrexia; the
more certain this state becomes, the more the digestive powers,
the excretions, the powers both corporeal and mental, as well
as the colour of the skin, approach the normal condition, so
much the sooner may the termination of the malady be ex¬
pected.
The more marked the limits between the paroxysm and the
apyrexia, so much the better. Above all, the condition of the
pulse must he attended to; in proportion as the latter becomes
slower, during the state of apyrexia, so much the earlier will
the disease disappear.
We have never observed that the type of the intermittent has
had any influence on the duration of the disease. On this
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point no difference was observable, whether the paroxysms
recurred daily or every fourth day, whether at the same hour
or otherwise, whether during the day or night.
The severity of the paroxysm is a very deceptive sign. We
have seen cases of intermittent fever, with the most violent
paroxysms, terminate in a short time.
If the paroxysm regularly, in all its stages, and continually
decreases in force, in which case there is usually an equal
diminution of the cachectic state, a favourable and rapid termi¬
nation may reasonably be expected.
If, without any previous amendment, the attacks should sud¬
denly disappear, a relapse may be looked for, especially if any
indisposition, however slight, should remain.
It not infrequently occurs, in highly developed forms of the
cachectic state, that the paroxysms gradually become weaker,
and finally cease.
If the cachectic state does not change, or, on the other
hand, actually increases, then the ^cessation of the paroxysm
becomes an important and clear sign of existing torpor.
A good prognosis may be formed when the paroxysm occurs
at the commencement of the disease, and is uncomplicated with
violent gastric disorder.
No correct conclusions can be drawn from the duration of
individual attacks.
The agreement of the different stages of the disease with
each other, in reference to duration, admits of a more favour¬
able prognosis than the contrary.
The cold stage is the most important. The longer it lasts,
the greater its severity, the greater the. disturbance in the
capillary vessels—as evidenced by cyanosis—and oppression
of the pulse, so much the more unfavourable does the prognosis
become.
If the increased severity, and prolongation of the cold stage
is at the expense of the hot, and the latter becomes weaker and
shorter, it then becomes a bad indication of a torpid condition,
and a greater development of the cachectic state.
If the hot stage is in accordance with the other symptoms,
so that a sufficient reaction iit the organism may be expected, a
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shorter duration of the malady may he concluded. An immo¬
derate degree of fever may induce some unfavourable results,
hut in our experience it exerts no influence on the length of
the intermittent.
The sweating stage is only prejudicial by being too great,
and lasting too long, thereby lowering the vital powers.
Instances in which the intermittent is but imperfectly formed,
rarely appear at the commencement of the disease, but only at
the conclusion; one or other of the stages disappearing because
the disease is on the point of subsiding: at least, we have often
observed that the disease disappeared in this manner. Should,
however, any stage of the fever he wanting at the commence¬
ment of the disorder, it is frequently attributable to a state
of torpor, in which case a greater development of the cachectic
state must be dreaded.
The objective symptoms merit by far greater consideration
than the subjective. If the former exist in a moderate degree,
the latter, even when presenting some activity, need not he
heeded.
The condition of the spleen imparts the most certain in¬
formation as to the character, course, and duration of an inter¬
mittent, especially as to whether the disease is actually cured
or not. There is not a case of intermittent fever in which
there is not enlargement of the spleen. The organic changes
in this organ advance step by step with the constitutional dis¬
turbance ; they stand, in particular, in a necessary and imme¬
diate connection with those in the vegetative sphere, and offer,
as they can he so readily and certainly distinguished, the best
indication in forming a correct diagnosis and prognosis.
According to the increase or decrease of the spleen, during
the paroxysms, must a more or less unfavourable prognosis be
formed.
In recent cases of intermittent fever, a cure should only be
considered as effected, when the spleen has returned to its
normal condition. On the other hand, in intermittents of long
standing, in which there is very considerable enlargement of
the spleen, it often occurs, that on the employment of the
suitable remedy, the organ diminishes rapidly to a certain
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425
point, and then remains stationary, the paroxysms and other
symptoms having entirely subsided. In such instances the cure
should be considered as certain, although the then existent
enlargement of the spleen may continue many months, or for
the whole period of life, without causing the slightest consti¬
tutional disturbance.
We have seen an instance in which intermittent fever has
disappeared on the occurrence of prurigo, and in another case,
on the appearance of eczema.
Therapeutics .—Like the rest of our colleagues, we searched
for a remedy which covered the symptoms of the paroxysm, and
while we did not lose sight of those indicative of the primary
disorder, we at least placed them in the secondary rank. In
consequence of observations made in the course of 1850, we
became convinced that we had not adopted the right treatment
of intermittent fever, and have since followed a different mode.
The paroxysms may, by their violence, duration, and other
prominent symptoms, yield much information as to the grade
and peculiarity of the primary disorder; thus, for example,
great chilliness, or great coldness, cyanosis, &c., indicate de¬
pression of the vascular system; slight shivering, followed by a
lower degree of warmth, a torpid condition; and a higher and
continuous elevation of temperature denotes an excessive ex¬
citement; a rapid change from cold to heat, or the reverse,
suggests some injury to the nervous system; partial degrees of
cold or heat, lead to the presumption that only certain portions
of the vascular system are affected; immoderate thirst, without
a corresponding degree of heat, or the contrary, thirst during
the cold fit, indicate a disturbance of the nervous system;
imperfectly developed paroxysms, likewise, often show a sinking
of the vital powers. Similar conclusions should only be made
when the paroxysms remain continually alike, and their con¬
tinuance cannot be accounted for in any better way. This,
however, experience teaches us is not usually the case, on the
contrary, the reverse is of far more frequent occurrence.
The form of the paroxysm is, in the greater number of
instances, very changeable; it frequently happens, for example,
that the second paroxysm is very different to the first, that the
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Homoeopathic Clinical Studies.
third does not resemble the second, nor the fourth the third.
If the choice of the remedy must depend upon the peculiarity
of the paroxysm, then, in such a case of intermittent fever, after
each attack, not only a new remedy, but often, one of a very
different action would be required, while it is impossible that
the primary disorder should be able, so often and so rapidly, to
assume a different form. Hence, the paroxysm may form a
part, but not the whole of the disease, and similar symptoms
may be called into existence by very different pathological
states, therefore it cannot be taken as a certain guide in the
treatment of intermittent fever. Hahnemann was therefore
perfectly right in maintaining, that the condition of the patient
in the interval, must be the true guide in the choice of the
most suitable homoeopathic remedy.
In the 164 cases of intermittent fever under our care, we
employed 15 remedies, and in 77 cases a favorable result was
obtained. The unhappy selection of the remedies in the 77
remaining cases, was the result of the views we entertained at
that time, of the importance of the paroxysm.
In examining more closely the following remedies, Arsen.,
Nux, Yerat., Puls., Chin., Ipecac., and Ignat., we find that they
all have a direct action on the nervous system, and that the more
decided and extended that influence may be, the more beneficial
do they prove in the treatment of the most obstinate cases.
The preceding table shews that 44 cases of Intermittent
fever were cured with Arsen., Nux, and Veratrum, and only 13
with Ipecac., Chin., and Ignatia.
In continuing the comparison of the above 7 fever remedies,
there is a second point worthy of notice, in deciding upon their
greater or less utility. They all have a close connexion with
the vegetative sphere, and are more beneficial when they exert
a greater influence upon it. Our principal fever remedies,
Arsen., Nux, Veratrum, exert a powerful influence on the
vegetative powers, and in this point leave far behind the
remedies of the second degree, Ipec. and Ignatia. The import*
ance of this influence is most clearly shown in the instance of
Pulsatilla; for in the action of the latter on the nervous
system, it should be placed next to Ignatia, and yet with the
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427
exception of Arsenicum, it proved most efficacious, a result
which must be solely attributed to its close relation with the
vegetative sphere. These facts prove that a remedy should
embrace both the nervous and vegetative systems in its action.
By the employment of Arsen., Nux, and Veratr., we have
cured the most obstinate intermittents, of many months dura¬
tion. The less violent forms, of only a few months duration,
have yielded to Puls, and China, while Ignatia and Ipec. have
proved beneficial in the mildest and most recent cases.
. Lastly, we must now consider the fact, that all the above
remedies have a direct influence upon the vascular system.
As the latter is subject to the control of the sympathetic nerves,
therefore those remedies should be selected, which act especially
as the vasomotory portion, while on the contrary, those which
act only on the spinal nerves, must have less influence on the
vascular system, therefore must yield to the former in import¬
ance.
Hitherto we have carefully avoided every hypothesis ; this
however is no longer possible, the occasion is too alluring. We
believe that intermittent fever is a neurosis, especially seated in
the ganglionic system, for those remedies prove most curative
which act on the nervous system. This accordance with the
views of most medioal practitioners, is certainly not without
importance; for as each indication of a curative action is in
reality a step towards the knowledge of that condition which we
describe as disease, it follows that homoeopathy carried out in
accordance with the feelings and requirements of the present
age, may throw much light on the hitherto dark regions of
nosology; this accordance moreover shows how closely homoso-
pathy is connected with the physiological tendencies still
dominant in medicine.
Intermittents may be divided into two classes; to the first
belong those which originate in disturbances of the nervous
system, in which the vegetative system is very slightly if at all
affected. To the second and more important class belong those
forms of intermittents arising from marsh miasmata, from a
residence in damp, humid dwellings, and from partaking of
deleterious food, by which digestion is disordered, as well as
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428 Homoeopathic Clinical Studies.
the process of chylification, assimilation, and sanguification;
the secretions and excretions become affected, evidencing great
disturbance in the vegetative system. A perfect cachectic
state results from the complete depression of the nervous
powers. The depression of the vital forces affects the vascular
system, so that the blood becomes serous, giving rise, before
death, either to accumulations of water in the cellular tissue, or
the larger cavities of the body, or to a state of complete maras¬
mus. An unfailing symptom of the disease is enlargement
of the spleen, which frequently attains incredible dimensions.
The liver is hut rarely enlarged.
Hitherto we have been considering the symptoms common to
all intermittents of this class, but we will now proceed to ascer¬
tain their distinguishing marks, and we shall find that they may
be separated into the two following groups.
a. Intermittents of this group are mostly developed with
rapidity, and are from the first attended with gastric derange¬
ment; diminution of appetite; aversion to food; nausea;
retching and vomiting; derangement of the evacuations. The
peculiar colour of the skin, so characteristic, soon shows itself.
After the disease has existed a little time, then these symptoms
appear, indicative of disturbances in the primee vise; the appetite
is entirely lost, or becomes fanciful. Food is borne either not at
all, or in but small quantities. The tongue is white; pains arise
in the regions of the liver, stomach, or spleen. The fluid ejected
is green, bitter, and watery; the bowels are constipated; the
evacuations are hard and lumpy; the urine is scanty, of a high
colour, and thick, with the exception of that passed during the
hot stage, which is mostly clearer than normal. Emaciation
ensues; the skin becomes rough, dry, inelastic, hangs in folds,
and there is desquamation of the cuticle. Enormous enlarge¬
ments of the spleen and liver take place, followed by effusion
into the abdominal cavity. The strength diminishes with the
progress of the disease; the patient becomes indolent or peevish,
and irritable, or what is more frequently the case, dull and
apathetic.
h. Intermittents of the second group are mostly slow in their
development; sometimes a long period elapses before a well-
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429
defined paroxysm occurs. After the disease has existed some
time, symptoms peculiar to a serous state of the hlood become
fully developed; the skin becomes pale, sometimes assumes a
tint intermediate between yellow and grey; the veins become
visible through the skin; the mucous membranes lose their
redness, the pulse and heart’s action are feebler and softer. At
the commencement of the disorder the circulation is easily
excited; hence shivering, heat, and redness of the skin are
produced by the slightest causes. The abnormal sounds of the
heart and bloodvessels, so characteristic of anaemia, are almost
never absent, and sometimes obtain to an enormous extent.
The secretions are increased, and become more fluid; hence
there is great disposition to sweating and diarrhoea, with a
frequent discharge of seroud urine: the powers of nutrition
become sadly enfeebled. The mental powers quickly diminish
in force, and finally the originally irritable patient falls into a
condition of complete apathy.
In these cases we found the spleen only moderately enlarged,
the liver of a natural size; on the other hand, serous effusions
of a partial character, into the cellular tissue, were of very
frequent occurrence.
We must however acknowledge, in conclusion, that there were
cases in which the disease presented symptoms of both groups;
hut these were of rare occurrence, and were rather limited to
intermittents of the second group, with gastric complications.
Our arrangement of intermittents is not strictly scientific: we
have not intended it to he such, hut simply one applicable to
our observations. We have not made any remarks upon forms
of fever which have not passed under our notice, because it is
not our intention to write a monograph of this malady. In
accordance with this principle, we will only treat in the following
pages, of those fever remedies which we have verified to he such
viz:—Arsen., Nux, Verat., Puls., China., Ignat., Ipecac.
Arsenicum is one of those few remedies, remarkable not only
on account of their activity, but also for the extent of their
action. It comprehends the organism in its totality. All the
powers by which life is carried on, every department and every
organ of the body, and every branch of a nerve, &c., are so
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430 Homoeopathic Clinical Studies.
subject to its power, that it is difficult to decide whether its
symptoms are primary or secondary, and where the precise
centre of its action is placed. The symptoms of chronic poison¬
ing with Areenio exhibit a surprising similarity with those of
the cachectic condition, induced by an intermittent; it likewise
possesses in so high a degree the property of producing period¬
ical exacerbations, that it excels all other remedies; in a word,
none of those remedies with which we are yet acquainted , has,
with so great a power , so varied and so close a relation to the
organs especially affected in intermittent fever; and none
corresponds to all the requirements which we have considered
as indispensable for the utility of a fever remedy as arsenicum;
hence we hold it to be not only a remedy for very frequent
employment, but as the first antipyretic.*
Clinical experience is in entire harmony with the anticipa¬
tions formed from the physiological proving of Arsenioum.
The employment of this remedy is the more urgent, when the
symptoms of the disease indicate great weakness of the vital
powers.
Intermittents caused by marsh miasmata are of the worst
and most dangerous forms; in these cases Arsenicum is not only
a useful, hut very often, the only remedy capable of warding
off the danger which threatens life. We feel called upon to
recommend it absolutely, in those cases in which the vegetative
powers are deeply affected, and in which considerable cachexia
is existing, attended with great changes in the internal organs,
such as the liver and spleen. We cannot refrain from men¬
tioning the feet that this condition is very much promoted by
the abuse of Quinine, and that we have sometimes treated this
disease produced by art, with the best results with Arsenicum.
Intermittents for which Arsen, is the most appropriate
remedy, present the following peculiarities in their paroxysms:
* However it is still far from being the only one; for example, the ex¬
tremely torpid form of intermittent is not within its range. Arsenicum will
often cure, when other remedies selected with the greatest care have failed.
Notwithstanding, we cannot assume Arsenicum to be an absolute specific, for
in spite of its apparently great similarity, in rare instances it has no influence
upon the disease, which may soon be subdued by another remedy.
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the accessions are mostly violent and of long duration. The
stages may be either well marked, or as is often the case are
wanting in one particular. If one stage is absent, it is the cold
one, and the hot stage becomes proportionably hotter. The
more violent the disturbance of the vascular system, the more
violent the thirst, so much the more is Arsenicum indicated.
The sweating stage may be absent, or on the contrary excessive.
Many other annoying symptoms may seem referrible either to
the nervous or vascular systems, such as cramps, pains, de¬
lirium, paralysis, and the state of anxiety so characteristic of
Arsenic.
The intervals between the paroxysms are not devoid of
symptoms of a varied and troublesome nature, such as restless¬
ness ; want of sleep; cramps; indigestion; feeling of weakness
and general illness; the most characteristic symptom for the
use of our remedy is the increasing feebleness after each
paroxysm.
Nux vomica .—The sphere of action of this remedy is of
much less extent than of Arsenicum, for its principal action is
on the nervous system, as is clearly shewn in cases of poisoning,
and in the experiments which have been made with this drug;
the contradictory symptoms which arise in the Nux disease
are only secondary, and are the results of disturbed innervation.
Its peculiar and most important action is on the spinal nerves,
then upon the sympathetic, as shewn by its influence upon the
functions of the stomach, liver and intestinal canal. In inter-
mittents, in which the nervous system is principally affected,
Nux is the true homoeopathic remedy. No more suitable
medicine can be selected, when, besides the local symptoms,
viz., diminution of appetite, aversion to food, nausea, eructa¬
tions, vomiting, and the various gastric affections, there are
likewise indications of a material change in the organs of
assimilation, as shewn by great disturbance of the digestive
powers, of the evacuations as well of the secretion of the bile;
when the process of nutrition is visibly affected, as evidenced
by emaciation and a cachectic state, with dryness and a peculiar
yellowish grey colour of the skin.
Although the sympathetic system is secondarily affected in
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432 Homoeopathic Clinical Studies.
intermittent fever, it however does sometimes occur that the
reverse is the case, and that the original seat of the disorder is
in the ganglionic system, which is but secondarily affected by
Nux, that is to say, in those nerves which regulate the functions
of the stomach, liver, and intestinal canal.
The special indications for the employment of Nux are as
follows: Paroxysms of moderate violence correspond more
clearly with Nux; still, when the general symptoms indicate the
employment of the latter, we should not be deterred from its
use by the feebleness or violence of the febrile stage. Neither
will the fact of the paroxysm being attended by symptoms of
nervous disorder, or occurring at any period of the day, exer¬
cise any influence in the selection of the remedy. Neither do
we consider it of any importance whether the type be quotidian,
tertian, or quartan.
The stages of the disorder caused by the use of Nux vomica,
are generally fully and clearly defined, and often maintain a
certain degree of regularity with each other. This, however,
is not universally the case; for very frequently, one stage may
be more developed than another, or one may be absent, or the
stages may run one into another. Hence in intermittents,
which in respect to duration and relation of their stages, differ
very much from each other, Nux may prove the best homoeo¬
pathic remedy.
The intervals between the paroxysms may either be free, or
may be attended with gastric disorder. In severer forms of
the disease the non-febrile condition is never free from these
symptoms, indicative of alterations in the process of nutrition.
The greater number of patients in which Nux proved useful
were of mature age, and of the male sex. This circumstance
does not seem to us be without importance, as it accords with
the general opinion that Nux is more beneficial in disorders of
the male sex.
Veratrum .—We have already expressed our views on Vera-
trum, when speaking of the indications for its use in typhus,
and then had occasion to remark that its employment was in¬
deed rarely necessary, although more reliance might be placed
upon it than any other remedy, owing to its character being so
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433
distinctly defined. The same is true of its selection and action
in intermittent.
The form of intermittent to which it corresponds is indeed of
very rare occurrence amongst us; when it does occur it is
easily recognised, and readily yields to Veratrum.
Veratrum is of service from its immediate relation to the
entire nervous systemj as a valuable antipyretic; its great im¬
portance is attributable to its powerful influence upon the
ganglionic system, especially upon its motor portion, for all
motor nerves in the circle of the vegetative spheres are subor¬
dinate to Veratrum, and mostly those which regulate the
movement of the alimentary canal and vascular system, hence
it answers to all the requirements of a fever remedy of the first
rank.
Physiological experiments prove that the action of Veratrum
on the nervous system is to weaken and oppress the vital mani¬
festations; hence it gives rise to sinking of the vital powers,
the greatest debility, syncope and paralysis. We are unable
to impart any certain information as to how it acts, but will
only hint that many of its peculiar symptoms, for example,
the pains similar to those induced by electricity, suggest that
Veratrum causes a sudden derangement in the nervous system,
and that each shock produces at first reflex actions, and sub¬
sequently, the contrary, a state of exhaustion in the nervous
portions affected.
The vascular system shews, at first, symptoms of excitement
which soon gives place to sinking of the circulation. The pul¬
sations of the heart and pulse become slower, feebler, softer,
and often imperceptible. The blood no longer freely circulates
in the capillary vessels. If the blood is arrested in the capillary
vessels cyanosis ensues, and the skin finally assumes the paleness
of death. It is scarcely necessary to observe, that the tempera¬
ture, which is so closely dependent on the circulation, must
sink below the normal standard. The organic powers sink so
low, that during life, mechanical and chemical affinities are
formed, so that the watery constituents of the blood, as it were,
exude from the surfaces of the stomach, intestinal canal, and
skin, without any effort of the secreting organs, so that abun-
VOL. XIII, NO. LIII.—JULY, 1855. * 2 F
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Homoeopathic Clinical Studies.
dant watery discharges from the stomach and bowels, as well as
a profuse cold sweat, ensue.
Such is the description of the disease caused by Yeratrum,
in its worst form. We have only seen exactly similar cases
of intermittent fever during the cholera. Intermittents more or
less approaching the above description, have been frequently
met by us at other periods, as well as doubtless by every prac-
titioner of much experience.
The following symptoms render the selection of Yeratrum
absolutely necessary. Great debility and feeling of general
illness; great sinking of the powers; slowness of the pulse and
of the heart’s action, not only during the apyrexia, but likewise
in the paroxysm. If these additional symptoms should appear,
it then becomes almost impossible to select another remedy;
such as cramp in the extremities, but more especially in the
stomach and intestinal canal; numbness of the extremities;
feeling of paralysis; fainting; watery diarrhoea, or obstinate
constipation; rapid sinking, and collapse.
The paroxysms offer very few peculiarities affecting the
selection of the remedy, which have not already been men¬
tioned, we will only make the following remarks.
The cold stage is of less or greater duration, and compara¬
tively speaking it is the prominent symptom, as it often en¬
croaches on the hot stage, and is even prolonged into the non-
febrile interval. The change of temperature is very perceptible
in the extremities. The hot stage is frequently absent, and
when present never attains a high degree. There is usually
only a subjective sensation of heat, while the temperature is
scarcely elevated, sometimes, nay often, diminished.
The pulse rarely rises at this period; it may indeed be
quicker, but not fuller, and more powerful.
The thirst is of no importance, as it is dependent more upon
the frequency of the evacuations than upon the amount of
fever.
The sweating stage precedes the attaok, and is of long duration,
lasting even to the next paroxysm; it is either very abundant,
or is replaced by a cold, clammy humidity of the skin.
The complications peculiar to the Yeratrum fever almost
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435
always occur during the cold stage. The patient feels very
exhausted after the attaek, and recovers but imperfectly during
the interval.
In one case, we remarked during the period of the usual
recurrence of the fever, only an increased coldness, with slight
cyanosis of the extremities, and during the whole interval of
apyrexia, a cold sweat, very abundant during the night, and
which rendered the patient very feeble.
This kind of intermittent fever either shews itself at first,
or is developed in the course of other forms, especially after
the abuse of China.
Hence it appears that Veratrum is the most suitable remedy
in the worst forms of intermittent fever, and in many respects
rivals Arsenicum, and should be preferred to the latter, when¬
ever a paralysed condition of the vital powers exists.
LAST DESPERATE EFFORTS OF THE ENEMY.
After a long period of suspension of hostilities, the allopathic
school has once more taken up arms against homoeopathy.
Our enemies, after lying perdu all the winter, have apparently
been warmed once more into life and activity by the rays of the
vernal sun, and for the last few months they have been busily
engaged in launching at our devoted heads all the destructive
missiles they could lay hands on ;—at one time plying the
heavy artillery of “ slashing articles;” at another, aiming at us
the envenomed shafts of calumny—now making a furious but
ineffectual assault on our well entrenched position, with long
phalanxes of irrelevant calculations; and now leading despe¬
rately the forlorn hope of an unjustifiable coroner’s inquest.
They have scarcely allowed a week to pass without directing
some new attack against us, or displaying some novel manoeuvre
designed to annihilate us, and drive us pell-mell into the
sea. They feel that we are gradually gaining ground upon
them, sapping the credit of their most cherished dogmas, and
undermining their pretensions to be the only legitimate and
orthodox practitioners. They watch with alarm the progress
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Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
we are making on their own terrain, and they see plainly that if
we are not repulsed, and that speedily, it will soon he all over
with their vaunted fortress of traditional medicine. Accordingly,
under the able guidance of their favourite general of the Lancet ,
they have been lately busily employed burrowing counter-mines
of argument, making sorties of hard words, firing canister and
grape of abuse, and discharging all their great guns of rhetorio,
invective, and calumny with reckless profusion; but as yet with¬
out proportional damage to their opponents. The redoubled fury
of the adversary’s fire poured in upon us from all sides, and from
every possible weapon, though unattended by danger, is not
destitute of annoyance, and we find ourselves constrained to
resort to more active measures, if only to shew our opponents
that our batteries of argument are well placed, and ready for use;
our means of defence sure, and our plans for effectual offensive
measures unbroken. Our enemies boast loudly of being one
united holy legitimate empire, and taunt us with an unholy
alliance with heretical hydropaths and mesmeric and kinesipathio
Bashi-bazouks. We may, however, retort that their unity is ap¬
parent only, not real, for that their boasted banner of legitimacy
is the rallying point for the partisans of a thousand different
medical creeds, only temporarily joined to oppose the victorious
advance of medical reform and progress, but among whom
dissensions prevail, and animosities are rife, which their common
hostility to ourselves is unable to keep in check.*
But to drop our war metaphor, it is painful to see the inea-
sures resorted to by our opponents to stop the progress of our
therapeutic doctrines. We have no objection at all to the use
* In proof of this we may refer to almost every number of the allopathic
journals. Take, instar omnium, the number of the Medical Circular that has
just come out while we are writing (that of Jane 13th.) In addition to the
usual abuse of homoeopathy, it addresses the following elegant language to
two of its allopathic contemporaries:—“ Let these jaundiced scribblers write
on; they can scarcely make themselves more contemptible than they have
already become. Let them crawl ignominiously at our heels, and spit out
their malice as their humour lists: it would cost us no effort to strangle each
with the other’s coils, if we deemed our time so valueless as to justify our
wasting it upon such a pair of miserable impotentsand so on, through a
whole column. If such is the way our adversaries speak of each other, we
can hardly expect them to he more courteous to the common foe.
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Athenaeum Logic .
437
of the acoustomed licence of gentlemanly controversy. We can
stand with perfect equanimity any amount of dry, logical
argument, good-humoured banter, or merited satire;—but what
shall we think of the force of our adversaries’ reasons when
these are backed by haling us before the tribunal of the law on
frivolous and vexatious charges ? What must we think of the
soundness of their doctrines, when they try to suppress all
opposition to it by personal calumnies and injurious in¬
sinuations against their opponents ? It is true we have long
been used to this sort of thing, and history teaches us that all
truths meet with a similar reception from interested and pre¬
judiced opponents. We fondly hoped, however, that our truth
had outlived that period of its existence; that such methods of
opposing it had all been exhausted. We trusted that the period
of tranquillity we had recently enjoyed was the forerunner, if
not of a general recogqition of our doctrines—at least, of a
more dignified and scientific opposition to them. So far, how
ever, is this from being the case, that at no period that we
remember of the existence of homoeppathy in this oountry, have
the means resorted to to crush us been so unworthy of a
so-called liberal profession; and we may add, so unsuited to
the end proposed, so apt to recoil upon the lieads of those who
employ them.
The truth of these remarks will, we believe, presently appear,
when we trace the chief incidents that have marked the anti-
homoeopathic campaign of 1855. We need not take the facts
in their historical order, but shall refer to them just as they
occur to us.
The following brief review from the Athenaeum, which is well
known to have an allopathic critic for the medical works,
mildly preludes the more vigorous operations of our opponents,
and is an admirable specimen of allopathic logic:
“ Tract8 on Homoeopathy. By W. Sharp, M.D., F.R.S.
(Aylott & Co.)—The foundation of all inductive science is the
law that effects are increased with the increase of their causes,
decreased by the decrease of their causes, and changed with the
change of their causes. Unless causes and effects answer to
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438 Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
these laws, they are not regarded as such by sane people. In
the face of these fundamental truths. Homoeopathy says effects
are increased by the decrease of their causes, and decreased by
the increase of their causes,—and, therefore, asserts a folly
which it is not worth the while of a man in his senses to look
into. Moreover, we may add, that the man who is inclined to
investigate this folly already betrays unsoundness of mind, and
we would warn him against experimentation on the subject,
which will be almost sure to end in his adopting the delusion.
We feel ashamed to see so intelligent a man as Dr. Sharp the
victim of so weak a delusion as the evidence of cure in
homoeopathy. Does he not see that an equally imposing array
of figures and facts could be brought forward in favour of
charms and amulets, the king's touch, the magnets of Mesmer,
and the pills of Morison and Holloway ? No amount of fine
writing can explain away this fact, nor get him out of the
unscientific position in which he has placed himself.”
We should probably be considered impertinent by the mys¬
terious magnifico who penned the above article, did wo venture
humbly to suggest that a high and mighty reviewer ought to
condescend to investigate (if only slightly) the subject he
undertakes to review. This idea, however, is treated with
contempt by out supercilious critic, who knows intuitively all
about homoeopathy, without deigning to investigate it: the in¬
clination even to do which, would, he asserts, betray unsoundness
of mind. He knows (by intuition) that '‘homoeopathy says effects
are increased by the decrease of their causes,” and vice versa ,
which is about as true as if one were to say “ that astronomy
says the moon is made of green cheese." Homoeopathy being
thus, according to him, such a preposterous folly, it is somewhat
remarkable to find him warning his readers against experi¬
mentation on the subject, as that he asserts will be almost sure
to end in their adopting the delusion. What should we think
of a teacher who should thus address his disciples ? * The
doctrines of my rival are sheer and transparent nonsense; but
don’t be persuaded to go and hear him, for if you do, you are
almost sure to be converted to his way of thinking.’ Should we
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Piper versus Galloway.
439
not be very apt to suppose that the teacher's estimate of Ms
rival’s doctrines was not a very correct one—and moreover, that
he was conscious of its incorrectness ? The last sentence in
this wonderful critique is the most curious of all; therein the
writer seems to insinuate that it is a telling argument against
homoeopathy, that it has “ an imposing array of figures and facts
in its favour.” We suppose the writer deems it a reoommenda^
tion of allopathy that the figures and facts are against it. He
reminds us of the story told of a certain speculative individual
who said, “ if the facts are opposed to my theory, so much the
worse for the facts.”
The next episode we shall notice in the recent revival of anti->
homoeopathic zeal, is that exhibited by two late coroner’s
inquests, got up by allopathic practitioners, with the praise'
worthy object of damaging the fair name of two of their
colleagues who differed from them in their therapeutic creed.
The first of these inquests is that held in February last at
Darlington, of which a full and literal report was given in our
last number. The disease that proved fatal in this case was, it
will be remembered, cancrum oris, a malady of the most mortal
description, and one which no one who has seen much' of
medical practice could for one moment confound with the
poisonous effects of an overdose of mercury ; and yet, because
the death occurred in the practice of a homoeopathic physician,
Dr, Galloway, an allopathic opponent was found so malicious or
so ignorant as to get up an inquest, in order to prejudice the
medical attendant in the eyes of the public; for notwithstanding
Mr. Piper's disavowal that he did not “ get up ” the inquest—
a disavowal that, in the absence of any assertion that he did so,
is extremely suspicious—for, as the French have it, “qui s’excuse,
s' accuse ,"—we have his acknowledgment that he certified
that “ the child died of salivation.” In other words, Mr. Piper
certified that the child was salivated to death by the homoeopathic
practitioner; and all he said at the inquest was intended to
prove this. He signally failed to convince the jury that
Dr. Galloway was in any way to blame for the fatal result.
It was shewn on the inquest that the disease that killed the
child was one of a very fatal character; that Dr. Galloway had
not given a particle of mercury before it broke out; and that
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440
Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
when he did administer that medicine, which was quite homoeo¬
pathic to the case, he gave it in the mild form of the mercurius
solubilis, and in doses of a billionth of a grain. As regards
the pretended analysis of the globules by Mr. Piper and his
friend, we put just the same amount of faith in its accuracy as
did the jury. As a set off against it, we have Dr. Galloway’s
declaration on oath, and the corroboration of an experienced
analyst. When so much malm animus and persecuting
rancour was displayed by Mr. Piper, we are at no loss to
estimate the precise value of his hole-and-corner examination
of Dr. Galloway’s globules. There was on his part a strong
desire to crush Dr. Galloway, and a foregone conclusion that
the child’s disease was an effect of corrosive sublimate, so we
can easily believe that his chemical analysis of globules of the
6th dilution of mere. sol. would yield to him exactly the result
he required, in order to establish Dr. Galloway’s dishonesty, and
convict him of killing his patient. The jury being uninfluenced
by Mr. Piper’s prejudices and motives, very properly awarded
more credence to Dr. Galloway and the weighty allopathio
authorities he adduced in support of the truthfulness of his
statements, than to Mr. Piper, whose enmity to the homoeopathic
practitioner he did not take the slightest pains to conceal.
The Lancet, in its comments on this inquest—of which,
however, it does not give the whole report, but merely two short
extracts—takes for granted that the case was as Mr. Piper
ignorantly supposed and alleged, .one of mercurial salivation,
and not cancrum oris. It accepts as proved the insinuation
that Dr. Galloway gave an overdose of corrosive sublimate
while professing to give infinitesimal quantities of medicine.
Having thus “ cooked the accounts,” and “ made things pleasant ”
to suit its own purposes, it winds up by saying, “ any comment
on this case is unnecessary.” Had the facts been as the Lancet
puts them, we think some comment had been very neoessary,
but as the facts are precisely the other way, we agree with the
Lancet in thinking that it adopted the wiser course in refraining
from commenting. The best comment on the Lancet's remarks
is the full report of the inquest, which we gave so lately, and
which we felt required no comment of ours in order to produce
the conviction in the minds of our readers that the whole affair
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Inquest at Kimberworth.
441
was a disgraceful and malicious attempt to blast the reputation
of a respectable practitioner,' merely because he practised
differently from bis persecutors.
The other inquest to which we refer was of a totally different
character as regards the cause of death, but the motives that led
to the holding of an inquest at all, were precisely similar to
those that prevailed in the above case; to wit—a desire to.
crush the reputation of a most successful and talented homoeo¬
pathic practitioner. From the account we subjoin, derived from
a local paper, it does not appear on the face of it that the
inquest was “ got up ” by the rival practitioners; but it will be
observed that it was held at the instance of a magistrate; and
from a private source we learn that this magistrate is himself an
allopathic surgeon. There is not a shadow of a doubt that no
inquest would have been thought of, had the medical attendant
not been a homceopathist.
“ On Wednesday T. Badger, Esq., coroner, held an inquest
at the Manor House, Kimberworth, the residence of Mr. John
Warris, farmer, on view of the body of Mrs. Jane Warris,
Mrs. Warris was forty-two years of age, and died on Saturday
evening, after her tenth accouchement. Mr. E. Smith, of
Sheffield, surgeon, was called to attend the deceased during
her last confinement, and on arriving at the Manor House
about one o’clock on tbe morning of Friday week, found that
she had already been in labour more or less for some hours.
At seven o’clock he prepared thirty grains of Ergot of Rye, of
which she took about two-thirds in two doses. The labour
not progressing satisfactorily, Mr. Darwin, of Masbro’, surgeon,
was desired to attend and bring his instruments with him. He
arrived a little after nine o’clock, and after ascertaining the
state of the patient, remarked that they should have another
‘ Spilling’s case, of Ecclesfield.’ Soon after his arrival,
Mr. Darwin suggested the administration of a dose of Opium,
and l£ grain was administered. Hopes were at first enter¬
tained of a satisfactory result, which, however, were not
realized. Dr. Shearman, of Rotherham, was called in between
eight and nine o’clock on Saturday morning, and expressed a
fear that rupture of the uterus had taken place, and remarked
to Mr. Smith (who practises homoeopathy), that if he had
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442 Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
* kept to bis globules this would not bave happened/ The
medical men consulted, and coming to the conclusion that the
state of the patient did not admit of any further steps being
taken at that time, it was arranged that Dr. Shearman should
go away for two hours, and if it became apparent that rupture
had taken place, the delivery should be proceeded with on his
return. The doctor left towards eleven o’clock, and on his
return between three and four in the afternoon, it was clear
that his opinion was but too well grounded. It being obvious
that the oase must terminate fatally, the medical men, after
another consultation, determined to proceed with the delivery
if the patient consented, inasmuch as that course would relieve
her of the agony which would have attended death in case the
delivery had not been effected. The patient was-informed of
her situation, and, on her consenting, the delivery was with
some difficulty effected. The patient began to sink immediately
afterwards, and died at half-past nine o’clock the same evening.
■ It appeared that Mr. Darwin had expressed an opinion, which
he repeated before the jury, that the Ergot of Rye had been
administered at an improper period. A rumour spread that
death had resulted from maltreatment, and a magistrate ad¬
dressed a letter to the coroner, calling upon him to investigate
the case. Hence the inquest. The enquiry was attended by
the following medical men:—Dr. Shearman, Dr. Clay, an
eminent accoucheur, of Manchester; Mr. Chesman, of Sheffield
(who had been instructed by the coroner to make a post mortem
examination of the body), Mr. E. Smith, and Mr. Darwin.
Mr. Darwin was the first witness examined, and (not having
had the advantage of knowing the facts disclosed by the post
mortem examination, which was only in course of being made
at the time), stated that the Ergot of Rye had been adminis¬
tered at too early a stage, and that rupture could not have taken
place before the Ergot of Rye had been administered, unless
there had been unnecessary manual aid applied.By the
time that Mr. John Warns, husband of the deceased, and
Mrs. Fletcher, her sister, had been examined on some general
matters, the post mortem examination had been completed, and
the evidence of Mr. Chesman was taken. In detailing the
appearances Mr. Chesman said there was a sort of malformation
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Shearman against all England.
443
of the pelvis, which exhibited a small cutting inlet. He
attributed death to the rupture of the uterus, and was of opinion
that the Ergot of Rye was not the immediate cause of the
rupture, but that the mechanical pressure of the child, which
was a large, full-grown one, against the inlet of the pelvis was
the cause; the ruptured part being soft and easily tearable.
. . . In reply to the coroner, Mr. Chesman said the adminis¬
tration of the Ergot of Rye, after the rupture had been ascer¬
tained, would have been highly improper, but was, in his
opinion, highly proper if administered before any symptoms of
rupture were present.Mr. E. Smith tendered evidence,
and after detailing the ciroumstances of the case, said he had
often administered Ergot of Rye in apparently the same circum¬
stances, with the happiest effect, and that there was not the
least symptom of rupture when it was administered in this
case, nor for five or six hours after. The Ergot of Rye had
nothing whatever to do with the rupture, which the natural
efforts producing pressure on the pointed part mentioned, were
sufficient to cause.Mr. Darwin now stated, in reply to
the coroner, that after what had been disclosed by the post
mortem examination, he was of opinion that the rupture might
have occurred if the Ergot of Rye had not been administered.
.... Dr. Shearman said there could be no suspicion of rupture
until after the Ergot of Rye had been administered. He was
of opinion that the natural pressure would not have caused the
rupture, and that the Ergot of Rye had caused it. Had the
patient been let alone, he thought she would have got over the
accouchement; but Mr. Smith was not to blame, for no doubt
he gave it with the best intention.Dr. Clay said the
stimulating stage of the Ergot of Rye was not of sufficiently
long duration to account for death in Mrs. Warris’s case ; the
smallness of the dose, and the length of time it was adminis¬
tered previous to the rupture (at the least five hours) sufficiently
exonerated the Ergot of Rye as the cause of death. He differed
with Dr. Shearman as to the probability of the ease having
resulted favourably Under different treatment, and said the
plain cause of death in this Case had been long previous illness,
general softening of the vaginal and uterine structures, increased
by inflammatory aotion probably some weeks previous to labour
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444 Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
—these combined acting against the sharp inlet of the pelvis
were sufficient to cause death without any other circumstance.
.... In a conversation which ensued, Dr. Shearman admitted
that it was merely a matter of opinion that the Ejrgot had
caused the rupture; for it was impossible to prove that it had;
and that in the only two published cases in which rupture was
attributed to the action of Ergot of Bye, it was only a matter
of supposition.Mr. Smith enquired of Mr. Darwin
whether the Opium, which, when administered in small doses,
was rather a stimulant than a sedative, was not as likely to
have caused the rupture as the Ergot of Bye ? and Mr. Darwin
replied certainly not, and that he did not consider l£ grain a
small dose. Dr. Clay, however, said, a dose of that amount
would have a stimulating effect in such a case as this, and there
the matter dropped.The coroner remarked, during the
expression of differences of opinion by the medioal men, that
although Mr. Smith practised homoeopathy, this was not a case
in which an issue could be raised between the two systems,
inasmuch as neither system oame into question.The
jury returned an unanimous verdict that death had resulted
from natural causes.”
We have received from Mr Smith some details which go to
explain some of the circumstances connected with this case,
better than they can be gathered from the above condensed report.
Labour commenced at 3 a.m. ; Mr. Smith saw the deceased first
at 1 p.m., and at that time it was thought by the attendants
that the delivery would be- completed in a very short time. On
examination the os was the size of a crown. The pains returned
every few minutes, but from the commencement to the end
they were confined to the upper part. The head presented.
About 5 p.m. the os was much larger, very flaccid , and easily
turned over the head with the fingers. About six the waters
broke naturally, and as the pains beoame weaker and were then
not expulsive, Mr. Smith administered the Ergot as above
stated, with the intention of altering the direction. As, how-
ever, the child did not advance, and it was getting late,
Mr. Smith conceived that the long forceps might be useful, so
he sent the patient’s husband to beg the loan of Mr. Darwin’s
forceps, and in case Mr. Darwin should refuse to lend them, to
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Homoeopathic Dishonesty.
445
bring bim also. When Mr. Darwin came at 10 p.m. he gave
the Opium. Mr. Smith never examined the case after half¬
past twelve at night, when he retired to rest, supposing that
the patient was now under the sedative influence of the Opium.
By Mr. Darwin’s account the head receded at 1 a.m. In the
morning the attendants being alarmed at the non-return of the
pains. Dr. Shearman was sent for, to whose care the patient
was then confided. The opponents of Mr. Smith endeavoured
to make out that the rupture of the womb was caused by the
administration of the Ergot of Bye before the os uteri was
properly dilated. In this however they entirely failed, and
Mr. Darwin, who was the first to make this assertion, after¬
wards retracted, inasmuch as he acknowledged that the rupture
might have occurred though no Ergot had been given. Dr.
Shearman, who stuck to the opinion that the Ergot had been
improperly given, was confuted by the eminent accoucheur
Dr. Clay, of Manchester, whose opiniQn we must take to be
decisive on this point, even without taking into consideration
the corroborative testimony of Mr. Chesman. Dr. Shearman
seems to have been very unwilling to admit that any obstruc¬
tion at the outlet of the pelvis was to blame for the accident,
and accordingly a few days after the inquest he wrote to the
local paper, asserting that he had “no difficulty at all in
delivering this time, or in any of her nine previous labours.”
In answer to this Mr. Warns stated that his own recollection
of his wife’s confinements was, that several of them were not
only difficult but attended with danger, and that she was only
attended in six of them by Dr. Shearman. The Doctor retorts
by calling Mr. Warris very ungrateful, and stating that he
attended Mrs. Warris in “ three of the most dangerous and
difficult confinements which any woma^ could go through,”
which certainly seems a statement slightly at variance with
what he had previously written.
This inquest, which terminated so unsuccessfully for its allo¬
pathic promoters, affords to the Lancet and Medical Times a
fine opportunity for exposing what they are pleased to term
the “ dishonesty ” of homoeopaths. With respect to the pro¬
priety of the administration of Ergot iu the case, these two
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446 Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
journals are at variance; for while the Lancet asserts that the
Ergot was improperly given, the Medical Times allows that
the case was not unsuitable for its administration. Both, how¬
ever, agree that the giving of Ergot by a homoeopath in order
to produce contraction of the uterus, is a proof of the dis-
honesty of the practitioner. As these two learned pundits
cannot agree as to the necessity for Ergot in the case, we shall
not touch upon this point, hut leave them to fight out the
question by themselves. As regards the other question, how¬
ever, on which they for once show such extraordinary unani¬
mity, namely, the alleged dishonesty of a homoeopath adminis¬
tering Ergot at all, we have a few words to say. We shall not
stop to enquire if there is any better method of inducing con¬
traction of the torpid uterus than by means of the physiological
action of Ergot of Rye. We shall only shew that the homoeo¬
pathic principle, in its application to the cure of disease, is not
at all affected by the means resorted to by Mr. Smith in the
case under consideration. Bomoeopat^ists do not profess to
apply their system except for the cure of diseases. No medical
authority alleges that the act of parturition is a disease, conse¬
quently the various means adopted for hastening that act through
its different stages hear no resemblance to the therapeutic
methods for the cure of disease. When from the narrowness
of the pelvic outlet, or the weakness of the expulsive efforts of
the womb, unaided nature is unable to effect the expulsion of
the foetus, it is necessary to employ mechanical means to assist
the delivery, or to stimulate the womb to more forcible con¬
traction. No accoucheur pretends that he has cured a disease
when he has succeeded, by means of stimuli directed to the
womb, in exciting its more energetic action. It matters not
whether these stimuli consist of cold applied to the abdomen,
of general stimulants given to the patient, such as brandy or
opium, or of substances that have a more special power of
acting directly on the uterine muscles. The judgment of the
accoucheur must determine which is the best method to adopt
in any case that comes before him. His judgment may he at
fault in the selection of his stimulant, but neither homoeopathy
nor allopathy has anything to do with the matter. It is per-
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Difficulties of the M. T. Gazette.
447
fbctly fair and legitimate to canvass the propriety of the accou¬
cheur’s selection of the stimulant for a particular case, hut to
assert that an accoucheur who is in the habit of treating dis¬
eases homoeopathically is dishonest because he employs a stimu¬
lant of this sort, is as palpably absurd as it would be to accuse
a homoeopathic surgeon of departing from his principles if he
employed an anaesthetic to deaden the pain of a surgical opera¬
tion. For the removal of a temporary or mechanical difficulty
the homoeopath betrays no inconsistency (not to speak of dis¬
honesty) if he employs any means calculated to effect his
purpose. Had Mr. Smith been aware of the softened condition
of the uterus, which was only ascertainable and only ascertained
after death, he would undoubtedly have resorted to other means
than stimulating that organ, in order to effect delivery, such as
the early employment of the forceps; hut in that case also
there would have been just as muoh, or just as little question
of allopathy or homoeopathy as in the giving of Ergot to cause
contraction of the uterus. The attempt to prove that the Ergot
had anything to do with the catastrophe of the rupture, failed
most signally, and was scouted by all the allopathic witnesses,
with the exception of Hr. Shearman, who seems to have been
actuated solely by a desire to convict Mr. Smith of bad prac¬
tice. Had the case ocourred in the practice of an allopath we
may be sure we should not have heard a word about improper
treatment from those high-minded and public-spirited allopaths
who conspired' to hunt down Mr. Smith; and those virtuous
organs of orthodoxy, the Lancet and Medical Times, would
have been loud in their protestations as to the propriety of the
treatment pursued.
The next episode we shall notice in the history of the late
anti-homoBOpathic crusade is the attempt of the Medical Times
and Gazette to put down hommopathy by exposing its baseless¬
ness and illogical character, as it is pleased to express itself.
This hebdomadal journal has announced its intention to publish
a series of articles on the “ Difficulties of Homoeopathy.” While
we write only one of these promised articles has appeared. If
we regard this as a sample of what is to follow, we shall he
prepared to estimate beforehand the amount of fairness and im-
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Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
partiality with which the writer intends to examine our doctrines.
He alleges that he is “ intimately acquainted with the writings
of Hahnemann.” This statement we can hardly believe, for he
gives a completely false view of Hahnemann’s early career and
writings. He asserts that from the first Hahnemann was unduly
attached to the theory and literature of medicine, an assertion
he could not have hazarded had he merely seen a table of the
contents of his collected Lesser Writings. He would there
have seen that Hahnemann’s earlier writings were almost all of
a purely practical character; and had he glanced at the “ modest
essay,” as he terms it, in which Hahnemann gave the first
hints respecting a new therapeutic law, he would have found
that whatever is theoretical there, is the logical and irresistible
* deduction from the overwhelming array of facts he adduces.
That the writer’s “ intimate acquaintance” with Hahnemann’s
writings may perhaps consist in having skimmed over the first
English edition of the Organon , we may perhaps admit, though
even this is doubtful, as he does not quote its title correctly.
Further than this, however, his homoeopathio knowledge does
not go; and many of his readers, whom he proposes to indoctri¬
nate in the difficulties of homoeopathy, know a vast deal more
about the matter than he does. That he is utterly ignorant of
the writings of Hahnemann’s disciples even in this country, not
to mention those of Germany, is apparent from this, that the
parts of the Organon he selects for his attack are principally
those theoretical opinions of Hahnemann which are of no con¬
sequence whatever to the truth of the therapeutic law expressed
by the formula similia similibus, and which have been aban¬
doned by almost every thinking homoeopathist. The chief, we
may say the sole, point alluded to in this first paper on the
“ Difficulties ” is Hahnemann’s assertion of the unconditional
and absolute power of medicinal substances. On this the
writer has wasted an immense quantity of vehement argument;
apparently unaware that Hahnemann’s disciples have long since
exposed the fallacy of this opinion. The truth of homoeopathy
is in no degree affected by the refutation of this theory.
If the writer of the articles in the Medical Times and Gazette
is desirous of learning what are the essentials and the non-
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449
essentials of Hahnemann’s doctrines, we cannot do better than
refer him to a review that appeared in our Journal for January
last, wherein he will find all the objections he is likely to bring
forward fully discussed and answered. We have neither incli¬
nation nor space to reiterate the arguments in favour of the
truth of the essential doctrines of Homoeopathy, which may be
found in a hundred independent treatises, and in many of our
earlier numbers. We have fortunately advanced a long way
beyond that infantile period of our existence, when it was neces¬
sary to discuss and defend the first principles of our therapeutic
system, and it is certainly not a very edifying spectacle to
behold a writer on the “ difficulties of homoeopathy,” coolly
ignoring all that has been written on the subject in England
during the last dozen years. Even Dr. Simpson, unscrupulous
as he is as to his statements and arguments in his recent work
against homoeopathy, had not the effrontery to write against our
system without regard to what had been put forth by its de¬
fenders in this country: The writer in the Medical Times and
Gazette presumes largely on the ignorance of his readers in
venturing to serve up a r6chauff& of the old and oft-refuted
platitudes with which the allopathic writers of a quarter of a
century ago used to attempt to annihilate the earliest partisans
of homoeopathy in this country. The tide of homoeopathic pro¬
gress has advanced too far and wrested too ■ large a territory
from the feeble grasp of allopathy to be stayed for one instant
by this antiquated critic’s Partington-mop, which might have
answered a temporary purpose, and achieved an apparent but
short-lived triumph, while yet homoeopathy was but as a feeble
stream in this country, without a literature, and unsupported by
any names of eminence and authority.
The next circumstance that offered an opportunity to our
allopathic contemporaries for venting their sarcasms and abuse
against homoeopathy, was the effort recently made by a number
of the adherents of our system to induce the Minister of War to
allow one of the civil hospitals about to be established near the
seat of war, to be under the superintendence of homoeopathic
practitioners. In our last number we briefly noticed the com¬
mencement of this important movement. We are now enabled
VOL. XIII, NO. LIII.—JULY, 1855 . 2 G
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450 Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
to place before our readers, the subsequent steps taken by its
promoters.
The following is a copy of the memorial drawn up by the
committee appointed for that purpose
“ To the Right Honourable Lord Panmure, Her Majesty's
Secretary of State for the War Department , dtc.
“ My Lord,—We, the undersigned peers, members of the
House of Commons, clergymen, officers of the army and navy,
lawyers, merchants, and others unconnected with the practice of
medicine, beg to state to your Lordship,—
“ That the proposed organization on the part of Her
Majesty’s Government, of civil hospitals at Smyrna and
elsewhere, for the treatment of the soldiers and seamen
now serving in the Crimea and in the Black Sea, and the
circular emanating from your Lordship’s department in¬
viting the co-operation of the medical institutions of the
metropolis in this beneficent work, have suggested to many
who have derived personal benefit from homoeopathy, that
it would be desirable to secure for those of the sick in our
army and fleet in the East who prefer this mode of treat¬
ment, the advantages which it affords in the treatment of
those diseases of an acute form so unhappily prevalent in
the Camp before Sevastopol.
“ That the homoeopathic system of medicine promul¬
gated in 1796 by Samuel Hahnemann, a German phy¬
sician, distinguished by his contributions to science, has
obtained the recognition and support of several of the lead¬
ing States in Europe and America.
“ That the Legislatures of two of the most important
States of the American Union (Pennsylvania and Ohio)
have granted charters of incorporation to homoeopathic
universities to which hospitals are attached; that the
chambers of the kingdom of Bavaria, of the Grand Duchy
of Baden, and other German states, have authorized pro¬
fessorships of homoeopathy in the public universities; that
the imperial government of Austria has instituted a pro¬
fessorship of homoeopathy and sanctioned the establish-
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Memorial to Lord Panmure.
451
ment of homoeopathic hospitals in Vienna, Hungary, and
other parts of its dominions; that similar hospitals exist
in St. Petersburgh and Moscow, and that one hundred
beds in the hospital Beaujon in Paris, have been for
several years devoted to patients who are openly treated on
the homoeopathic system by Dr. Tessier and his hospital
assistants.
“ That when the Bavarian parliament and the Hunga¬
rian diet in 1843, unanimously agreed to recommend
homoeopathy to the favourable consideration of their re¬
spective governments, it was shown:—
“ 1st. That in Germany, the mortality in homoeopathic
hospitals was not quite 6 per cent., whereas in other hos¬
pitals it amounted to more than 12 per cent.
“ 2nd. That in severe inflammatory diseases, the mor¬
tality in homoeopathic hospitals was not quite 5 per cent.,
and in the other hospitals nearly 15 per cent.
“ 3rd. That in cholera the mortality which in other
hospitals was 56 per cent, was in'homoeopathic hospitals
under 83 per cent.
“ 4th. That the average number of days which the
patients remained in the hospital, was 28 to 29 in the
ordinary hospitals, and from 20 to 24 in homoeopathic
hospitals: and
“ 5th. That in homoeopathic hospitals the charge for
each patient is not one-half that in other hospitals*
“ That the results obtained in homoeopathic hospitals On
the Continent have been fully corroborated by those ob¬
tained in the homoeopathic hospitals and other charitable
institutions in Great Britain.
“ That moreover one of the medical inspectors of the
Board of Health has borne testimony to the successful
results obtained in the London Homoeopathic Hospital in
the treatment of the cholera epidemic which broke out
with such violence in the Golden Square District during
the month of September last.
“ That those results have been embodied in a return
made to the Medical Council of the Board of Health, and
2 o 2
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Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
Dr. McLoughlin the medical inspector alluded to, who
carefully watched the cases received into the wards of the
London Homoeopathic Hospital, has recorded in a letter
addressed to one of the medical officers of that institution,
his opinion of the superior results obtained in cases of the
most malignant form of cholera there treated, over those
of any other mode of treatment he had witnessed; and he
has expressed his readiness, when called upon, to corrobo¬
rate the return in question.
“ That the undersigned and others who met together for
the purpose of considering this matter, have appointed a
deputation to present this memorial to your Lordship with
the view of obtaining your Lordships authorization for the
appropriation of some portion of the premises Her Majesty's
Government propose to devote to the purposes of a civil
hospital at Smyrna or elsewhere in the East, and for such
assistance as your Lordship may see fit to grant, so as to
enable a staff of properly qualified physicians and surgeons
practising homoeopathy to be selected and sent from this
country, to receive and treat those officers, soldiers, and
seamen who may desire to place themselves under the
homoeopathic system of treatment, during the period of
their sickness.
“ That many of the undersigned have sons, brothers,
relations or friends serving Her Majesty in the army and
navy in the East, who have the fullest confidence in the
efficacy of homoeopathy in the treatment of diseases to which
many of their comrades have fallen victims, and to which
they themselves are hourly exposed, and who feel greatly
the want of that mode of medical treatment in which they
have faith.
“ That should your Lordship require detailed statistics
demonstrating the successful treatment of diseases by the
homoeopathic system, we are able to furnish them most
abundantly from authentic documents already before the
public, but we forbear to trespass further upon your
Lordship’s time in a memorial of this nature.
“ We have the honour to be, my Lord,
“ Your Lordship’s obedient Servants.”
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453
Lord Panmure s reply.
In a very short time this memorial received the signatures of
1 archbishop (the philosophic Whately pf Dublin) 2 dukes, 1
marquis, 10 earls, 2 viscounts, 6 lords (peers), 17 peers’ sons,
14 members of parliament, 18 baronets, 17 generals, 27 colonels '
and lieut.-colonels, 49 majors, captains, and subaltern officers
of the army, 2 admirals, 7 captains of the royal navy, 8 com¬
manders, &c., R.N., 05 clergymen, 45 justices of the peace,
barristers and solicitors, and 314 bankers, merchants, and others.
This list might have been almost infinitely increased, had more
time been given for the collection of signatures, but it was
thought advisable not to delay the presentation of the memorial.
Accordingly, a deputation, consisting of the Earl of Essex,
Lord Lovaine, M.P., General Sir John Doveton, K.C.B.,
Admiral Gambier, Colonel Wyndham, Colonel Taylor, R.A.,
Captain Fishboume, R.N., and Lord R. Grosvenor, M.P.,
waited by appointment on Lord Panmure, the Secretary of
State for War, on the 29th of March. Lord Panmure listened
very attentively to what the various members of the deputation
had to say in support of the memorial, and promised to take the
matter into consideration, and give his reply in writing. It is
now a matter of history that immediately after the date of the
presentation of the memorial, Lord Panmure had a fit of the
gout, which, not having been treated homoeopatbically, laid
him up for nearly five weeks. At the end of that time he
was sufficiently recovered to give the following reply to the
memorialists:—
“ War Department, 4th May, 1855.
My Lord,
I am extremely sorry that I have been prevented by
illness from sending you a reply to the memorial which you did
me the honour to place in my hands some time since. I have
given my most careful attention to the allegations and arguments
therein set forth, an attention which is called for on my part not
only by the importance of the subject of which it treats, but by
the distinguished names by which the prayer of the memorial is
supported.
I regret, however, that after the best consideration which
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454 Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
I can give to the subject, I do not feel that I am justified in
lending the authority of government to promote this particular
mode of medioal treatment in the army.
I am far from presuming to decide on a question of medicine,
and not even from the gentlemen who composed the deputation
which accompanied your Lordship to present the memorial, can
I accept direction on so grave a subject. ’
The great principles of the science of medicine on which we
rely, have been slowly built up by the labour, and are founded
on the recorded experience of able and learned men; and until
these principles are proved to be erroneous, and consequently
abandoned, the government ought to continue to he directed by
their professors and teachers.
With this opinion, I regret to say that it is not in my power
to comply with the request contained in the memorial.
I have the honor to be, my Lord,
Your Lordship’s most obedient servant,
Panmure.
The Lord Robert Grosvenor, M.P.”
There is no need to criticise the terms of this reply, hut we
can scarcely refrain from a smile when we peruse that wonderful
paragraph about “ the great principles of medicine,” which must
assuredly have been dictated to the War Minister by some
medical friend; probably the same who brought his lordship so
triumphantly through his fit of the gout, after four or five
weeks of vigorous treatment on those great principles “that
have been slowly built up by the labour,” &c.
Such, then, was the termination of the great and influential
movement set on foot for the purpose of securing to our army
in the field the advantages of homoeopathic treatment in those
diseases which were, at the time the movement was commenced,
decimating our brave troops under the superintendence of the
practitioners of that science of medicine “founded on the
recorded experience of able and learned men,” &c.
We admit that Lord Panmure was placed in a very difficult
position, and that he could hardly have granted the prayer of
the memorialists without giving mortal offence to the appointed
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Prospects of the . Campaign.
455
practitioners of the old system. Still, the number and in¬
fluential character of the memorialists, the striking facts adduced
by them in proof of the superiority of the system they advocated,
and the urgent desire of many of the most influential officers in
the army and navy engaged in the Crimea, might have induced
a minister devoid of prejudice, and determined to do what was
best for the public welfare, to despise the feeble clamour that
would have been raised by interested parties, and grant the
reasonable request of the memorialists.
The delay that occurred between the presentation of the
memorial, and Lord Panmure’s answer (five weeks), occasioned
by his lordship’s sharp fit of gout, sufficed to exhibit a marked
improvement in the health of the army, and to render the
necessity for further medical aid less apparent; but when the
genial warmth that has served to dispei the maladies occasioned
by the winter’s cold shall have ripened into the fervid heat of
the Crimean summer, we may have to witness an increase of the
sickness of our troops by the prevalence of cholera, dysentery,
and fever, in which the “ science of medicine,” as practised on
Lord Panmure’s favourite plan, may prove, as heretofore,
powerless; and a demand again arise for the employment of
another system, which has often asserted its superior success in
such maladies. In the meantime, it is so far satisfactory to
know that many of the most intelligent officers engaged in the
war have a tolerable amateur knowledge of homoeopathy, and
have already ministered effectually to the relief of their own
and their companions’ maladies ; and we know that at least one
homoeopathic practitioner has proceeded to the East in order to
supply homoeopathic advice to those who prefer that method.
This disinterested and patriotic endeavour on the part of a
number of gentlemen, distinguished, many of them, for their
rank, learning and services rendered to the country, to induce
the government to supply the sick of the army engaged in the
war, with an opportunity of availing themselves, if they so
wished, of the system of medicine which these gentlemen had
found so beneficial in their own cases, did not fail to rouse the
ire, and perhaps excite the fears of the partisans of allopathy.
The Lancet , as the mouthpiece of our opponents, gave utterance
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Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
to the concentrated animosity of its subscribers, in an article
entitled “ Lordly doctors. Homoeopathy and Lord Panmure."
The capacity of judging of the merits of any system of medicine
is here sought to be denied to any, except the constituted
medical authorities. The editor ridicules the notion of a man
like the Archbishop of Dublin, who has hitherto only dis¬
tinguished himself by his philosophical and theological writings,
but who belongs to no Faculty of Physicians, no College of
Surgeons, being able to decide which system of medicine cures
his diseases best. Of course the Lancet would deny the right
of any patient to question the perfect propriety of the practice
pursued by any “ regular” practitioner. Supposing Mr. Wakley
were to have an opportunity of legislating on the subject, we
presume he would, carrying out the principles laid down in this
article, pass an act making it a misdemeanour or a felony for
any patient to presume to turn off his doctor, and put himself
under another, whose practice differed from that of the first.
In our present social state, it would perhaps be difficult to pass
suoh a law; but from what we heard a few days ago, it seems
there is a spot in this globe where such a state of things exists,
if not de jure , at all events, de facto. A friend informed us
that he met with an American gentleman at some watering-
place in England, who was labouring under some severe disease.
Our friend observing that the poor patient after some weeks
was just as ill as at first, said to him one day, “ You don’t seem
to be getting better?” “No,” replies the patient; “rather
worse, I reckon.” “ Then why don’t you try some other system ?
why don't you change your doctor ?” “ Change my doctor!”
cried the patient earnestly, “ change my doctor! Do you then
in England change your doctors ?” “ Of course we do, when
we find they are doing us no good,” was the reply. “ Ah, my
good sir, I am delighted to hear it,” said the poor patient, “ and
I shall certainly follow your advice; but I dare not for my life
do such a thing at home. If I were to dismiss my medical
attendant in Kentucky, he would instantly call me out and
shoot me.” A charming condition of things to be sure! If you
object to allow the doctor to kill you slowly, you must be
prepared to submit, to be despatched quickly by him. Something
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Fury of the Lahcet.
457
similar to this Mr. Wakley is evidently desirous of establishing
in England. He worries and badgers, vilifies and threatens
those gentlemen who decline any longer to submit to be
physicked to death by the “ legitimate practitioner,” and who
have adopted another system of treatment, and are desirous of
putting it in the power of their relatives and friends in the
Crimea to avail themselves of what they believe to be the better
method of cure. The manners and customs of this country un¬
fortunately stand in the way of doctors shooting patients who
dare put themselves under another practitioner, hut Mr. Wakley
tries to gain the same end by sticking those who presume to
doubt the excellence of the system he advocates in the pillory of
the Lancety and firing at them his whole armoury of abuse and
ridicule.
For tbe thousand and first time Mr. Wakley mumbles an
impotent threat about turning Lord Robert Grosvenor out of the
representation of Middlesex, in consequence of his “ continuous
advocacy of an odious system of quackery.” It is certainly the
height of absurdity in Mr. Wakley to threaten to turn others
out of Parliament, who could not retain his own seat for
Finsbury.'
The next event that we have to notice in our history of
recent anti-homoeopathic proceedings, is an act of a much
more serious character, which has already created no small
amount of indignation, and which will not be lost sight of
until an effort is made to obtain justice on behalf of the
aggrieved parties.
During the prevalence of the cholera in London last year, the
president of the Hoard of Health, anxious to collect statistics
shewing the result of the various methods of treatment pursued,
with a view to be able to point out the best in the event of the
occurrence of another epidemic, caused a medical council to
be constituted which might assist him in his labours. Schedules
were prepared and forwarded to every qualified practitioner in
town, with a request, that in the event of their having had any
cases of cholera to treat, they would fill up the schedule, which
would shew at a glance all the important features of the disease
and its treatment. The objeot of the president, as he himself
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458
Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
expresses it, was “ to determine the number of cases of choleraic
disease, the proportion of deaths and recoveries, and the treat¬
ment pursued in each case.”*
These schedules having been forwarded to all the qualified
medical men whose names were to be found in the Medical
Directory, were of course sent to homoeopathic as well as to allo¬
pathic practitioners. Those of the homoeopathic body who had
had cases of cholera under their care filled up their schedules
and returned them to the Board of Health as desired. They
were all referred to a select Treatment Committee of the Medical
Council, who in course of time published their “ Report,” which
was duly presented to both Houses of Parliament.
In this Report the homoeopathic practitioners were surprised
to observe that no notice whatever was taken of their returns—
not the slightest allusion was made to them. And' yet
in their introductory observations, the Treatment Committee
distinctly state that they do not offer opinions, but only present
“ materials on which philosophical deductions are hereafter to
be based.”f Nevertheless the returns of the homoeopathic
practitioners have been carefully excluded, as if they could not
have assisted in the slightest degree to form a basis for philoso¬
phical deductions. The report itself is an attempt to arrange
the thousand and one different allopathic methods of treatment
under four heads, and the precise value of the labours of the
Council may be judged of by the following remark of the Times
newspaper of June 2nd upon it. “ There are, unhappily,” says
the journalist, “ in this report, defects of so serious a nature as
to deprive it of all value as a practical guide in the treatment of
any future epidemic.” In this estimate of the worth of the
report we entirely agree, but we are glad the Times has said it
first, for the writers in that journal cannot certainly be accused
of any leaning towards homoeopathy. But to continue our nar¬
rative. The Committee of Management of the London Homoeo¬
pathic Hospital which had furnished the returns of a large
number of cases of cholera to the Board of Health, applied to
* Letter of the President of the General Board of Health, &c. Parliamen¬
tary paper, page 12.
f Report of the results of the different methods of treatment pursued in
epidemic cholera. Parliamentary paper, page 3.
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Cholera and the Board of Health. 459
Sir Benjamin Hall, the President of the Board, to know why
their returns had been omitted from the Beport. To this Sir
B. Hall returned a courteous answer, which we shall notice
presently.
It was deemed expedient to bring the matter before Parlia¬
ment, and accordingly on Monday, the 14th May, Lord Kohert
Grosvenor, who, with his usual zeal for homoeopathy, willingly
undertook the mission, is reported to have said: “ I beg to ask
the President of the Board of Health, whether forms were issued
to the legally qualified medical practitioners of the metropolis
last year, inviting them to fill them up, in order to exhibit the .
results of the various methods adopted by them for the treat¬
ment of cholera. Whether, when those forms were returned,
the Medical Council of the Board of Health refused to take
cognizance of any of them, or of any returns of a like nature
made by the legally qualified medical officers of any hospital;
and if so, for what reason ? And if any correspondence has
taken place between the General Board of Health and any
persons complaining of omissions in the report issued by the
Board as to the results of cholera treatment; and if so, whether
he has any objection to lay it upon the table of the House ?”
Sir Benjamin Hall stated in reply, that forms of returns had
been sent out from the Medical Council of the Board of Health
to all qualified medical practitioners in the metropolis whose
names appeared in the Medical Directory. The forms were
filled up and returned in due course, and a report based upon
them was afterwards presented to Parliament. It appeared,
however, that the returns sent in by the homoeopathic prac¬
titioners were not noticed by the Medical Council; and the
reason given by Dr. Paris, the chairman of the Council, was
contained in a resolution of that body, stating that to use the
returns of the homoeopathic practitioners would he to give an
unjustifiable sanction to an empirical practice, alike opposed to
the maintenance of truth, and the progress of medical science.
The immediate effect of Lord B. Grosvenor’s question to Sir
Benjamin Hall has been the publication of another parlia¬
mentary paper of which the following is the title
“ Cholera .—Betum to an address of the Honourable the
House of Commons, dated 17 May, 1855 ;—-for copies of any
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460 Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
letters which have been addressed to the General Board of
Health, complaining of the omission of any notice of certain
returns in relation to the treatment of cholera, which returns
were sent to the General Board of Health in pursuance of a
circular dated September last, and issued by the Board; and of
any correspondence which has passed between the President of
the Board and the Medical Council; together with copies of
the returns which have been rejected by the Medical Council.”
This is altogether a very valuable document, and deserves a
more extended notice than we are enabled to afford it in this
• number. It contains the precise terms of the letter addressed
by the Commttee of Management of the London Homoeopathic
Hospital to Sir Benjamin Hall, together with the reply of the
President of the Board of Health. There is also a copy of the
letter of the President of the Medical Council in answer to
Sir Benjamin Hall’s enquiry why no notice of the homoeopathic
returns was taken by the Treatment Committee of the Medical
Council. Here it is:—
“ Dover Street, 21 April, 1855.
“ Sir,—For the information of Sir Benjamin Hall, I beg to
enclose a resolution unanimously passed by the Treatment
Committee of the Medical Council of the General Board of
Health, which I trust will be a satisfactory answer to the in¬
quiry addressed to me regarding the reasons which induced the
Committee to pass over without notice the homoeopathic returns
of their treatment of cholera.
Resolved ,—That by introducing the returns of homoeo¬
pathic practitioners, they would not only compromise the value
and utility of their averages of cure, as deduced from the opera¬
tion of known remedies, but they would give an unjustifiable
sanction to an empirical practice alike opposed to the mainte¬
nance of truth, and to the progress of science.’
“ I have, &o.,
** T. Taylor, Esq. “ John Ayrton Paris, President.
“ Secretary to the Board of Health.”
Such is the precious document that Sir Benjamin Hall read
in the House of Commons as the only excuse that the Treat¬
ment Committee had to offer for the omission of all notice of
the cholera returns of a number of duly qualified medical men.
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The Paris Exposition.
461
It is well worthy the careful perusal of our readers, not indeed
as a specimen of good grammar and composition, for it is barely
English, but as an example of all that can be said by a body of
learned pundits for a plain and manifest dereliction of duty and
malversation of the functions they were appointed to discharge.*
It is to he observed that these gentlemen were not appointed
by the Board of Health in order to express their particular
opinions, but only to collect and arrange the results of the
treatment pursued by all qualified practitioners. They could
not of course assert that the homoeopathic returns were fur*
nished to them by unqualified practitioners, for most of the
homoeopathists possess medical titles, diplomas and degrees of
the very highest class. The homoeopathic returns would, for¬
sooth, “ compromise the value and utility of the averages of
cure deduced from the operation of known remedies .” Such is
the statement of the Treatment Committee. In the homoeo¬
pathic returns the name of every medicine given was distinctly
indicated, and yet it is here insinuated that they are unknown,
therefore secret remedies or nostrums. The simple medicines
of homoeopathy are certainly not known to those who are in
the habit of administering those intricate and surprising com¬
pounds whioh we find from the report were given by the allo¬
paths, nor are they susceptible of being arranged under any of
the categories into which the reporters have classed, in a very
arbitrary fashion as it appears to us, the perplexing composite
medicines used for the treatment of the cholera, viz. alteratives,
astringents, stimulants and eliminants. The homoeopathic
medicines were only unknown to the Treatment Committee
because they did not trouble themselves to look at the returns
laid before them. We readily grant that the homoeopathic
returns would compromise the value and utility of the allopathic
averages of cure, for, as it appears from the parliamentary papers
before us, while that allopathic method recommended as the
most successful by the Committee shewed a mortality of 36 2
* As ten days elapsed between Sir B. Hall’s application to Dr. Paris for an
explanation of the extraordinary conduct of the Committee and Dr. Paris’s
answer (vide Parliamentary paper), it is only reasonable to suppose that the
dateless resolution contained in the letter was passed by the Committee after,
and in consequence of Sir B. Hall’s remonstrance.
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Last desperate efforts of the Enemy.
per cent., the homoeopathic treatment pursued in the homoeo¬
pathic hospital lost only 16*4 per cent. That this success was
obtained in cases of the severest description of developed
cholera is proved not only by the testimony of the medical
officers of the hospital staff, but also by the voluntary state¬
ment of Dr. Macloughlin, one of the medical inspectors of the
Board of Health, who writes as follows:—“ That there may
therefore be no misapprehension about the cases I saw in your
hospital, I will add, that all I saw were true cases of cholera,
in the various stages of the disease; and that I saw several
cases which did well under your treatment, which I have no
hesitation in saying would have sunk under any other.” * The
homoeopathic returns would have compromised the value and
utility of the allopathic averages, by shewing their utter value¬
lessness and inutility. As, however, the committee was not
appointed in order to demonstrate the value and utility of allo-
pathio treatment, but in order to ascertain what treatment
pursued by qualified medical men was the most successful, we
have no hesitation in affirming that by omitting from their
report the results of the most successful method of treatment
they have altogether vitiated the value and utility of that report,
and have not only been guilty of a “ practice alike opposed to
the maintenance of truth and the progress of science,” but they
have committed >a deliberate fraud on the publio by setting forth
the least successful as the most successful mode of practice,
thereby endangering the lives and health of those who might
hereafter put confidence in the deductions they arrive at. We
will not say much about the insult offered in this resolution of
the Treatment Committee to the whole body of their homoeo¬
pathic colleagues, their equals in rank, in education, in scientific
acquirements, and in the estimation of the public; that is a sort of
treatment from long custom we have by this time got used to, and
which from its outrageous injustice we are able to despise. But
* See Letter of Dr. Macloughlin to Hugh Cameron, Esq.—Cholera, parlia¬
mentary paper, page 5. And yet in the face of this testimony, freely given
by one of their own Medical Inspectors, we know that one of the members of
the Treatment Committee when questioned on the subject of the rejection
of the homoeopathic returns, said that the reason for their exclusion was that
the cases pretended to have been cured by the homceopathists were not cases
of cholera at all!
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Amenities of Periodic Literature!
we very much mistake the temper of those who preside at the
Board of Healthy of the House of Commons, and of the British
people, if, when they come to know the facts of the case, they
will stand quietly by and see with indifference this gross
“ cooking of their accounts" even by such a great authority on
Diet as Dr. Paris.
The matter will not he suffered to rest as it is. Steps will,
we believe, he shortly taken to obtain a just recognition of the
success of the homoeopathic system during the late epidemic of
cholera, and to repair the wrong that has been done by this
conclave of allopathic conspirators, who in order “ to make
things pleasant” to the followers of their own sect, did not
hesitate to defraud the public of the knowledge they were paid
to furnish.
Of course the Lancet is indignant at the notion of “ homoeo¬
pathic humbugs" presuming to protest against the omission of
their returns by the Treatment Committee, and enraptured at
the “ excellent letter" of the dietetic Paris. It has a charming
article on the subject full of opprobrious language applied to the
homoeopaths and “ their touter” Lord Robert Grosvenor, in
which the words “ impostors,” “ quacks,” “ humbugs," and
other recherch6 and refined epithets are plentifully bestowed
on us. The Lancet, by general acknowledgment, is worn out
and rusty, it continues to mumble out its vulgar sarcasms and
vituperations, but all the point and brightness of its early days
are sought for now in vain. It has long ceased to be a terror
to those it chooses to attack in the allopathic school; and as
for us, the more it has rated, calumniated, and abused us, the
more we have been amused at its imbecile rage. In the very
number in which the abusive artiole We have referred to occurs,
there is a Teport of a meeting of the London Medical Society,
at which Dr. Routh, noted for his work entitled the “ Fallacies
of Homoeopathy ,” read a paper on Pneumonia, and recom¬
mended as the best medicine for that disease the tincture of
aconite , the use of which drug in that affection he could only
have learned from the practice of the homceopaths. On a
former occasion * he spoke of the value of the same medicine
* Med. Times and Gazette, No. 252.
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in bringing down the pulse in searlet fever, which notable dis¬
covery is also among the "fallacies" of homoeopathy. We
can afford to be abused by our enemies, when we have the
satisfaction of detecting them pilfering from the treasury of our
materia medica, and unwillingly acknowledging that what they
steal from us is more serviceable to them than anything they
previously possessed.
We have already exceeded the space we had intended to
devote to the subject of this article, but we cannot conclude
without an allusion to an article in the June number of the
Monthly Journal of Medicine, where we find a review of our
review in our last number of Dr. Begbie’s paper on Belladonna
in scarlet fever, in the January number of the British and
Foreign Medico-Chirurgical Review. It is highly flattering
to our vanity to find our article has created such a sensation
among the Edinburgh dons that they have deemed it necessary
to adopt the unusual course of reviewing, at great length, our
critique. If we may be permitted to judge from the style of
the article in the Monthly , we should guess it to proceed from
the author of the paper which was so thoroughly cut up in our
last. Surely none but Dr. J. Warburton Begbie would take
the trouble to write such an elaborate defence of Dr. J. War-
burton Begbie ! The paper in question is merely a rechauffe
of the article in the Medico-Chirurgical, a reiteration of the
statements and opinions there expressed, intermixed with some
atrocious puns on the names of Dr. Black and Dr. Teuffel, and
a very silly parody on the " House that Jack built,” for writing
which any boy at the High School of Edinburgh would have
been punished with a score or two of “ palmies."
REVIEWS.
Lettre sur le ChoUra, addressee au Docteur Nufiez, par le
Docteur J. Perry. Paris—Bailli&re. 1855.
The author of the above letter is one of the most talented and
successful of the homoeopathic practitioners of Paris. He has
already distinguished himself by several articles in the pages of
our Gallican contemporary, remarkable for the research and
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originality they display. Hitherto he has been chiefly known as
a 8tout partisan of the dynamization theory of Hahnemann, in
following up which theory to its logical consequences, he has
advocated the employment of the highest potencies of Jenichen,
and recommended the employment of medicines by olfaction.
Dr. Nunez also, to whom the letter is addressed, has gained
considerable notoriety by recommending, for both acute and
chronic diseases, the dilutions from 2000 upwards. A pamphlet
on cholera, thus endorsed with the names of two of the most un¬
compromising partisans of dynamization and of Jenichen, could
not fail to excite our curiosity. The author we know to be a man
of scientific attainments, and trustworthy integrity : one who, we
believe, would scorn to promote his own particular views on
homoeopathic practice at the expense of a rigid adherence to
truth. We, therefore, opened the brochure, and eagerly sought
to learn how a physician with extreme notions on the subject of
dynamization would treat a disease of the intensity and malignity
of cholera, in which we confess we had no experience of the
power of high dilutions.
It is a self-evident proposition in medicine, that the potency
of the dose should be increased in proportion to the intensity
and severity of the disease. We must all act on this principle
if we would seek to preserve the appearance of consistency in
our therapeutic method. Those of us who do not profess to
hold by the dynamization theory, maintain that (ceteris paribus)
the lower dilutions are the more powerful, and consequently best
adapted to the cure of diseases of the greatest intensity, and
most rapid course. Those who hold to the doctrine that with
each step in dilution, or dynamization, as they fondly term it,
the medicine is increased in potency, who consequently speak of
the stages of dilution as stages of development of medicinal
power, and who term the dilutions, or attenuations, potencies ;
the 1st, 3rd, 12th, &c., being lower potencies; the 30th, 300th,
3000th, 30,000th higher and highest potencies, ought con¬
sistently to give their highest potencies in diseases of greatest
intensity; their lowest in maladies of the mildest character.
This, however, they never do. Dr. Kau is the only author we
remember who advocates the use of the higher attenuations in
VOL. XIII, NO. LIII.—JULY 1855. 2 H
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acute, the lower in ohronio diseases; but his advocacy of this
plan is founded on reasons totally independent of the dynami-
zation theory. Hahnemann at one time proposed a uniform
dilution (the 30th) for both acute and ohronic diseases; and
Bonninghausen, in imitation of the master, advocates a uniform
high potency (the 200th) for all diseases; but none, even of
the high potency men, propose to give the highest of their high
potencies in acute diseases, and the lowest in chronic. Even
the ultra-dynamist. Dr. Nunez, gives his lowest high potency
(the 2000th) in acute, while he reserves the higher numbers for
chronic diseases.
In consideration of these facts, we were certainly prepared to
find Dr. Perry advocating the employment of somewhat lower
dilutions for the treatment of cholera than even the lowest
number sanctioned by his Castilian friend. We confess, how¬
ever, that we were not prepared to find our author rivalling in
his prescriptions the material doses of our respected friend,
Georg Schmid, of Vienna. Suoh is, however, actually the oase.
We should like to have seen the countenance of “ mon cher
Nunez” as he perused this dreadful defection of his Parisian
friend from the faith in the omnipotence of the Jeniohen high
potencies. But without further prelude, we shall now proceed
to give our readers a sketch of the practice advocated in this
“ letter.”
In a preface the author makes a sort of apology for the em¬
ployment of the massive doses he recommends. He states, that
after having advanced to the extreme limits of attenuation, and
seeing that there was apparently nothing more to he done in
that direction, he thought it was right to return once more to
the starting point, and to examine without prejudice what oould
be done with non-dynamized medicines. " If,” he continues,
“ we calmly oonsider how often it happens that we fail to cure
with highly diluted medicines, we shall acknowledge that we
should be worse than blind to shut ourselves up systematically
in the narrow circle of our dynamizations, and to reject as
unworthy of the title of homoeopaths those who do not always
employ them.” This passage seems to imply that in France, as
in Germany, and to an insignificant extent in England also,
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there exists a party arrogating to themselves the title of pure
homceopathists, who affect to regard as little better than crypto-
allopathists those who do not always prescribe doses sufficiently
attenuated to please the fancy of the would-be purists. It is,
however, a significant confession from one who has hitherto
been recognised as a great champion of the dynamists, that he
found the dilutions so often fail to cure the disease. This
acknowledgment conveys a practical warning to those who one-
sidedly confine themselves to the use of medicines highly
attenuated, and thus lose the benefits that are often derivable
from the lowest dilutions, or even the crude medicine. We have
always endeavoured to defend homoeopathy from those who
have sought to elevate the dynamization theory into a law of
equal importance and universality with that of similia similibusi
We have now in Dr. Perry, formerly a rather exclusive dynamist,
a convert to the doctrines we have hitherto advocated, in con¬
junction with the most scientific of our homoeopathic brethren.
Dr. Perry first considers the question of prophylactics, or
preservatives from cholera. These preservatives are hygienic
and. medicinal. The former include the usual precautions
relative to diet and regimen, but as these offer nothing peculiarly
worthy of remark, we shall pass on to a more original proposition
of Dr. Perry's, which he includes under the head of hygienic
preservatives;—to wit, a plan for modifying the qualities of
the drinking water, aooording to the character of the constitution.
Thus, for those of soft, lymphatic constitutions, he would add a
small quantity of iron to their water, or even a little saltpetre;
or he would let them take at meal times, with or without a little
wine, an infusion of wild chicory, sage, or bramble. For dry,
nervous, active constitutions, it would be best to give an infusion
of chamomile, scabiosa, or sage, especially if there is a tendency
to hypochondriasis. Those disposed to enteritis, or to diarrhoea
proceeding from a herpetic cause, ought to take an infusion of
mint, or of the flowers and leaves of the cistus, or of berberis
vulgaris. For sanguine constitutions, we should prefer borage,
bugloss , or hops. Dr. Perry gives reasons “ plenty as black¬
berries,” for administering these potions; but we confess we
are not convinced of their utility, and fear the most of them
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would turn an Englishman’s stomach, and rather tend to bring
on the disease they are designed to prevent. Strangely enough
Dr. Perry proposes that one or other of these diet-drinks should
be used, maugre their undoubted medicinal character, even
whilst the patient is taking a purely medicinal prophylactic. He
asserts that the medicine in this massive form acts quite dif¬
ferently from, and does not therefore interfere with the attenuated
homoeopathic medicine. He mentions incidentally"that camphor
is not nearly that universal antidote of homoeopathic medicines
it is commonly represented to be;—an observation in which we
are quite disposed to agree with him.
As to medicinal prophylactics, the first he mentions is a plate
of copper or brass, worn next the skin, after the method re¬
commended by Dr. Burq, which we have already alluded to in
a former number of this Journal. Camphor should be placed
about the room, and a bottle containing some should be carried
in the pocket, and smelt occasionally, especially when we go into
any large assemblage of people, or into an ill ventilated place.
If we are obliged to go among cholera patients, we should wear
a little bag of it about us. The other medicines he recommends
as prophylactic, are veratrum and arsenicum. Both these
should, he says, be given in the first trituration or dilution.
The veratrum may be given only a dose every two or three
days, but if any derangement of the alimentary canal occurs, it
should be alternated with arsenicum every day. The author
does not pretend that these means will always succeed in pre¬
venting the cholera from attacking an 'individual who makes
use of them, but he believes that in case of an attack, they tend
to render the disease much milder and less dangerous.
Dr. Perry thinks it is a mistake to suppose that the invasion
of cholera is not in all cases preceded by some characteristic
symptoms, caused either by some error in diet, or by some moral
affection. Even those cases where the patient seems to be
struck down by cholera at a blow, are, he says, almost invariably
preceded by some symptoms like the following: — Peculiar
lassitude, felt especially in the hams; the knees often give way;
loss of appetite ; hypochondriacal sadness, giving rise to pre¬
sentiments ; discomfort in the stomach; difficult digestion, often
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causing a sort of oppression and eructations ; rumbling in the
stomach; diarrhoea of greater or less intensity. At this stage
he believes it is easy to arrest the further progress of the
disease by means of verat., arsen., cupr., indigo, jatropha, and
nux vom. The indications for these remedies he states to be—
for cuprum, rush of blood to the head ; and vertigo when the
digestive process is going on; inclination to vomit, especially
aftef eating. Malaise, discomfort in the stomach, followed by
colic and diarrhoea. (In such cases it should be given alter¬
nately with arsen.) Indigo corresponds to the following states:
General undefinable discomfort; disagreeable feeling in the
stomach, which the patient cannot describe ; discomfort in the
bowels, with borborygmi, followed by frequent stools of a liquid
watery character, mingled with greenish slime, and accompanied
by weight and painful pressure in the anus. Jatropha corres¬
ponds to—slow digestion; discomfort; weight in the stomach;
eructations, with bad taste; cramps in the stomach, with bad
taste in the mouth; general uneasiness and coldness; intolerable
burning in the stomach ; cramps in the stomach; vomiting of
water, with diarrhoea of the same character. (In this latter case
it should be alternated with verat.)
As regards the treatment of regular attacks of cholera.
Dr. Perry says that as soon as possible the practitioner or
attendants should cover as many parts of the skin as possible
with pieces of copper or brass, especially the epigastrium,
abdomen, chest, loins, thighs, soles of the feet and palms of the
hands. The metal should previously be warmed. The shape
of the pieces of metal is indifferent, the ordinary copper or
brazen culinary utensils may be used in default, of more con¬
venient things. As this metal has the property of arresting
cramp, it should be applied whenever and wherever cramps
occur. The patient must be kept very warm. If no other
medicine is at hand, one or two drops of spirits of camphor
should be given every ten or twenty minutes. But the specific
remedies, it should be remembered, are veratrum, arsenic, and
cuprum, which should be used as soon as they can be got.
Dr. Perry has no faith in the dilutions of these medicines in
fully developed cholera, unless in cases of extremely exalted
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susceptibility, or in mild forms of the disease. Veratrum be
says should be given in doses of from one to four, or even six
drops of the mother tincture repeated every hour or every half
hour at first; sometimes verat. suffices alone, but it is generally
better to alternate it from the first with arsenic in the dose of
one or several drops of the first dilution. If after some hours
these remedies do not seem to be doing any good,' we should
have recourse to cuprum. The best preparation, he says, is the
ammoniuret of copper, but the sulphate and acetate may also
be used. Burq, who advises the ammoniuret , recommends
forty, fifty, and even sixty centigrammes to be given in the
twenty-four hours. Dr. Perry does not think such large doses
are requisite. One centigramme he considers enough for a
dose. One drop of a solution of l js th of the salt and 4 /*ths of
distilled water, will represent the prescribed quantity. In
extreme cases Dr. P. does not hesitate to double this dose, and
give it alternately with veratrum .
Another medicine recommended by our author is one of
which Hahnemann has spoken favourably, but which has not as
yet been recommended by homceopathists, viz. the Gajeput oil.
Our author tried it, and found it of great service in many cases
of cholera, some of which had failed to be benefited by any
other means. He gave it in doses of one drop in a teaspoonful of
water, a dose every half hour. Sometimes he found it best to
alternate it with veratrum or cuprum.
For slighter cases of the disease the remedies indicated need
not be given in such strong doses. They* may be employed in
the first dilution.
Besides the above remedies, Dr. Perry recommends the
administration of some drinks. Thus during the. commence¬
ment of the algid period he advises a warm infusion of chamo -
mile Jlowers, of mint or’ of tea. When the thirst is intense
iced water is the most appropriate drink. Injections also of
decoction of rice, or of starch, may be given every two, three,
or four hours, in proportion to the frequency of the stools. He
does not hesitate to mix with the injection occasionally five or
six drops of laudanum, or a few spoonfuls of poppy water. He
also sometimes gives opium by the mouth in doses of 1 l»th to
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1 /«th of a grain, two or three in six or eight hours. He has
found this diminish the evacuations, restore the vital reaction,
and render the patient more sensible to the homoeopathic
medicines.
For the stage of febrile reaction, aconite in tincture, or low
dilutions he found to be the best, and this was Dr. Tessier s
experience*also. If cerebral congestion supervenes, we should
employ in addition the application of plates of copper and zinc
to the nape, kidneys, epigastrium, and frictions with camphor
on the inferior extremities.
For the stage of collapse, when the increasing weakness seems
to presage a fatal termination, we may sometimes succeed by
means of lachesis, sage, aconite, or jatropha.
The convalescence will demand great care. The giving of
food should be regulated by the most extreme prudence. But
dietetic measures will not alone suffice. The remaining dis¬
orders of the digestive functions will require the use of indigo,
jatropha, tart, em., zinc., sulph. and aeon.
The patient. Dr. Ferry says, should be watched for at least a
year after an attack of cholera, and subjected occasionally to
treatment for the restoration of his digestive powers, and to
assist the constitutional change to which be is liable. The
functions of the spleen, liver, &c., will best be invigorated by
means of sage. Ferrum in the form of chalybeate water, or
steel filings, will be of use in the case of those whose system
has been much exhausted.
Dr. Perry describes an affection which he terms hypochondrie
cholerique, which he says is caused by the choleraic poison,
and which is very difficult to subdue. The organism loses its
power of reaction, the nervous system is profoundly affected
and performs its functions irregularly, the circulation is dis¬
turbed, and there is scarcely an organ that remains undisturbed
by the malign influence. During the prevalence of the epidemy
such cases must be treated by theprophylatics above mentioned;
but should the symptoms notwithstanding still persist, we must
give sage. The best form to commence the use of this drug is
the infusion. Two leaves of sage infused for a quarter of an
hour in three or four tumblers of boiling water, will supply a
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drink of sufficient strength. Of this one, two, or three small
glasses may be taken in the course of the day, either during
meals or at other times. After using this preparation for six
or eight days, recourse may he had to the dilutions of the same
medicine. Of course it will he needful to attend to all the
appropropriate hygienic measures, and in some cases it will he
necessary to have recourse to electric shocks ancf to animal
magnetism.
Such are the directions Dr. Perry gives us for the treatment
of the cholera. We have judged it expedient to give such a
full account of them, as they offer many points of interest from
their novelty and originality. We are not prepared to say that
we approve of all our author’s recommendations. We cannot
imagine that any person in health would derive benefit from, or be
rendered more capable of resisting the influence of the epidemy
by drinking the messes Dr. Perry advises. Of the action
of sage pathogenetic or therapeutic we have no knowledge,
nor is our information respecting mint, bugloss, borage and
scabiosa much greater.* We can however speak confidently
of the power of a small plate of brass or copper worn next
the skin, in removing the nervous and depressing feelings
experienced by some persons during the prevalence of the
cholera. We cannot pretend to decide whether this beneficial
result he a medicinal prophylactic effect of the metal, or a
mere moral effect resulting from the sense of security from
infection it imparts to the wearer ; suffice it to say, we know
several remarkable instances in which it did produce this
desirable result, and in consequence are inclined to recom¬
mend it to the attention of our colleagues. But the most
interesting point connected with Dr. Perry’s pamphlet is
what we adverted to in the outset, that it is the work of a
champion of the dynamization theory, and an admirer of the
highest potencies. We here see how readily this theory is
virtually renounced in the presence of such a disease as cholera,
and how the good sense of Dr. Perry triumphs over his
theoretical predilections, and leads him to select the materially
* Has Dr. Perry derived his knowledge of the virtues of these unproved
substances from the revelations of a dairvoyante , as we might infer from a
paper in the Jour . de la JSoc. Gall . for Juue 1st ?
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478
stronger doses of the lower dilutions and tinctures in place of
what he might be presumed to suppose the spiritually stronger
doses of the high dilutions, in order to combat the terrible
potency of a destructive pestilence. Dr. Perry’s doses are
actually stronger than any we have seen recommended by an
avowed opponent of the dynamization theory and a declared
practitioner*of the low dilution school. Our readers know that
we are far from being exclusive advocates for any particular
class of dilutions. We have always upheld the doctrine that
the dose should be varied to meet the various intensity of dis¬
eases and the various susceptibilities of patients, and we are
now happy to find Dr. Perry advocating the same views, the
more so as we have hitherto thought that he had rather an
exclusive leaning towards the high and even the highest
dilutions.
A Treatise on Diseases of the Eyes, dec. based on Dr. RUchert’s
clinical experience in Homoeopathy, by John C. Peters,
M.D. New York, 1854.
This is a useful compendium of the recorded cases of the homoeo¬
pathic treatment of some diseases of the eyes. It is something
more than a mere translation of Dr. Ruckerts clinical experi¬
ence, for Dr. Peters has enriched his volume with observations
and cases not contained in the sources consulted by Riickert,
and he has not confined himself to homoeopathio works only,
but has added many valuable observations of allopathic writers
on ophthalmic diseases. It has no pretensions to be a complete
treatise on diseases of the eye. In addition to the specific
ophthalmias the only diseases treated of are some affections of the
appendages of the eye, hypopion, iritis, and a few other diseases.
No account is given of the affections of the nerve of vision, or
of the maladies of the deeper seated structures of the eye.
Dr. Peters deserves the thanks of homoeopathic practitioners
for the number of useful manuals he has already published,
founded upon Ruckert’s work and enriched by his own observa¬
tions and researches. He has already published quite a little
library of these manuals, and we trust he may receive sufficient
encouragement to go on with his meritorious labours.
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OBITUARY.
Dr. CR08ERI0, of Paris.
The immediate disciples and friends of Hahnemann are
dropping off one by one. Not a year elapses that we have not
the painful duty to perform of recording the decease of some
veteran homoeopathist whose name is intimately associated with
the rise, extension, and triumph of the new system of medicine.
The subject of the present memoir, however, does not exactly
belong to the class of Hahnemann’s disciples, for his conversion
to homoeopathy only dates from some twenty years ago. But
his advanced years, his previous high reputation, his eventful
life, his more than youthful zeal and industry in the propa¬
gation of Hahnemann’s doctrines, and his friendship with their
venerable author, served to render him conspicuous among the
adherents of the new school, and we feel in recording his death
that homoeopathy has lost one of its most eminent partisans.
Simon Felix Camille Croserio was bom at Condova, in Savoy,
on the 16th of November, 1786. He died at Paris the 13th of
April, 1855. He was consequently in the 69th year of his age.
The following particulars of his life we borrow from the pages
of our Gallican contemporary, to which, when alive, he was a
contributor.
He early evinced a great aptitude for work and a zealous
desire to do his duty. At school he gained the love and respect
of his masters and fellow pupils, and obtained high honours of
scholarship. Having early devoted himself to medical studies,
he pursued them with such success that at the age of twenty he
obtained, by competition, the post of demonstrator of anatomy
at the University of Turin. However he had soon afterwards the
mortification to find his career in that way brought to an un¬
timely close, as he was forced by the conscription to enter the
army. It was not long before he got the appointment of sub¬
assistant surgeon, his commission bearing the date of 1806.
On the 12th June, 1808, he obtained the title of Doctor of
Surgery from the University of Turin. As assistant-surgeon in
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Dr. Groserio.
475
the Imperial Guard he made the campaign of Germany in 1809,
those of Spain in 1810 and 1811, that of Bussia in 1812, those
of Saxony in 1813 and 1814, and the campaign of France the
same year. In the disastrous campaign of 1814 he was wounded,
and had his left leg broken. He was made surgeon-major of
the Old Guard in 1815.
After the fall of Napoleon I. he abandoned the army, and
soon established himself at Paris. Although a native of Pied¬
mont, he did not require any permission in order to practice
medicine in France, because when he took his degree at Turin
that city was under the government of France. Immediately
after the revolution of 1830 he got himself naturalized as a
Frenchman.
Having witnessed a cure effected by Hahnemann in 1838, he
was so struck by it that he determined to study the Organon ,
the only work of Hahnemann at that time translated into French,
The perusal of this aphoristic work made him anxious to become
acquainted with the instruments by which homoeopathy effected
its marvellous cures. In order the better to be able to compre¬
hend the ideas of Hahnemann, and to understand the exact
signification of the symptoms produced on the healthy human
being, he resolved to devote himself to the study of the German
language, and it was in the pages of the Materia Medica that,
without a master, he acquired a knowledge of this language.
By day occupied with the care of his patients, he spent his
nights in translating and learning the Materia Medica. His
excessive application to his new studies and sitting up late at
night affected his sight.
The success he obtained in his application of homoeopathy
caused him to embrace its doctrines with enthusiasm. In order
to propagate it among students of medicine he requested, in
1835, the authorization to deliver in Paris a course of lectures
on homoeopathy. He was, however, unable to obtain the
permission.
Croserio was a studious man; he worked hard and wrote a
great deal. In conjunction with Drs. Jahr and Leon Simon
he edited the Annales de la Midecine Homoeopathique. He
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Obituary.
wrote many articles for the Archives de la M6decine Homoeo-
pathique. His fertile pen supplied a great number of papers
to the Journal de la SocfetS Hahnemannienne de Paris, to
which he also contributed translations from the German, Italian,
and Spanish journals. He published an excellent article there on
the treatment of gonorrhoea. Among his other works we may
mention the following:—1. A volume entitled On Homoeo¬
pathic Medicine, dc.; and on the diet to be followed during
the treatment, 1835; 2. On the advantages Homoeopathy
offers to society , 1835; 3. Statistics of Homoeopathic Medi¬
cine, 1848; 4. A Manual of Homoeopathic Medicine, 1850.
In the last-named work, the author, who had been long
actively engaged in midwifery practice, has consigned the results
of his great experience of the homoeopathic system, as applied
to this branch of medicine. This work is well known to most
of our readers through the American translation.
Dr. Croserio suffered in his health from his intense application
to the study and practice of homoeopathy. For a long time he
had been subject to a chronic pulmonary catarrh, with much
oppression of the breathing, and sometimes fits of suffocation.
In 1853 he had diabetes mellitus, of which he cured himself;
hut in consequence of the fatigue he underwent in the treatment
of the cholera patients of 1854, he had an attack of cholerine.
The most serious symptoms were subdued; but he would take
no care of himself, nor give himself the necessary time to
recover. He continued to be a valitudinarian, was very much
debilitated, and looked much older than he actually was.
Madame Croserio tried to persuade him to go into the country
to recruit his health, but this he steadily refused to do, saying,
that if he quitted Paris he would be deserting before the enemy,
and betraying his patients: that a soldier should die at his post
in the breach. And there indeed he died; for in spite of his
sufferings and his weakness, he continued to give advice to
patients until the last moment. Death was only the termination
of his labours, and of his devotion to science and to humanity.
Towards the end of his life he became so debilitated, that his
voice could scarcely be heard. Some days before his death, he
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The Rev. Thomas R. Everest.
477
was informed that it was the intention of the Gallican Society
to offer him the title of Honorary President, hut he did not
survive long enough to receive the proposed honour.
He was accompanied to the grave by a large number of his
friends and patients. The Rev. M. Ooquerel, who performed the
religious ceremonies, made an oration at the grave, in whioh he
gave a sketch of the labours and good qualities of the deceased.
Although he had been married thirty-five years, he had no
family; but having been appointed guardian to a young orphan
girl, a distant relative, he adopted her, and brought her up as
his own child until she married.
Oroserio’s ardent and philanthropic disposition rejoiced to
record the progress of homoeopathy. He desired to spread the
knowledge of its truths, and loved to put it within the reach of
the poorer classes. He was physician to some benevolent
societies, and to the Maternal Society of Paris. He was phy¬
sician to the Protestant Provident Association, and likewise to
the Establishment of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul. For a
long time he was physician to Ihe Sardinian Embassy.
Being master of several languages, he had a large corres¬
pondence with foreign homoeopathists. He was member of
many learned societies at home and abroad. He belonged to
the old Gallican Homoeopathic Society; had been President of
the old Homoeopathic Society; and afterwards President of the
Hahnemannian Society of Paris. He was also corresponding
or honorary member of various foreign homoeopathic societies.
At his death he was an active member of the present Gallican
Society.
The Rev. Thomas R. Everest.
We regret to have to record the death of the Reverend
Thomas R. Everest, Rector of Wickwar, one of the oldest
homoeopathic authors of this country. Mr. Everest did much
to popularise a knowledge of homoeopathy, and is well known
as the author of some extremely well written and useful pub¬
lications on the new system of medicine. In 1834 he published
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Clinical Record.
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“A Letter addressed to the Medical Practitioners of Great
Britain on the subject of Homoeopathy.” The following year
he gave to the world “A Popular View of Homoeopathy ,”
which has passed through several editions here and in America,
and has been translated into German. In 1851 he published a
sermon which he had preached for the benefit of the Hahnemann
Hospital, which contains a good many allusions to the practice
of homoeopathy, and also a very witty and sarcastic reply to
Dr. Bose Cormack, called forth by some attempt of that worthy
to ridicule Mr. Everest’s sermon. The “ Horce Homoeopathic
published in 1853, we believe, likewise proceeded from his pen.
Mr. Everest was a warm admirer of Hahnemann, whose
friendship and intimacy he enjoyed during the last few years of
the veteran’s life. He was a great stickler for pure Hahne-
mannism, and many a sound rating has he given to those
homoeopathic practitioners who ventured to dispute any of the
maxims of the founder of homoeopathy.
Mr. Everest died on the 15th of June. We believe the
disease that proved fatal was* apoplexy. His loss will be
sincerely deplored by all who take an interest in the propagation
of homoeopathy in this country.
CLINICAL RECORD.
REPORTS OF CASES, by Alfbed C. Pope, M.D.
Headache. — Lachesis.
Case I.
Elizabeth S., set. 31, unmarried. Attended the Derbyshire
homoeopathic dispensary, September 1, 1854. For many years
past has suffered, every three or four days, from intense head¬
ache. The pain is throbbing and oppressive in character; it
occupies chiefly, but not exclusively, the right half of the head,
and extends down on the same side of the neck, which generally
feels stiff and sore. The pain is always aggravated at the cata¬
menial period, which is attended with considerable aching across
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Irritation of Brain.
479
the loins. The discharge lasts generally eight or nine days,
recurs regularly, is dark coloured and profuse.
Prescription: P. Laches. 6. ter in die sumat.
Sept. 8th.—Has had no return of headache since here; a
longer period of freedom from pain than she has known for
several years. Prescription : Eepeat med.
Sept. 15th.—Has had headache slightly for two days this
week. Prescription: Repeat med.
Sept. 22nd.—No return of pain; catamenia are present;
the discharge is dark coloured, but not so profuse as usual.
Prescription: Repeat med.
Sept. 29th.—Shortly after the last visit the headache re¬
turned, but did not continue beyond a day or two.
Prescription: Repeat med.
Oct. 13th.—Looks much healthier. Has no headache. Feels
better than she has done for years.. Prescription: Repeat med.
Nov. 28th.—Has only had headache once or twice during the
last six weeks, and then but very slightly.
On this occasion she was 'discharged, promising to come
back should the headache return at all. Not having made her
appearance again, I think it may be fairly concluded that she
was perfectly cured.
Case II.
Irritation of the Meninges of the Brain , and Spinal Cord .—
Lachesis.
Lydia L. set. 43, married. Came to the dispensary on the
2nd of January, 1855. Six weeks since she felt a soreness at
the vertex, which gradually spread over the right side of the head
and face; the same sensation, together with pricking pains like
pins and needles, involves also the upper and lower extremities
of the same side. The mouth is very sore ; so much so, that
she cannot masticate her food without great pain. After the
least desire to micturate has been evinced, she cannot retain
urine for more than a few minutes; coughing also produces an
immediate flow of urine. She is always worse in the afternoon,
when the soreness frequently changes to a sudden darting pain
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Clinical Record.
in the arm, and all power of grasping is lost, so that anything
she may have in her hand when this pain comes on is instantly
dropped; at the same time there is slight vertigo.
Besides these more recent symptoms, she has, for the last
fourteen or fifteen years, suffered from scraping pain between
the shoulders, with darting pain across the epigastrium and
loins. Appetite has generally been deficient, and the stomach
felt distended for some time after a meal. Bowels moved re¬
gularly.
The catamenia have always been, and still are, quite regular.
Prescription P. Laches. 6 gt. 4ta qq. h.
Jan. 9th.—Every symptom alleviated. She expresses herself
much better. Prescription: Bepeat med. ter in die.
Jan. 19th.—She feels no pain, or discomfort of any kind in
the face and head; the improvement in the arm and leg is not
quite so marked. Prescription: Repeat med.
Feb. 2nd.—Has taken cold, and is not quite so well.
Prescription: fyP. Sulph. 3 ter. in die st., mitte tales ix—postea
fyP. Lach. 6 ter. in die st.
Feb. 16th.—Feels perfectly well; has not felt so well for
many years past; every symptom of disease, both in the ner¬
vous and digestive systems, has disappeared.
The above case struck me as being the incipient form of what
Dr. Todd has termed “ peripheral hemiplegiaand had disease
been allowed to advance unchecked, would probably have placed
the patient, to a great extent, beyond the control of medicine of
any kind.
Case III.
Catarrhus Vesica — Belladonna. Nervous Headache —
Ignatia.
Anne N., set. 53. Applied at the dispensary on the 13th
of June, 1854, stating that for some time past she had felt a
heavy, dull, aching pain at the hypogastrium; urine small in
quantity; frequent dysuria; great aching across the loins.
Bearing down pain in the region of the uterus; no leucorrhoea;
catamenia ceased several years ago. Headache chiefly across
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Acute Ophthalmia.—Mercurius corrosivus. 481
the forehead; is easily excited. Appetite very poor; tongue
dry, and brown furred; bowels costive. She is exceedingly
weak, and very nervous.
Prescription: fyP. Belladonnas 3 x. gt. 4ta h. st.
June 20th.—Very much better; urine increased in quantity,
and its passage is attended with less pain. Bearing down pain
muoh less. Prescription: Repeat med. ter. in die.
July 4th.—The only symptom now remaining, and that not
at all relieved, is headache; the pain is principally across the
forehead, and always aggravated by any excitement; she cannot
hear the least noise.
Prescription: fyP. Ignat. 3 x. gt. 4tah. st.
July 11th.—Has called to state that she feels perfectly well.
There is now no indication of any disease, either of the nervous
system, the bladder, or uterus.
The above case appears to me to afford an illustration of one
of those forms of disease in which the alternation of medicines
is not only advisable, but necessary, to a speedy cure. The
morbid process, as indicated by the totality of symptoms, would
seem to be at work in two essentially distinct spheres; disease
in the one being to a certain extent, though not altogether, in¬
dependent of that in the other. Aud in such cases when medi¬
cines homoeopathic to the two phases of disease are exhibited in
alternation, the result would in all likelihood be more rapidly
favourable than when, as in the one now reported, they were
prescribed in succession; all that could have been expected
from the first being accomplished before the second was ordered.
This view seems strengthened by the generally acknowledged
fact that a homoeopathic medicine, in the vast majority of cases,
acts only upon that part of the system which is morbidly suscep¬
tible of its influence.
Case IV.
Acute Ophthalmia.—Mercurius corrosivus.
Mary B., set. 52. Came to the dispensary on the 9th of May,
1854. Six weeks since, during an attack of influenza, the right
eye became extremely inflamed; it has gradually become worse.
On examination, the sclerotic and conjunctiva are observed to
VOL. XIII, no. Lin.—JULY 1855. 2 i
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Clinical Record.
be intensely injected; the cornea is very dim and suffused; the
eye feels sore, as though sand were between the ball iand the
lids; the least light excites great pain; there is considerable
lachrymation, particularly during the night. The head feels sore.
She is very weak.
Prescription: P. Mero. cor. 3 x. ter. in die sumat.
•May 23rd.—Very much better; the inflamm atory appear¬
ances have nearly subsided; there is much less burning heat-in
the eye, but it aches a good deal on exposure to light.
Prescription: Repeat med.
May 30th.—The condition of the eye is now apparently quite
healthy; it still aches a little, and feels weak. .
fyP. Chinee 1. ter. in die.
June 19th.—Quite well.
Case V.
Orchitis .—r Pulsatilla.
Richard C., set. 23, unmarried, called at my house on the
evening of the 24th of May, and stated that two dayB ago, when
carrying a very heavy weight, he felt a severe strain over the
lower part of the bowels, particularly on the right side; the
pain has since very much increased, and has extended to the
right testicle; there is a tender and large swelling in the right
groin; the testicle of this side is much enlarged, and very pain¬
ful; the loins and sacrum feel very much bruised; it is with
great difficulty that he can walk.
Prescription: P. Amicse 1. gt. 4ta h. st. L. Arnicas
<p 2j. Aq. Purse. 2 x. Fiat Lot. Sig. App. ad tumorem
quater in die.
May 30th.—Pain and swelling in the groin much better ;
pain across the sacrum still very severe; the testicle is swollen,
livid looking, and soft. There is a good deal of discharge from
the urethra. Prescription: fyP. Puls. 3 x gt. 4ta. h. st.
June 13th.—Very much better. Prescription : Repeat med.
A few days after this he sent to say that he was quite well,
and had returned to Mb work—that of a fitter at the railway
works.
Arnica is generally mentioned by homoeopathic repertory
makers, and others, as a valuable medicine in orchitis. Certainly
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Gastralgia.—Pulsatilla.
488
if 1 it is specific to any form of the disease, it ought to her so
when this is traumatic; During the last two years and-a-half,
I have only met with two cases of traumatic orchitis—the above
and another.* In both I prescribed Arnica, and in both it failed
in any way to influence the disease, which in each case yielded
to Pulsatilla. It is perhaps not unworthy of remark, that in
Hahnemann’s Materia Medica Pura, as translated by Hempel,
there is no indication in the proving of arnica that would lead
one to prescribe it in orchitis ; while in that of pulsatilla, this
condition of the testicle, particularly that of the right side, is a
prominent feature.
Case VI.
Gastralgia .— Pulsatilla.
Anne C—, aged 24, a housemaid, was admitted to the Dis¬
pensary on the 21st of November, 1854. At intervals she has,
for the last nine years, suffered from attacks of gastralgia; of
short duration generally, but of frequent recurrence. The last
attack has continued for three months, and has greatly weakened
her. She complains of a drawing pain at the epigastrium, often
extending round to the back: it is worse after a meal, and is
then increased by a feeling of oppression in the same part.
This usually continues for two hours, when vomiting commences,
and relief is obtained after the contents of the stomach have
been fully expelled. Occasionally, a little blood is observed in
the vomit. When the pain is severe, the mouth rapidly fills
with water. The salivary secretion is also in considerable
quantity in the morning. Tongue white; appetite pretty good;
bowels regular. Is generally better at the catamenial period
than at any other time. This recurs quite regularly. She
looks pale; has dark areolae around the eyes; feels extremely
weak, and unable to work.
Prescription r fyP. Puls. 3 ter. in die st.
November 28th.—Pain much less; has had no sickness
since here. Tongue cleaner; feels stronger; complexion much
healthier.
Prescription : Repeat med. gt. mane et‘ vesp.
* British Journal of Homoeopathy, Vol. xii. p. 487.
2 I 2
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484
Clinical Record.
December 12th.—Takes her food quite well. The pain
is not nearly so severe. Prescription : Repeat med.
January 2nd, 1855.—Feels quite strong and well; appetite
good; bowels regular; has no pain.
Hematuria and Chronic Cystitis .*
Louis Driencourt, of P^ronne, joiner, set. 27, of lymphatic tempera*
ment, from his youth shewing traces of chronic nephritis. Previous
to 1849 he had never been seriously ill. Has always lived a regular
life. At the beginning of 1849, without known cause, he com¬
plained of drawing pains in the limbs, along with pains in the hypo-
gastrium, which got worse every evening. Urination became at the
same time painful, and in spite of rest and a so-called cooling regimen
the first symptoms became aggravated, and the urethra became the
seat of shooting pains before and after making water; the urine was
thick. Until May 1850 he was under allopathic treatment, consisting
of tisanes, diuretic powders, and turpentine pills. In place of be¬
coming better he grew worse, the pains became fixed, constant, and
radiated towards the lumbar region and right renal region. He had
a call to make water from twelve to fifteen times an hour day and
night. Suddenly the urinary secretion was suppressed, with horrible
increase of pain. The pain was relieved after a copious emission of
blood, which coagulated immediately after passing out of the urethra.
Cold food, cold baths, tisanes, turpentine pills, a blister over the right
kidney, leeches to the anus were prescribed. No benefit accrued
from this treatment. The patient continued to pass considerable
quantities of blood by the urethra. The pains extended to the
penis, perineum, and rectum. The motions became rare, and much
mixed with blood.
By the advice of his physician he went to seek medical advice to
Paiis. He first came into the hospital of la Piti6, under the care of
Dr. M., who diagnosed catarrh of the bladder, and prescribed
general baths, sulphuric lemonade, tisane of dandelion and nitre,
with five grammes of bicarbonate of soda, and six pills of turpentine
daily. After some time Dr. M., seeing the efforts made by the
patient when making water, imagined he had paralysis of the bladder,
and accordingly subjected the patient to electrisation of this organ
by means of metallic sounds introduced into the bladder and rectum,
* From Jour, de la Soc. Gallic, v.
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Hematuria and Chronic Cystitis.
485
connected with the poles of a battery. Cupping was also practised
ever the kidneys, poultices to the abdomen, and the bladder was
twice injected with a solution of nitrate of silver. Notwithstanding
this the haemorrhage continued.
Dr. M. then handed over the patient to Dr. L. d’E., who after
introducing a number of sounds into the bladder, discovered three
fleshy columns there, but no stone. These operations increased the
haemorrhage, which was treated with nitrate of silver but without
effect. After three weeks Driencourt was sent to the hospital
Beaujon to be under Dr. R., where he remained a month, and was
daily examined by several medical men. The treatment here was
twenty leeches to the anus, sixteen cups over the kidneys, two
cauteries over the right kidney, and a diuretic tisane. No amend¬
ment, whereupon Dr. M. proposed the extirpation of the right
kidney (!), but Dr. R. fearing there might be calculi in the ureter,
opposed this small operation. Tired of the inutility of the regular
treatment Driencourt consulted a quack, who treated him for six
weeks but without success. The violence of the pains he expe r
rienced at last drove him into the Hotel Dieu, where he came under
the care of Dr. D., who imagining that the bladder was retroverted,
treated the case by injections in a double stream. Dr. L. d’E.
consulted again, thought it was a case of gravel in the ureters;
Dr. R. believed it to be some obscure disease of the kidneys.
Dr. B., into whose hands the patient next fell, applied twenty leeches
to the anus, and ordered a bath daily. In the course of three months
five hundred leeches were thus applied, and yet the hemorrhage
continued as before, and the pains were not relieved. Some drops
of bloody urine escaping occasionally, containing some small white
grains, led Dr. B. to diagnose a cystitis depending on calculus.
After seven months and seven days of treatment the patient was sent
to Dr. A., who after sounding him, found the urine highly alkaline,
and ordered two baths daily, four pills of turpentine night and
morning, and a bottle of Yichy water every day. No amendment.
Dr. S., on being consulted, said nothing could be done. Dr. R.
advised cooling medicines, rest, twelve to fifteen leeches occasionally
to the anus, and a blister over each kidney.
After having in vain sought health at the hands of the first allopa¬
thic medical men in Paris, Driencourt returned to P£ronne in the
beginning of February, 1854. His first doctor, not knowing how to
get rid of him, jokingly advised him to consult a homoeopathist.
This advice the patient took, and applied to Dr. A. Dours.
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Clinical Record.
The following was his state at that time:—His expression betrays
great suffering. His nights are distressing. He is forced to get up
every quarter of an hour to pass a few drops of bloody urine, fre¬
quently of pure blood. If the desire to make water is sometimes
less frequent, he is tormented with painful erections the moment he
shuts his eyes. These erections can only be subdued by the pro¬
longed application of cold water. The least fatigue causes violent
pains in the hypogastrium, the left leg, the course of the ureters, and
the right kidney, which percussion shews to be swelled. Two or
three times daily there is a gush of pure blood from the urethra; or
sometimes, instead of that, black clots are passed with agonizing pain.
After the blood the urine passes, holding in suspension thick mucus,
which quickly settles at the bottom of the vessel. No gravel can be
detected among this mucus. Constipation alternating with stools
composed almost entirely of blood. Shooting pains in the anus.
Violent headache. Pulse from 96 to 100, pretty strong. Little
appetite, moderate thirst. The patient sits on one side, the right
tuberosity of the ischium scarcely touching the seat. He dreaded
greatly the advent of warm weather, as then his sufferings were
greatly aggravated.
The treatment was commenced with canth. 6, one drop in 120
grammes of water, a spoonful to be taken every three hours. The
effect was immediate. The patient was able to sleep a few hours.
The inclination to make water did not come above four times in a
long February night. Canth. continued for a week, in various dilu¬
tions, 12th, 18th, 24th, 30th checked the hemorrhage, and diminished
the erections. But the urine still continued to hold much mucus in
suspension. Sulph. 30, a drop in 120 grammes of water, one
spoonful per diem, was then given. During the next week the
patient did not lose a drop of blood. No erections. One natural
stool evety day. The 25th February he complained of a violent
pain over the left kidney, the sure forerunner of haemorrhage, which
occurred in great quantity during the night, with relief to his pain.
Canth. 6. The haemorrhage ceased, but the mucus did not diminish.
Lycop. 30, a drop for eight days did not prevent the return of the
blood. Driencourt had thus four attacks of haemorrhage in two
months. Canth. was always successful in checking them. The
mucous state of his urine gave the patient great distress. He then
got uva ursi 30, four globules in 120 grammes of water, a spoonful
every day. This medicine, sometimes in the form of infusion,
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Pneumonia.
487
4 grains of the tops of the plant in 500 grammes of water, some¬
times in the 6th, 12th, and 80th dilutions, continued during the
months of April, May and June, rendered the urine quite clear. All,
the other symptoms of cystitis and hematuria entirely disappeared.
The summer was passed without suffering. The patient has
resumed his work. A slight relapse of mucus in the urine, with
some pain in the left renal region, yielded readily to ma ursi 30,
and. his state is now perfectly satisfactory.
Pneumonia.
A boy, aged 8, was attacked in the evening with an acute pain
beneath the right breast. In the night he had alternate chills and
heats, and cough; Seen the following morning this is his state
Great restlessness; skin hot and dry; pulse quick, not very strong,
120; respiration short and quick; pain beneath the right breast in¬
creased considerably by inspiration, percussion, and the touch; cough
short, not frequent; no expectoration; crepitating rale from the
lower angle of the right scapula to the bottom of the chest; vesicular
murmur everywhere else; percussion gives a normal sound. Aeon.
3 / m in water, a dose every two hours. The child slept ill, but was
more tranquil; the body not so hot; copious perspiration; pulse
105; respiration freer, but the pain of the side as acute as before;
the crepitating rale continues; rust-coloured, viscid expectoration.
Bry. 3 /» i n water, a dose every two hours. The same evening the
pulse fell to 90 ; the expectoration lost its viscidity and rust-colour.
The next morning it was ascertained that the night had been passed
chiefly in sleep; the pain of the side almost gone; respiratory
sounds natural; very little fever. The next night the boy slept
well, and in the morning was quite lively. Having exposed himself
too much he had a shivering fit at noon; the fever, pain in side,
cough, rust-coloured sputa and crepitating rale returned. Phos. 3 /„,
in water, a dose every two hours. The next day all these symptoms
bad disappeared, and his recovery was rapid.—Charge, Rev. Horn.
vol. I., p. 427.)
A girl, aged 10, of strong constitution, experienced in the morning
a violent rigor, followed by heat, fever, cough day and night. She was
seen next morning. She lies on her back; is anxious, constantly com¬
plaining ; burning fever; skin dry; pulse full, 120; pain below the right
breast, extending all over the right side of the chest, aggravated by
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Clinical Record.
coughing, inspiration, and the touch; frequent cough, with expec¬
toration of transparent, viscid rust-coloured sputa; slight dyspnoea;
dull sound on percussion posteriorly all over the inferior lobe of the
right lung; no sound on auscultation at that part. Aeon. s /ia in water,
a dose every three hours. In the evening slight perspiration mani¬
fested itself; the night was bad; no sleep; the patient noisy; very
restless; respiration more impeded; incessant cough; sputa difficult
of expulson, and of a deep rust-colour, adhering to the vessel; much
acute pain in the side; dull sound under the right nipple, and pos¬
teriorly up to the spine of the scapula; crepitating rale in the same
place ; pulse frequent and full; skin covered with Bweat. Bry. */*,
in water, a dose every two hours. The day was passed in the same
state. At night delirium; dulness on percussion increased; respi¬
ration accelerated; frequent cough, with expectoration of very viscid
and rusty sputa; pain of the side slightly amended; great anxiety
and restlessness. Phos. 3 / K in water, a dose every two hours. In
the afternoon there was perspiration and rest. The following day
great improvement; the child had slept well; no pain in the side;
the sputa no longer tinged with blood; respiration not so quick;
mucous rale; pulse scarcely febrile. To have beef-tea. The next
day (6th of the disease) percussion elicits a normal sound; the sputa
are rare, white and mucous; pulse normal; natural heat of skin;
mucous Tale; discharge behind the ears. Suph. 2 / M . On the 8th
day the child was perfectly well.— (Ibid. p. 433.)
A coachman, aged 35, of feeble constitution, but usually enjoying
good health, was attacked a week before with the influenza then pre¬
valent. The day previous to being seen he felt a violent rigor, soon
followed by burning heat, forcing him to keep in bed. Seen the
next day he was found' lying on his back; face red; headache;
lustrous eyes, frequent cough, rapid respiration; acute pain on both
sides of the chest, worst about the level of the ninth, tenth, and
eleventh ribs of the left side; pulse quick; skin hot and dry;
tongue yellowish; belly soft; no stool for two days; no expectoration.
Aeon. 6, one drop in water, a dose every two hours. The next day
intense fever, with less dryness of skin; respiration quick; frequent
cough; sputa of a deep rust-colour, adhering to the vessel; dull
sound on the left side anteriorly from the clavicle to the level of the
heart, and posteriorly in the supra and infra-spinous fossee; crepi¬
tating rale below the clavicle and under the axilla; acute pain in
the side much increased by inspiration. Bry. 12, a drop in water, a
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dose every two hours. The third day the state was the same. The
cough occasioned pain in the head as if it would burst, and was very
frequent; difficult expectoration of viscid, rusty sputa. Nux v. */*>
at once, the rest of the day Aeon. 4 /, a as before.—4th day. Delirium
during the night; desponding expression; greater difficulty of breath¬
ing; sputa orange-coloured, very copious; pulse incompressible; com¬
plete dulness in the superior half of the left side of the chest; bron¬
chial respiration posteriorly and under the axilla; pain greater than
ever; no stool. Bry. 4 /u in water, a spoonful every two hours.—
5th day. Stupor and unconsciousness to such a degree that he did
not know the doctor; the head drawn backwards; pulse weak and
quick; great dryness of mouth; slight epistaxis; frequent cough,
which he tries in vain to suppress, with orange and saffron-coloured
sputa; mucous ride all over the chest; difficult deglutition; little
urine; no stool. Bell. 3 /, a In the afternoon, amelioration of the
head symptoms; he has recovered consciousness; he complains of a
violent pain all over the chest; the dyspnoea is great; pulse feeble,
and very frequent; no heat of skin; great despondency; he thinks
he is dying. Phos. 4 /w—6th day. Same state. Phos. 3 / a4 —?th
day. Sputa dirty grey-coloured; great alteration of the features;
coldness of the face and limbs ; insensible pulse ^threatened suffoca¬
tion; cold and viscid sweats. Sulph. 3 / 3 o, beef-tea.—8th day. •
General condition improved, but face still livid, body cold; the sputa
which had ceased have now returned of a deep, rust colour; great
dyspnoea. Phos. 3 / ia , beef-tea.—9th day. Sputa viscid but white ;
less oppression; pulse stronger and slower. Sulph. 3 /», beef-tea.—
10th day. Slept well last night; pulse 80; mucous rale throughout
the chest; the lung dilates posteriorly and anteriorly ; cough seldom,
with insignificant expectoration, smiling countenance. Beef-tea.—
On the 16th day he was able to resume his occupation.— {Ibid. p.
437.)
MISCELLANEOUS.
The Physiological action of the Essential Oil of Bitter
Oranges.
An essay with the above title, by Dr. Imbart Gourbeyr, has
recently appeared in France. We propose, with the assistance of
our contemporary the Journal de la SociSti Gallicane , in whose
ty Google
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Miscellaneous .
pages a very fall analysis of it appears, to give an abstract of it.
We may premise that from the internal evidence of the work it is
evidently written by a believer in homoeopathy. It is, probably, for
we have no precise information on the subject, the inaugural essay
of some aspirant to the degree of M.D., who, convinced of the neces¬
sity of advancing therapeutics by means of the Hahnemannio method
of physiological experimentation, has yet abstained from making a
confession of hiB belief in the heretical doctrines of homoeopathy, and
has disguised his heterodox opinions for fear of offending the preju¬
dices of his allopathic examiners.
But without further prelude we shall proceed to the examination
of the essay itself, which possesses intrinsic merits to recommend it
to our notice, whichever school the author may belong to.
Dr. Gourbeyr remarks that the essential oil of the orange tribe is
very much used. It enters into the composition of many phar¬
maceutic preparations, among the rest the infusion of orange-leaves,
the distilled water of orange-flowers, &c.
The particular species of orange to which his observations refer is
a bitter orange, called in France chinois , the citrus vulgaris chinensis t
of which there is a considerable trade in France. Our author’s
observations of the action of the essential oil were made on the
persons employed at Clermont in peeling the oranges. They are
forty-one in number. Of these the following four are the most
interesting.
“ Obs. 1.—Leboeuf, a woman aged 47, was employed at the work
for eight years. In 1850 she was more particularly affected by her
occupation; she had two serious attacks, which forced her to give
up the work; but before that she had always experienced more or
less the action of the oranges upon her health; she had never been
able to work among them without suffering to a certain extent. At
the period mentioned she experienced the following symptoms:—
confusion in the head; weakness of sight; pyrosis; nausea accom¬
panied by headache; sleep disturbed; cramps and general itching of
the skin; occasional eruptions of pimples all over the body ; pimples
red, of the size of small pin’s heads, not suppurating, but bleeding
when scratched. Besides these pimples, she frequently had red
patches of the size of a shilling; great weakness in all the extremi¬
ties, especially the arms. On. one occasion the left hand swelled.
This swelling, accdmpanied by itching, lasted a fortnight, and only
subsided on leaving off work. She experienced such a degree of
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491
activity in her limbs, that once engaged in work, she laboured, so to
speak, in an irresistible manner; she frequently felt drawing puns
and horripilations. On re-engaging in the work in 1849, in spite
of her natural repugnance to it, she was always the first at the
workshop. After a few days she became sleepless, and felt a great
wish to abandon her occupation. She continued to get worse and
worse. As soon as she entered the factory, she was affected with
suffocative feeling and perspiration. She was forced to open the
windows, and at the same time she felt nausea and itching. For a
fortnight before her attacks she had convulsive spasms of the left
side of the face, similar to those often noticed in children. These
convulsions lasted for about two minutes, and occurred fifty times a
day. At last, feeling herself always growing worse, she left off
working, and remained at home. Two days afterwards she expe¬
rienced an extreme degree of activity. Being engaged in the
morning in washing clothes, she found that the more 6he washed the
more she wished to wash; she could not stop. She was then taken
with a general trembling, and fell down. All her body was con¬
vulsed, but chiefly the left side of the face, and her shoulders were
very much affected. She scraped the ground with her feet, and
knocked over everything. She never, however, lost consciousness.
This attack lasted a quarter of an hour, and she remained doubled
up all day long. The following day she had a similar attack,
excited by putting her hands in water. This was at the commence¬
ment of December, 1849. She continued poorly all the winter, and
was unable to go out for four months. She felt great fatigue and
constant sleeplessness. The least exertion made her worse; she
wept incessantly, and imagined herself lame. Frequent drawings in
the limbs, she was obliged to stretch herself much. She had often
headache, and heat in the abdomen. Since that time she did not
work at the orange-peeling trade, and all the symptoms declined.
Even now the mere odour of the bitter oranges makes her feel ill.
“ Obs. 2.—Descotes, a woman aged 32, has worked for more
than two years at the bitter-orange-peeling business. About two
years ago she was forced to leave off work for a fortnight, her head
was so severely affected, and she sent for me. Ever since she has
been engaged in the work she has suffered in her head, and when she
resumes her work she always gets worse. She also suffers much
from her teeth ; seven or eight of them have decayed and broken
down. The pains extend into her tongue with shootings and noise in
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Miscellaneous.
her ears. Sometimes she felt, for an instant, drawing pains in the
face ; her nose was drawn to one side, and she had spasmodic move¬
ments under the eyes, which were perceived by her fellow-workers.
She groaned frequently without having the power to stop herself.
She was constantly feeling as if something suffocated her. Palpita¬
tion of the heart; rising'in the throat, which seemed to choke her.
When she went back to work the first day she vomited or felt
extreme nausea; besides which, she had loss of appetite and great
thirst. Every evening on coming home, she complained of her head
and stomach; had rigors on going to bed, and when she got hot, she
was very restless and threw off the clothes. She slept little, and
often started up out of her sleep. Drawings in the limbs, especially
at night, or whenever she was annoyed; cramps in the legs ; horri¬
pilations. The first year she had nothing in her hands; the second,
the left hand became swollen, red, without pimples or itching. This
caused her no pain, but it hindered her in her movements. She has
not worked at the orange-peeling for five months, but she still has
headache and toothache, though in a less degree. She sleeps well
now. She was confined on the 26th February; she had quitted her
work six weeks previously. Tedious confinement; the child died
after four days in convulsions; its face was distorted. She has
already lost five children, but none of them died of convulsions.
Were it not that she can get no other employment she would leave
off her present occupation.
“ Obs. 3.—M£ge, aged 27, has worked for four years at the
bitter-orange business. The first three years she felt no ill effects,
except a little headache, as if she had been intoxicated. In October,
1851, she re-commenced her work, and carried it on for two or three
months. She had never before worked at it so long at a time.
Brought to bed in March, the infant had more than thirty attacks of
epileptiform convulsions, which occurred as often as ten times a day.
It died of them. Her eldest child, a boy of eight years, had never
had convulsions. Headache, with intoxicated feeling; pain in the
temples, especially on the right side ; often obliged to go out to get
the fresh air; noise like bells in the ears. All the teeth are painful;
toothache on the right side. The last time she worked she was
forced to put in two plugs of opium, which relieved her. She has
twice had slight convulsions in the face; her-lips tremble; drawings
in the face, which only last for a minute. Sensation of choking;
frequent, irresistible yawning; fatigue of the limbs; drawings in
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the arms; horripilations; she often puts her hands behind her back,
and twists hen hands about. The day before yesterday she wished
to resume her work, which she had left off for a month. She was
only able to work in the morning: she was forced to give it up.
She felt as if she should be suffocated; severe headache; drawings
in the limbs; pain in the jaws. She will not again work among the
oranges.
“ Obs. 5.—Andan, a woman aged 52, was only engaged at the work
for a single winter, five years ago. For three months her hands and
fore-arms swelled, became red, and exuding. She could not flex her
fingers, and they itched so much at night that she could not sleep.
Her children had to get up in the middle of the night and rub
grease upon the affected parts, which gave her some relief. Scabs
formed betwixt the fingers, and on the internal aspect of the fore-arm,
in patches. She constantly twisted about her hands and arms to
relieve the itching. The lobe of both ears became swollen and red
for eight days. The eruption lasted all the winter, and her suffer¬
ings were constant. Last year she wished to resume her occupation,
but she had not done so more than a week, when the eruption re¬
appeared ; she then consulted a medical man, and by his advice gave
up the work.
“ To the preceding observations, I may add another, not less in¬
teresting. It is a letter from M. Gamier Sibillat, a confectioner in
Marseilles. ‘I beg you to eommunicate to M. Imbart the infor¬
mation I am able to afford him on the subject of the bitter oranges.
The women who peel them have often headaches and nervous symp¬
toms. The strong smell is very bad. To escape as much as possible
being affected by it, they have to peel the oranges in the open air;
and as soon as they are peeled they remove them. I observe that
those women who are nursing cannot peel the oranges: if they do,
the infant gets convulsions, or dysentery; in fact, they cannot do so
until they have weaned the baby. In order to avoid the swelling of
the hands, they take the precaution to wrap pieces of cloth round the
ends of their fingers; but notwithstanding that, some of them get
swelling of the hands, especially when they peel the first oranges,
which are always the hardest, and have the most powerful odour.
Some of the women become so nervous, that they are obliged, on
that account, to abandon their work.’
“ In analyzing all the observations I have collected, I can now give
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Miscellaneous.
a general table of the symptoms produced in our . workpeople by the
toxical agent of the oranges.
“ They are liable to headache: sometimes all over the head,
sometimes confined to a part of it; sometimes it is pressive and
frontal; and sometimes it is a kind of intoxication, accompanied by
vertigo ; at other times, it is an extremely characteristic hemicrania,
most frequently on the right side. This headache is often accompa¬
nied by nausea, and even vomiting.
“ There occur also real facial neuralgias; sometimes general,
sometimes confined to the temples, with lancinating or gnawing
pains. They, also, are most frequently on the right side. Sometimes
these pains are real persisting odontalgias, accompanied by caries,
and destruction of the teeth. The sight is sometimes simply
weakened. There are frequently noises in the ears, like the sound
of bells, or of a mill, but unaccompanied by deafness. Once I
observed swelling and redness of the lobes of the ears.
“ In some cases there are drawings on one side of the face; a sort
of epileptiform convulsion frequently occurring. Sometimes there is
suffocation; oppression of the chest; painful sense of choking at
the upper part of the sternum; sometimes strangling sensation in
the throat, and pleurodynia. Almost always there are frequent and-
uncontrollable yawnings; and in the stomach uneasiness, pyrosis,
weight; frequent eructations and thirst.
“The sleep is generally much disturbed. Sleep with dreams;
starting up awake; inability to find a comfortable position; and-
buraing heat. Complaints are made of starting up in bed, and
inability to sleep.
“ The extremities are the seat of drawings; of horripilations, with'
desire to stretch the legs, and to twist about the hands. The whole -
muscular system is affected. Sometimes there is general contraction-
and weight on the shoulders; general, more frequently partial
cramps; cramp-like pain in the wrists; general excitement; rapid,
motion. They work with desperate rapidity, which they cannot
control. I have also observed a general trembling, with semi-lateral
epileptiform convulsions. The jerkings and muscular agitation occur
by day as well as by night.
“ There are, besides, itching, either general, or partial. In the
latter case confined to the superior extremities, with swelling and
redness of the hands; also eruptions of red patches on various parts
of the body, or vesicular eruptions all over the arm, chiefly on the
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hands and betwixt the fingers, and occasionally an erysipelatous
swelling of the face. .1 ,
“ Of all the symptoms, the most frequent are the headache and
neuralgic pains in the face; the noise in the ears; the yawnings;
the gastcalgia; the oppression of the chest; the drawings in the
limbs ; the nocturnal agitation; the swelling and eruptions, on the
dun. :
“ This general table of symptoms is the faithful resumi of twenty-
nine observations. Among forty-one individuals, twelve experienced
no symptoms; and yet in these, twelve, the average of years during
which they were engaged in the work is greater than in the, rest.
Thus, three women had worked for 15 years; two for 12 years; and
two ethers for 9 and 4 consecutive years. Like the others, they had
worked in close rooms. Thus there were about one. quarter of the
workwomen who shewed themselves.to be insensible.to. the action of
the essential oiL. ,. ,,
. V. Although no accidents occurred from this species of poisoning
so serious, as to. endanger life, we may judge of their gravity by the
large number who. refused to continue the work, for of the 2,9 who
experienced the action of the essential oil, 15 left off completely in
consequence of the symptoms they felt, that, is to say, nearly one-
half. Others stated that, necessity alone obliged them to continue
at the occupation.
“ in four work-women we observed epileptiform convulsions on
one side of the face. Two of them . having been employed during
pregnancy, lost their children by convulsions, shortly after they were
born. I am induced, to attribute this, to the action of the essential
oiL; and I am confirmed in this opinion by M. Gamier-Sibillat of
Marseilles, who assured me that women engaged in nursing, cpuld
not peel the oranges without observing that their infants were sub¬
ject to convulsions and to dysentery.
“ The accidents experienced by the work-women are of two kinds;
the first, the various forma of nervous, symptoms;. secondly, the cuta¬
neous symptoms or eruptions* The nervous symptoms were the
most eommon; they were very often accompanied; by, eruptions on
tbs "skin, but almost always they were the predominating accidents.
In some cases, on, the contrary, the eruptions,, swellings, and itching
were the sole phenomena, unaccompanied by notable nervous
affections*
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Miscellaneous.
“ The slighter symptoms of poisoning almost always went off
when the patients left off working; the more serious ones some¬
times lasted for several months afterwards.”
The author then enters on a comparison of the symptoms caused
by the essential oil of bitter oranges, with those produced by cam¬
phor, and finds a great analogy between them. For the pathogenetic
effects of camphor he refers to the experiments of Alexander of
Edinburgh, of Dr. Young, and of the adherents of the homoeopathic
school. The latter he considers merit complete confidence, as they
were made with material doses of camphor.
He next passes on to the examination of the therapeutic employ¬
ment that has been made of orange leaves, and of the distilled water
of orange flowers. Then' comparing this therapeutic action with the
physiological action of the essential oil, he says:—
“ Here, then, is an agent which in the healthy organism produces
spasmodic affections, and which, on the other hand, cures analogous
diseases. We are at first astonished at this singular coincidence;
but the relations more or less marked existing between the disease
produced and the similar malady cured by the same agent, have not
escaped the attention of physicians of all ages. They have even
formed the basis of medical doctrines or systems; they have been
formulized under the name of a law. This law, called the law of
similitude, of substitution, or homoeopathic law, which might be more
appropriately termed law of analogy, seems to hold good in the case
of a large number of medicines. This law is after all only the ex¬
pression of well known facts, for, as M. Trousseau has well remarked,
‘ the homoeopathic doctrine, as a doctrine, certainly does not deserve
the ridicule which has been justly bestowed on the therapeutic prac¬
tices of the homoeopathists. When Hahnemann enunciated this
therapeutic principle, similia similibus curantur, he proved his maxim
by adducing facts derived from the practice of the most enlightened
physicians.’ Besides it was Hippocrates who first formulized the
principle; Hahnemann in generalizing it, only took us back to
the Greeks. It, therefore, belongs completely to medical tradition.
Is it as general and universal as the German reformer asserts it to
be? In the present state of our knowledge, this thesis does not
appear to me to be sufficiently proved, numerous as are the facts in
its favour. However, it is not my aim to discuss this question:
accident has put it in my power to verify the law of similitude in the
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case of one of the most frequently used medicines in our materia
medica; I believe I have sufficiently'demonstiated it. Opposed as I
am to any exclusive system, I am a sincere partisan of medical eclec¬
ticism, with no confidence in anything but experimental medicine.
I seek truth in facts, and not in preconceived ideas, which are over¬
turned one day to be reconstructed the next.
“ En resumS, I think I am entitled to draw from my memoir the -
following conclusions :—1st. The essential oil of bitter orapges
developes in the healthy organism some affections sut generis , certain
special symptoms. 2nd. These symptoms are of two kinds: on the
.one hand, local phenomena characterized by eruptions of various
kinds; on the other, nervous phenomena, such as headache, facial
neuralgia, noises in the ears, oppression of the chest, gastralgia,
horripilations, restlessness and sleeplessness by night, and even epi¬
leptiform convulsions. 3rd. The action of the volatile principle of
the oranges bears a great resemblance to that of camphor. 4th. This
essential oil seems to be subject to the law of substitution or simili¬
tude.”
. The above remarks will, doubtless, be read with interest. The
author, if not exactly a homceopathist in disguise, has evidently pro¬
fited by his knowledge of the doctrines of Hahnemann, and his
thorough conversion to homoeopathy is only a question of time and
experience. The employment of bitter oranges in this country in
the manufacture of marmalade is very extensive, and we are curious
to know if those employed in peeling and cutting up the skins are
liable to any or all of the affections so graphically described by our
author. We are glad to observe that the Society of Arts has formed
a committee for the purpose of inquiring into what they term Indus-
• trial Pathology, meaning the diseases incident to different trades. If
their scheme is carried out, we doubt not their labours will go far to
enrich our pathogenetic knowledge, and among other things, we
shall probably soon have a more profound knowledge of the effects
of the oil of bitter oranges on the work-people engaged in their
manipulation.
Cold as a Local Anaesthetic Agent.
Owing to the occasional deaths that have occurred from the em¬
ployment of chloroform, Dr. Amott has been for some time pressing
vol. xm, no. mi.— jcly 1855. 2 k
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Miscellaneous.
on the attention of the profession the use of refrigerating mixtures as
a safe and exceedingly efficacious means for depriving parts of their
sensibility. It appears that it does not destroy the sensibility much
deeper than the skin, hut as the incision of the skin causes much
more pain than that of the flesh, great suffering is saved. The
following is a simple illustrative case :•
“ I was consulted a few days back by a gentleman between 30 and
40 years of age, of a highly nervous temperament, concerning a
tumour situated over the right clavicle, and which required removal.
It was just one of those cases in which on the one hand, a surgeon
would not have sanctioned the use of chloroform ; and on the other,
the patient would have protested against anything being done unless
it could be accomplished without pain. The tumour was of a
sebaceous character, as large as a walnut; had been gradually in¬
creasing for two or three years, and gave him inconvenience during
every movement of the arm. On informing my patient that chloro¬
form (to which he was much averse), would be attended with risk,
but that the removal of the tumour could be effected with safety and
without pain by the previous application of cold, his nervous anxiety
subsided, and he consented to the operation. I mixed together two
parts of pounded Wenham Lake ice, and one part of salt, and put
them in a common white pocket handkerchief, and kept the mixture
pressed on and around the tumour during the space of one minute,
by the watch. The integument that was submitted directly to the
action of the cold, became remarkably corrugated. It was then cut
into, and the tumour removed without the slightest sensation of pain,
and much to the astonishment and delight of the patient, who said
that the only thing that annoyed him, and that not much, was the
burning sensation of the application. No vessel required ligature;
the bleeding, in fact, being very trivial; and the wound had healed
at the end of the week.” (Reported by Mr. Ward, Medical Times
and Gazette, September 2nd, 1854.)
Various freezing mixtures may be used, and these may be enclosed
in a fine oiled silk bag, or metal case. It is said to be quite success¬
ful in preventing the pain of tooth drawing. In addition to its
anaesthetic power, Dr. Arnott considers that it has another advantage
—that of diminishing the risk of local inflammation after an operation.
What, a priori, would be supposed as a probable result of the
application of cold, proves to have no existence. Instead of setting
up violent inflammation, it averts it. In paronychia, boils and
carbuncles, such an ansesthetic agent may be of great value.
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The following is a summary of the benefits derivable from local
anaesthesia produced by congelation, given by Mr. Blundell, a
surgeon-dentist, in a pamphlet just published :—
1st.—We can, by it, now accomplish the painless extraction of
teeth, without the loss of consciousness, and without danger to life.
2nd.—It not only obviates the nervous shock of the operation
itself, but it also dispenses with the injurious effects of the circulation
of a poison through the system, as in etherization.
3rd.—Under its influence some of the most unmanageable, dif¬
ficult and painful dental operations are rendered the most painless.
4th.—The patient retaining consciousness, though insensible to
pain, is able to preserve a far greater degree of composure and
quietness than when under the influence of any other anaesthetic
agent.
5th.—The rigidity of the muscles of the jaw, and the consequent
difficulty of keeping the mouth open, so universally experienced
under anaethesia by chloroform, are entirely superseded. We have,
in short, the additional advantage of the will of the patient.
6th.—The amount of time occupied in the induction of insensibility
by chloroform, and in the recovery to consciousness afterwards, with
all the inconveniences attending the passiveness of the state, are
saved both to dentist and patient.
7th.—The expense incurred in the use of cold for anaesthetic
purposes, is less than that of chloroform.
8th.—It checks undue haemorrhage after extraction. It is rarely
that haemorrhage after tooth extraction proves fatal. The occurrence
may be said to be almost an impossibility under this new anaesthetic.
9th.—-Fewer complications arise as the sequelae of tooth extraction
than either under chloroform, or without any anaesthetic; the anti¬
phlogistic properties of cold being repressive of inflammation and
irritation. Recoveries tire more speedy and certain.
10th.—It is of great efficacy in scurvy of the gums, and similar
haemorrhagic affections of the mouth.
11th.—It may be the means of preventing a vast amount of con¬
stitutional disease resulting from delay, through dread of pain.
12.—The application of cold is highly serviceable in many cases of
acute toothache.
The apparatus used by Mr. Blundell appears to possess decided
advantages over the ordinary means of applying cold. It can be had
at Messrs. Horne & Thomthwaite’s, 123, Newgate Street, London.
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500
Miscellaneous.
Influence of Vaccination.
Attempts are being made at the present moment in various quarters
to discredit vaccination as a preventive of small-pox. We have in a
former number alluded to the m{mifesto of Bonninghausen,* and his
select clique, and now we have before us a pamphlet by Dr. Lutze,
of Ccethen,f published with the same object, viz.: to induce the
governments of Europe rather to discourage, and even to forbid
vaccination, than to encourage it. We will readily grant what these
authors insist so strongly upon;—that vaccination does not invariably
protect from small-pox; that its protective influence in many cases only
extends over a few years; and we may grant that in some cases, when
vaccine lymph has been taken from the arm of a diseased child, cer¬
tain maladies may have been communicated to the inoculated infant.
But all these accidents, which have been enormously exaggerated by
Dr. Lutze, would not induce us to reject vaccination, if it can be
shewn that by its means the ravages of small-pox have been con¬
siderably checked. That such is the case we think has been over
and over again sufficiently proved. As, however, the statistics on
this subject may not be remembered by many of our readers, we do
not hesitate to re-produce here the results of the investigations of a
parliamentary committee appointed to make enquiries upon this
subject in 1853.
1. —To prove the influence of vaccination in England.
Out of every 1000 deaths in the half-century from 1750 to 1800,
there were from small pox .. .. .. 96
Out of every 1000 deaths in the half-century from 1800 to 1850,
there were from small-pox .. .. .. 35
Either small-pox has become naturally milder, or is treated more
successfully ; or the mortality from it has been diminished by vacci¬
nation. That the last is the true cause can be proved from independent
evidence.
2. — To prove the influence of vaccination on the Continent.
In various German states, sufficient evidence can be obtained
to show, that before vaccination was used, out of every 1000
deaths there occurred from small pox .. .. 66-5
After vaccination there occurred .. .. .. 7‘26
* See p. 171.
f La vaccination est non seulement inutile mais dangereuse, par Arthur
Lutze, M.D.; traduit par Ch. F. Zimpel, M.D.
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Influence of Vaccination.
501
3 .—To prove that in countries where vaccination is most perfectly
carried out , small-pox is least mortal.
(a) In this country, where vaccination is voluntary, and frequently
neglected:
Deaths from
small-pox.
Deaths from
all causes.
London
• •
16
1000
Birmingham ..
• •
16-6 ..
**
Leeds
• •
17*5 ..
99
England and Wales
• #
21-9 ..
Paisley
• •
18
»
Edinburgh
• •
19-4 ..
99
Perth
• a
25
99
Glasgow
a •
36
99
Dublin
• a
25-66 ..
99
Galway
• a
35
99
Limerick
• •
41
99
Connaught
• a
60
99
All Ireland ..
• •
49
99
(b) In other countries,
where vaccination is more or less com
pulsory:
Westphalia ..
Deaths from
small-pox.
6
Deaths from
all causes.
1000
Saxony
8-33 . :
99
Rhenish Provinces
3-75 ..
99
Pomerania ..
5-25 ..
99
Lower Austria
6
99
Bohemia
2
99
Lombardy
2 ..
Venice
2-2
99
Sweden
2-7
99
Bavaria
4
99
There can be little doubt that the immense difference apparent in
these two tables is justly attributed to vaccination .—Report on Small¬
pox and Vaccination. Parliamentary Paper, 3rd May , 1853.
This paper satisfactorily proves that since the introduction of vac¬
cination, the mortality from small-pox has decreased in a most
remarkable degree; and further, that the mortality is smallest in
those countries where vaccination has been most generally employed.
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502
Miscellaneous.
The vast proportional diminution of cases and deaths from small-pox
exhibited in those countries where vaccination is compulsory, com¬
pared with our own country, where it is voluntary, induced the
legislature of England last year to pass an act making vaccination
compulsory in England also. The failure of this act to produce that
universal vaccination so much to be desired, is, we think, by no
means a matter for congratulation, as the opponents of vaccination
seem to regard it.
It is undoubtedly the general impression among medical men, that
vaccination is not nearly so effectual a preventative now as it was
when first introduced. This we believe to be the fact. In place,
however, of viewing it as a ground for the total rejection of vac¬
cination, we are more disposed to regard it as a reason for investigating
into the causes of this comparative failure of modem vaccination.
It is quite possible that the lymph may degenerate by passing through
a number of individuals, and the disease it excites be no longer
capable of protecting absolutely from the influence of variola. If
this be the case, perhaps it would be well to discourage vaccination
with lymph obtained at many removes from the original source, and
to insist upon the use of pure natural vaccine lymph obtained from
the cow, either in the natural disease, or in that excited artificially
by inoculation of the cow with the matter of human variola. Or it
might be worth inquiring into the accuracy of those remarkable alle¬
gations of Dr. Bossu, of which we gave an account in a recent
number,* relative to the transmutation of variolous into vaccine lymph
by its admixture with cow’s milk.
As regards Dr. Lutze’s proposal to substitute for vaccination the
administration of a globule of the 30th dilution of varioline , we put
small faith in the efficacy of that measure ; and even were it as suc¬
cessful as we believe it to be futile, we do not see how matters could
thereby be improved; for if vaccine lymph is to be rejected on
account of its supposed impurity, occasioned by transmission through
human beings, we do not see how variolous matter can be a bit more
pure, as it is obtained also from human beings, who may have all
sorts of latent psoric taints lurking in their system, which might be
as readily communicated to the variolous as to the vaccine matter.
If the dose of varioline, 30, can have any influence on the consti¬
tution so as to render it fit to resist small-pox infection, it is hardly
* Vol. xii. p. 687.
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What has Chemistry done for Dietetics ?
503
to be supposed but that the psoric taints contained in it may have
their evil influence on the patient’s system.
To our mind, all this outcry about the ineffioacy and danger of
vaccination is absurd ; and we believe that if the medical man take mo¬
derate care in ascertaining the purity of the source whence his vaccine
lymph is derived, and above all, if he can procure it at not many
removes from the natural cow-pox, he will be able to protect bis pa¬
tients by vaccination as well as they have ever been protected since
Jenner’s time.
What has Chemistry done for Dietetics ?
The weakness of the human intellect is more strikingly shewn in
this branch of learning than any other, because from the earliest
times it has attracted the attention of all investigators of nature and
appliers of science; and the further we go back the more positive is
the profession of knowledge on points in which ignorance is now con¬
fessed. So convinced were the chymiatric schools of Paracelsus of
the value of their “ fermentation theory,” that they carried it from
the physiological process of digestion into the explanation ol the
whole circuit of life, normal and morbid. We have been witnesses
of a somewhat more modest attempt in our own day. Though
romance has ceased, and zeal cooled, we still see many lives of
animals, and many lifetimes of men, given almost wholly to this sub¬
ject—and with what result ? That which to-day seems established
by the most irrefragable experiment is to-morrow rendered doubt¬
ful by equally clear observations.
Penelope’s fingers are completely outdone. Well, indeed, may
Dr. Lehmann remark, that such experience should more than any
other a dm onish us to be reserved in our judgment upon those results
of researches which appear even absolutely certain. Might not the
existence of lactic acid in the gastric juice have been so character¬
ized? Yet has Professor Schmidt “shewn” (as chemists say) its
absence under many circumstances, and the presence of free muri¬
atic, while we see M. Blondlot coming back again to his former
belief in the acid phosphate of lime, though the incorrectness of this
has been asserted by the best chemists of the day. Who could have
expected, after M. Bernard’s recent experiments on the influence of
the vagus over digestion, that this influence was to be denied, or at
least rendered doubtful? Frenchmen see fat resolved into fatty
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504
Miscellaneous.
acids and glycerine by the contract of the pancreatic juice, while
Germans can scarcely make out that an emulsion of the two sub¬
stances take place. Candidly, now, is there among the chaos of
different opinions offered by observers any final cause by which to
explain the action and intention of the pouring of bile into the intes¬
tines? Who could have foreseen, from the state of our present
knowledge, that an isolated coil of intestines with a little alkali in¬
side it, would be in a condition to digest muscle? In short, the
intestinal canal exhibits itself to us as the theatre of a host of most
mysterious performances, yet still
“ Before the gate
Our spirits stand disconsolate.”
These considerations may fairly prevent us from wondering at the
very little advance which the science of dietetics proper has made,
and the little advantage which has accrued to it from the growth of
other sciences. A few of the results of old experience have been
confirmed, a few rendered doubtful; empirical observation has been
sometimes put in the right path; but, in truth, a conscientious writer
on this subject is reduced to make a most meagre affair of the real
practical part of it. And even then a greater portion of his pages is
taken up with pointing out what modern science might ascertain,
' than with what it has actually discovered- Stout books, it is
true, are written upon the subject, but the smallest part of them is
that which is named in the title-page.— (Brit, and For. Med. Chir.
Rev., October, 1853, p. 403.)
The Edinburgh Homoeopathic Dispensary.
In the general decline into pecuniary embarrassments of the
wholly gratuitous homoeopathic dispensaries, it is highly gratifying to
exhibit one example of an opposite description; and when we con-
' sider that the enormous number of patients are attended to by only
two physicians, we cannot too strongly express our admiration at
their exertions.
Repobt. —In presenting their Eighth Annual Report, the Com¬
mittee have to congratulate the subscribers on the increasing useful¬
ness of the Edinburgh Homoeopathic Dispensary. It has been open
during the year every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday,
from two to three o’clock. The number of patients applying for
relief in the course of this year has been 2,522—shewing an increase
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Acute Rheumatic Inflammation, &c.
505
of 201 above the last year; and thus nearly 25,000 patients have
been attended to at this dispensary since its opening in 1841.
While the patients themselves, appreciating the benefit received
from this institution, have begun to add more considerably to the
funds of it, the Committee have at the same time to acknowledge
with gratitude the liberal contributions from the subscribers during
the past year; they have thus not only been enabled to discharge
arrears of debt to the amount of £ 30, but have now a balance on
hand. Their hope is, that the same liberality being continued in
future may encourage them to regard the broadening of the basis of
this Institution, so long desired, as not now far distant.
The Committee have to record their warmest thanks to the
physicians for their unwearied, arduous, and willing services, for
which it is gratifying to find that the prosperous state of the institu¬
tion is regarded as an abundant compensation; and it may hardly
be necessary to mention, that while patients attending the dispensary
are invited to contribute something, however little, to the funds on
which it depends, the physicians will also gladly continue giving
advice, &c. &c., to their numerous applicants as heretofore.
Acute Rheumatic Inflammation as affected by Rest.
It seems a subject not unworthy of clinical inquiry, but which I
do not think has received investigation, whether the tendency to
acute inflammations, as a consequence of rheumatic fever, is not
developed principally in those persons who have disobeyed the
warning to keep quiet, which the pain caused by motion so feelingly
preaches to them. Our young patients, who will not be controlled,
and our pioor patients, who are unwilling or unable to give up work,
are certainly those in whom we most commonly find the various
degrees of these inflammatory lesions. My own experience, limited
as it is, of rheumatic fever among the upper ranks, certainly makes
me fear pericarditis less in them than in the frequenters of hospitals,
which has led me to think that the “ comfortable classes ” are little
liable; while life insurers, who may be taken as a type of the
“prudent classes ” when they confess to having had rheumatic fever,
scarcely ever have any sure symptom to relate of chest affection, or
any marks to exhibit of having been treated for it. The power
then and the will to keep quiet at the commencement of acute
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506
Miscellaneous.
rheumatism, seem to me the great preventives of secondary inflam¬
mations.
Though it does not come strictly under the present head, I cannot
forbear drawing attention to the frequency with which this same
tendency (to become locally inflamed in consequence of motion) is
exhibited throughout the whole persons of those affected with rheu¬
matic fever. The localization of the rheumatic action in one or
more points, and the putting on of sthenic, and then of disorganizing
inflammation, occurs by far the most often in those who, through
wilfulness, ignorance or necessity,- have made the greatest efforts to
war against pain, and keep about in spite of it. I believe most
practical observers agree with me in this, yet strange to say, it is
scarcely noticed by writers on the subject. We find great varieties
of treatment recommended, by which we flatter ourselves we some¬
what reduce the duration of the distemper; but we never feel quite
happy while employing any, for each has, at some time, received the
reproach of doing harm while it relieves the immediate pain. The
pupils of Sydenham used to feel great comfort in seeing their sick
easier after bloodletting, till Dr. Todd told them that they increased
thereby the liability to pericarditis; colchicum made both patient
and practitioner joyful, till a suspicion was started that the anaemia
which so often occurs in gouty and rheumatic constitutions, was due
to the soothing drug. And so on, throughout the list. We use
them all, but we use them as two-edged tools. Not such is rest;
it cannot injure, and I believe does more to prevent ill consequences
of rheumatic fever than any other treatment. He who would spend
time in making this humble anodyne and prophylactic generally-
known would deserve the gratitude of society. Recommendations
of it ad clerum are, it may be hoped, superfluous; but unless we
enquire, we should hardly guess how wide spread among the laity is
the idea, “ that all pain, especially gouty and rheumatic pain, should
be fought against to the utmost, and that rest is a temptation to be
resisted.” *
Friction in obstinate Chlorosis.
In ordinary practice iron and its various preparations are considered
indispensable for the cure of chlorosis. But in certain cases it
* Dr. Chambers, Decennium Pathologicum. Brit, and For. Med. Chir.
Rev. xxiv. p. 494.
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The Puff Indirect. 607
entirely fails, produces no benefit, and 1 if persevered with induces
congestion of the viscera, especially of the lungs, leading sometimes
to hsemoptysis. Iti a larger number of cases ferruginous prepara¬
tions are well borne at first, and produce marked amelioration ; but
after a while such improvement-becomes stationary, and however
much the dose may be increased, the patient is not prevented from
frilling baek into her former state. Such patients are sometimes
seen although saturated with iron, for months and years, still
exhibiting all the characters of chlorosis.
In homoeopathy the possession of such remedies as Con. Graph.
-Sep. Puls. Lyo. give, in addition to Fer., greater advantages in the
cure of ohiorosis. Still with these additional remedies very
intractable cases occasionally are met with. In such circum¬
stances it were well to bear in mind the practice of frictions as
strongly recommended by Dr. Aran (Bull, de Therapeutique, tom.
xliii. p. 415). He has found that by the employment of dry and
stimulant frictions , aided by good regimen, and in some cases by
wine lavements , these obstinate cases may be very satisfactorily
treated, when iron has failed. Either flannel or a brush may be
used, and occasionally a stimulating fluid, such as spirit of camphor
[why not alcohol ?], or some ammoniacal preparation, may be added,
so as to induce rubefaction. The frictions should be continued for
five or ten minutes, every night and morning, being chiefly directed
along the back and limbs. In a few days a marked modification of
all the functions is produced. The patient becomes more lively and
alert, her countenance acquires colour, and appetite, flesh and
strength begin to return, and that although no internal medicines
whatever have been employed. In some cases in which progress is
not so rapid, vinous enamata are of great service.
The Puff indirect.
HOMOEOPATHY AND DIAGNOSIS.
[To tho Editor of the Medical Times and Gazette ]
Sib, —As a large portion of the public incessantly clamours for
facts, allow me to state in your pages, a fact illustrative of the dense
ignorance of the more highly scientific departments of our profession
displayed by those fashionable quacks—homoeopaths. As your
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508
Miscellaneous.
space is valuable, I will be brief. On the 28th of May last, I was
called to attend a boy, of eleven years of age, whose appearance pre¬
sented great emaciation, contracted features, and a hectic flush on
the cheek. The poor lad had been ailing six months, complaining
of cough, expectoration, severe .and protracted dyspepsia, pain
between the shoulders, and in the left lateral region, nocturnal per¬
spiration, loss of flesh, and debility. On proceeding to make a
physical examination of the chest, I found it narrow, flat, and
sunken. Its lateral expansion, on inspiration, was greatly impaired.
The left infra-clavicular region was absolutely dull on percussion,
in the same region the ear recognized a humid rale, and broncho¬
phony, as startlingly intense as if the stethoscope had been placed
over the thyroid cartilage itself. Similar phenomena were audible
in the supra-spinata fossa of the same side. Under the right
clavicle, mere resonance was slightly impaired, puerile respiration
and slightly increased voice were audible. Your readers need not be
told that the above was a model case of phthisis. The boy’s mother
stated, that at the commencement of his illness she took the patient
for some time to the Homoeopathic Dispensary, where she was
repeatedly told that the lad’s case was not consumption.
It is painful to think that a prolonged administration of inert
rubbish should, in many cases like the above, prevent the adoption,
at a proper period, of those remedial measures which alone promise
success.
I am, &c.
[Full name and address. J
This is one of the most amusing examples of puffing we have seen.
Can it really be a fact worth recording that a boy was taken to a
homoeopathic dispensary, that said boy months afterwards was seen
by an allopathic surgeon, and that his mother stated to this surgeon
that she had been told by an anonymous homoeopathic physician that
her son was not consumptive, and notwithstanding this reported
announcement by the anonymous physician the boy was found on
examination to be labouring under unequivocal symptoms of phthisis ?
We repeat does any one suppose for one moment that this shadowy
statement would have been sent to our cotemporary but for the sake
of embodying the “ nominis umbra” of the surgeon who signs it
and gives his full address. In short it is the clap-trap of Moses and
Sons, who beguile us of our attention by heading their paragraphs
with “ Storming of Sebastopol ,” and end us in precise admonition
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Caladium in Itching of the Vulna. 509
to be sure we go either to their West End or City establishment if
we want the best and cheapest trousers.
It is gratifying to find that homoeopathy is recognized as the
subject of such paramount interest in the medical world at present
as to he the safest stalking horse for a professional puff.
Caladium Seguinum in Itching of the Vulva.
Hitherto little use has been made by homoeopathists of this plant.
The negroes have long been familiar with its powerful action on the
genital organs, which they avail themselves of in order to cause
impotence from motives of revenge or jealousy. The following
article from an allopathic journal, the Archives Ginlrales de Midecine
for January last, suggests another use for it in connexion with the
sexual organs..
“ Itching of the vulva is generally owing to some eruption of a
herpetic or other character. Sometimes the insignificant character
of the eruption does not satisfactorily account for the violence of the
itching, which seems to be owing more to a nervous hyperathesiaj
In that case the itching becomes excessively violent, sometimes
accompanied by a voluptuous sensation that occasionally amounts to
a hysterical attack, and almost inevitably leads the patient to the
practice of masturbation; the labia majora and minora are swollen
and hot, the mucous membrane is of a bright red colour, and there
is sometimes the appearance of an eruption, hut this is only the
effect of the rubbing by which the patients have sought to soothe , the
itching.
“ Many modes of treatment for this affection have been suggested.
It sometimes goes off in a few weeks, but as often it continues
obstinately for months. A new remedy has just been proposed by
Dr. Scholz in the Zeitsch. fur Klin. Med. It is the caladium
seguinum, a plant belonging to the natural family of the aroidese,
akin to our arum maculatum.
“ The plant grows in India, where its acrid and irritating juice
has the reputation of being a good cure for gout and rheumatism, and
also of having a depressing action on the functions of the genital
organs. The negroes have such great confidence in the latter power,
that they feel perfectly sure of the chastity of their wives, after
rubbing their coral necklaces with the juice of this plant. The
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510
Miscellaneous.
author is inclined to believe from his experiments that the caladium
is the anaphrodisiac of women, as the lupulus is that of men.
“ Dr. Scholz has obtained the best results from the use of the alco¬
holic tincture of caladium seguinum in two cases of pruritus vulvae;
which had resisted a great many other remedies. The first was a
little girl, four years of age, who had suffered two months from
itching, which had led her to the habit of masturbation, in conse¬
quence of which she was affected with various serious nervous symp¬
toms. Six drops of the tincture of caladium were mixed with 100
grammes of water, and a dessert spoonful given every three hours.
After the first dose, the child was relieved, and it was only found
necessary to give two more doses of the remedy. The second case
was a girl of twenty years of age, whose pruritus seemed to be
owing to a herpetic eruption. She was cured almost as rapidly ad
die first.”
Nitrate of Silver in Paralysis.
The following case from an allopathic journal would seem to indi¬
cate a power in nitrate of silver to cure paralysis which we might
have guessed it to possess from Dr. J. O. Muller’s proving, but
which homoeopathic practice has not yet shewn it to possess.
A tradesman, who had fallen into a state nearly approaching to
idiocy, with paralysis of the lower limbs, had a sloughing sore on the
sacrum of the size of the palm of the hand. I prescribed a lotion to
be used several times a day, composed of a scruple of nitrate of silver
in two ounces of water. Subsequently I increased the strength of
the lotion, half-a-drachm of the nitrate to two ounces of water. This
latter solution had been employed for two days; about a quarter of
it had been used. One day the nurse, on coming to dress the
patient’s back, perceived that the latter, taking the opportunity when
no one was watching him, had drained the little bottle to the very
last drop. He must have swallowed about 20 grains of the nitrate
of silver. His mouth and throat were covered with a white eschar.
He was seized with a violent rigor, but singular to relate, not only
did the sore on the sacrum heal up in a fortnight, but the palsy of
the lower extremities also disappeared, so that now the patient can
walk very well, and he has grown much stouter. His mental state
has als o very much improved, so that he is able to carry on a con¬
versation. Formerly he used to pass his urine and faeces below him;
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511
Homoeopathy in America.
he wallowed in filth; now he observes all the rules of cleanliness. I
was not summoned by the nurse until a considerable time after the
nitrate of silver had been swallowed; very luckily, as it happened,
for I should certainly have administered some antidote, and thus des¬
troyed the effects of the medicine. The amendment in this case
could not be ascribed to anything else than the ingestion of the
nitrate of silver.”— {Dr. Docker, Medic. Zeit., No. 43.)
Homoeopathy in America.
We learn from a correspondent in America that the Legislative State of
Michigan has passed an act requiring the Board of Regents of the Uni¬
versity of Michigan to appoint a professor of homoeopathy in the medical
department of the University. This act was passed by the large majority
of two-thirds of the Legislative Assembly. At the present moment the
Regents have not yet concluded to carry out the views of the Legislative
Assembly, as the act has excited' the greatest opposition on the part of the
allopathic professors, who allege that such a proposition is quite unheard of,
that no professor of homoeopathy is attached to any European university,
and that the appointment of a professor of homoeopathy must inevitably
lead to much confusion.
The immense majority by which the act was passed in the Legislative
Assembly shews the liberal and enlightened views of the legislators. We
can scarcely suppose that this majority is entirely composed of believers
in homoeopathy, but it at all events consists of liberal-minded men who
justly think that the students should have the advantage of receiving in¬
struction in homoeopathy as well as allopathy in order to enable them to
judge which is the best method of curing disease. After all there is no
more practical inconsistency in appointing a homoeopathic and an allo¬
pathic professor of medicine than in appointing almost any two therapeutic
professors, so much do the latter differ among themselves. There is actually
as great a difference between a practitioner of the new or physiological
school and one of the old dosing sort, as between a homoeopathist and
either of the former, for in point of fact th^y all differ from one another
toto ccelo —that’s all.
As regards the allegation that there is no professor of homoeopathy in
any European university, that is not correct, for our friend Ur. Joseph
Buchner is professor of homoeopathy at the University of Munich, and
has been so for many years.
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
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Birth at Meimth
fete at HnJutemttui’a native town* Meissen, in < 5 onnaemonition of his
birth, on the hundredth '-.anniversary of Dip nateiitoy, Bn Hireche-1, who
took the management of ihe eereraony, »soed a jxuMie invitation to the
friends and disciples uf the Sounder ot hMueopa<Jiy r to assist at the
020
Miscellaneous.
interesting event. Agreeably to the new light thrown by Dr. Hirechel’s
researches on the actual day of Hahnemann's birth, the lete was advertised
to come off on the 11th of April.
On the 10th day of that month a small circle of homoeopathic prac¬
titioners assembled at the Hotel de Russie, in Dresden. The greater
number, however, met the following day at Meissen. At the hotel “zum
Hirsck,” in Meissen, at half-past ten, a.m., Dr. Hirschel opened the
meeting with a few introductory words.
After some little preliminary business, Dr. Muller, of Leipzig, delivered
an oration relative to the attacks to which Hahnemann had been exposed
during his life, and the dignified mode in which he had treated those
attacks, by preserving a contemptuous silence. The learned speaker
warmly defended the character of our common master from some calum¬
nious aspersions on his character, which had recently been made by a
leading apostle of the physiological school in Germany.
The president, Dr. Hirschel, thanked Dr. Muller in the name of the
meeting, for his defence of Hahnemann, and trusted that' Dr. Muller’s
words might be published.
Dr. Kirsch, of Wisbaden, next read an essay upon the ? homoeopathic
treatment of typhoid diseases, illustrated by cases which had occurred in
his own treatment.
The next thing that was done was the solemn inauguration of Hahne¬
mann’s bust, in the school of St. Agra, where he received the first elements
of his education. Permission to do this had been previously obtained
from the Minister of Public Instruction. The local authorities testified
the greatest willingness to do all in their power to render the ceremony as
imposing, as possible. To this end the boys were recalled from their
holidays a day before their time, and these, together with the masters, the
municipal authorities, and a large number of gentlemen and ladies were in
waiting in the hall of the school to give the medical men a festive reception.
Dr. Franke, the rector, welcomed them in a suitable speech. When the
medical deputation had taken the places allotted to them, Dr. Hirschel
ascended the tribunal, and pronounced an eulogium upon the great man
whose memory they had assembled to honour. He described Hahnemann
as a thinker, as a reformer, and as a man; and gave a brief account of
his public and private life. He sketched also the history of the great dis¬
covery with which his name is for ever associated, and he summed up by
asserting that Hahnemann would take a place in the estimation of humanity
beside those great reformers, Luther, Lessing, Bacon, and Kant Hirschel
was followed by a young native of Meissen, named Lemaistre, who deli¬
vered an eloquent speech in reference to die career of Hahnemann, and
his connexion with the school of Meissen.
Thereafter the municipal authorities, and the other participators in the
festival, marched in procession through the town to the house of Hahne-
man’s birth, which had been all freshly painted and decorated. All the
Digitized by
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Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Linz Homoeopathic Hospital. 521
surrounding houses were adorned with banners, flowers, garlands, in¬
scriptions, and portraits of Hahnemann. The tribune which had been
erected in the place in which the house was situated, was decked with
green fir branches. An immense crowd, consisting of persons of all ranks,
was assembled. Here again Dr. Hirschel delivered an appropriate popular
speech, and amid strains of music the- tablet^ which had been let into
the wall of Hahnemann’s house, was uncovered. It bore the following
inscription :—“ Chr. Fr. Samuel Hahnemann, the Founder of Homoeo¬
pathy, was born here the 11th of April, 1755.”
The proceedings of the day were terminated by a public dinner in the
saloon of the “ Hirsch ,” where Hahnemann’s bust was displayed, crowned
with flowers. Many appropriate toasts were given, and a song, expressly
composed for the occasion, was sung. The chief magistrate requested to
be allowed to keep the bust, as a remembrance of the day; and another
was presented to the owner of the house where Hahnemann was born, in
order to be displayed in the house.
The number of homoeopathic medical men and chemists present at
Meissen on the occasion was twenty-nine. (From the Zeitsch. fur hom.
Klin. Vol. iv. No. 8.)
The above was not the only festival held in Germany in honor of the
centenary of Hahnemann’s birth. Dr. Arthur Lutze, who has attained,
a great renommee at Cothen, celebrated the 10th of April by raising a
statue to Hahnemann at his own expense. We have not yet seen any
account of the proceedings on that day.
The Hospital of the Sisters of Charity at Linz.
This hospital was opened on the 1st of June, 1842. The chief agents
in its establishment were the Sisters of Charity themselves. The muni¬
cipality of the town allotted a house for the reception of the sisterhood, and
the Arch-Duke Maximilian d’Este, influenced by philanthropic motives,
built and endowed the wing destined for the hospital. The pecuniary re-
sources of the hospital have since been increased by contributions from aU
sides to such an extent, that a considerable number of patients are treated
there every year.
The building is situated in one of the terminal streets of the town, and
is provided with a fine large garden, which is chiefly used for growing
vegetables and fruit. Two large lofty wards are assigned to the patients.
One is intended for women, the other for men ; and each contains twenty
beds, arranged so as not to give the appearance of crowding. Six windows
provide an ample supply of air and light.
Besides the above, a ward for children, with twelve beds, was opened
in 1852. The kitchen and laboratory are in the house, and the attendance
is provided by the sisters; the labour of sick nursing being their humane
Digitized by
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Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
522
Miscellaneous.
occupation. The physician since the opening is Dr. Reiss, well known in
the homoeopathic world, and one of the most employed practitioners of
Lin?. There is a consulting chamber, where out patients are daily supplied
with advice and medicine gratuitously. The arrangements of the whole
establishment meet all the requirements of humanity and science as far as
that is possible with the limited means at hand. It were to be desired that
there were a convalescent ward, and a bathing establishment; also that
the kitchen were supplied with more rechercM viands; pia desideria,
which may yet be supplied.
The Institution has now existed twelve and-a-half years. Thirteen
annual reports of it lie before ub, giving a pretty good view of the services
it has performed.
Since its foundation, this philanthropic institution has, singularly
enough, had to endure much enmity, and has been exposed to many
misrepresentations. It is scarcely necessary to indicate the quarter
whence these proceeded. The results obtained in it, however, have suc¬
ceeded in silencing even the most furious opponents of homoeopathy, and
the course, now taken is to ignore its existence altogether.
With the help of the annual reports, we have endeavoured to make out
an accurate statistical account of the results obtained in the hospital. The
figures we shall adduce are so far valuable, that they admit of a com¬
parison with the results of other hospitals.
The number of patients treated from June 1st, 1842, to January 1st,
1855, amounts to 9,129. Of these, there died 501 (40 of marasmus
senilis.) The mortality was consequently 6*47°/ 0
Of acute diseases, 5,300 came under treatment. Mortality, 2*6%
There were 3,829 cases of chronic diseases. Mortality, 9*4%
This relative mortality is in conformity with the demands of science and
of humanity. In acute diseases, the greater proportion were cured.
Those diseases which had already the seeds of death and decay in them,
furnished the moBt victims.
This favourable proportion is most strikingly exhibited in the particular
diseases. The following exhibits the mortality in some of the principal
maladies:—
Acute exanthemata .. ..
427 cases.
Mortality, 1*6%
Inflammation of lungs
315
99
>9
2*2%
Typhus ..
647
»
99
12%
Organic diseases of heart..
172
99
99
14*5%
Tubercular diseases ..
438
99
99
28*9%
The greatest mortality, viz.: 36*2°/ 0 was shewn in dropsy, which
always came under treatment as a secondary disease.
Two epidemics are worthy of notice, viz.: dysentery in 1850, mor¬
tality, 14%; and cholera in 1854, 33 cases of which were treated, of
whom 16 died.
The number of out-patients treated was 24,000.
Digitized by
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Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
The Mineral Waters of Contrex&ville. 523
In the children’s hospital, 635 cases have-been treated. The mortality
was 8*9%,
The chief forms of disease that occurred among them were as follows:—
Acute exanthemata
.. 86 cases.
Mortality
, 9-3«/ 0
Inflammation of lungs
.. 43
9f
n
0%
Typhus.. .
-. 35
99
w
14-2%
Scrofula .
.. 99
99
99
o%
Hooping-cough .. ..
... 42
n
99
2-5%
Dropsy.
.. 18
99
9 f
61*1%
. The average annual expense of the whole hospital is 6,186 fl. (£618 12s.)
. We are aware that in order to give the above data greater value, it
would be requisite to add some particulars; as, for instance, the exact
duration pf the diseases under the homoeopathic treatment. Unfortunately,
we are not in a position to give fuller particulars at present, as the pro¬
tocols before us are only of quite a general character, and we are not in
possession of the details of cases. We shall endeavour at some future day
to supply this omission.
The treatment iu this hospital since its beginning, has always been of
the simplest description. The cures have only been effected by means of
specific medicines, in small doses, aided by careful nursing, appropriate
diet, and a judicious employment of heat and of cold.
The expenses of the treatment were smaller than those of any other;
and, when we reflect that the mortality was also proportionably very
small, we are at a loss to understand why homoeopathy, with such great
advantages in practice, has not yet found an entrance into other hospitals
under the direction of the state. Does the conservative principle go so
far, as to keep in the background what is evidently the best ?
It must strike every one that it is only the hospitals of the Sisters of
Charity in Austria which have adopted homoeopathy. The reason of this
may be that these hospitals have only been established since Hahnemann’s
discovery, and that they had not to set aside another mode of practice, to
which they had been long used; that men of judgment, having some
influence in the matter, and acquainted with the practical results every¬
where obtained by homoeopathy, justly estimated the advantages offered
by it, and especially its.economy and simplicity, in which it so far excels
the other methods.
The result shews that they have no cause to regret the choice made;
and henceforth, let us hope that the example may be followed, and that
homoeopathy may be taken into consideration at all events, in any
hospitals that may be .hereafter established. ( Zeitsch.f\ horn. Klin. iv. 49.)
The Mineral Waters of Contrex6ville.
Our homoeopathic brethren on the Continent, and especially in Germany,
pay much more attention than we do to the employment of mineral waters.
Digitized by
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Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
524
Miscellaneous.
Perhaps one great reason for this is, that almost all Germans who can
afford it make a point of spending a portion of every year at some water¬
ing place, as naturally as oar well-to-do-classes resort to the sea-side, and
that with equal real or supposed advantage to their health. As then his
patients inevitably go to the mineral wells, the German homoeopathic
doctor is forced to study the nature and effects of the various mineral
sources of his country, in order to gnide his patients as to which is the
best spring for their disease. The question that the doctor has to decide
is generally not whether the patient is to go to some Bad or stay at
home, but which Bad is the best for him to go to. Is it to be Kissingen,
lschl, Carlsbad, Ems, Baden, Wiesbaden, Schlangenbad, Schwalbach,
Aachen, Spa, or Franzensbad? Our homoeopathic colleagues in Germany
have wisely set themselves to investigate the physiological action of many
of these mineral waters, and this they have done With great care in the
case of some of those waters, such as Wiesbaden, Franzensbad, Kissingen,
nnd others. On the other hand, we in England have totally neglected
our mineral waters. Our patients are not generally addicted to mineral
water drinking, so we are seldom consulted by them as to the relative
advantages in their cases of Bath, Moffat, Harrowgate, Tonbridge Wells,
and Cheltenham. The .English are a sea-side frequenting folk, and we
have generally to determine their choice, which lies among Brighton,
Ramsgate, Margate, Herne Bay, Weston, Lowestoft, Rothsay, and the
thousand and one other places which are thronged in summer by onr
assiduous bathers. We doubt, however, if we are right in altogether
neglecting our mineral sources, and think they may sometimes be more
useful in some cases and less hurtful in others than we generally suppose
them to be.
We are not now about to write a recommendation to prove the waters
of our principal mineral sources. The above reflections have merely been
suggested by the perusal of a pamphlet * upon the mineral waters of Con-
trexeville in France, which has recently been put into our hands by a
patient who has derived benefit from their use.
Contrexeville is situated in the department of the Vosges, about 80
leagues from Paris. About 100 years ago a Dr. Bagard first recom¬
mended the use of the mineral waters which have their source there, for
the cure of various affections of the kidneys and bladder. Since that time
little attention has been paid to them until lately, when they have again
begun to attract numerous visitors affected principally with diseases of the
urinary apparatus. The pamphlet before us contains the details of a con¬
siderable number of cases successfully treated by these waters. They are
chiefly cases of gravel, catarrh of the bladder, and other affections of the
urinary passages. The chief component parts of the water are sulphates
* Notice sur les propriety physiques, chimiques et m6dicinales des eaux de
Contrexfeville (Vosges) par A. F. Manulet Paris, Baillidre. 1851.
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' of lime and magnesia, subcarbonates of lime, magnesia and soda, muriates
of lime, magnesia and soda, nitrate of lime, carbonate of iron, silica, and
carbonic acid. They also contain an appreciable, though small quantity,
of arsenic. The quantity of silica they contain, according to one analysis,
is remarkable, 2 1 /, grains in 44 oz. of the water. They give a decided alka-
line reaction, and have a very powerful solvent action on some calculi.
As patients affected with chronic catarrh of the bladder, gravel and
calculus will occasionally insist on going to some mineral spring, and
apply to us to direct them in their choice, we think we shall be doing our
brethren a service in directing their attention to one which has proved
successful in many cases of these diseases, and which bids fair to rival the
source of Vichy for the cure of affections of the urinary organs.
Hahnemann 8 Birthday.
Hitherto the 10th of April has always been considered as the birthday of
the founder of homoeopathy. Hahnemann himself always celebrated his
birthday on that day, and his friends and disciples all over the world have
accepted the date given out by himself. But it now appears that we have
all mistaken the proper date, and that the 11th of April is the correct day.
We learn this perhaps not important but curious fact, from an extract
from the Baptismal Register of Meissen, given in the February number of
Dr. Hirechel’s Zeitschrift. It is to the following effect:—
" Christian Friedrich Samuel Hahnemann, born on the morn¬
ing of the 11th April, 1765; baptized the 13th April of the same year,
by M. Junghanns. Father— Christian Gottfried Hahnemann,
Painter. Mother— Johanna Christiana, bom Spiessin.”
There would seem to be quite as much uncertainty about Hahnemann’s
name, as about his birthday. We know he only signed himself Samuel
Hahnemann ; sometimes Hahneman (under which latter orthography he
published one of his works now in our possession). His biographers
usually give his names, Samuel Christian Friedrich. His baptismal
register gives his name, Christian Friedrich Samuel; and it appears from
an extract from the register of the school he first went to, that he was
entered as Christian Gottfried Samuel; but this latter must surely be a
mistake of the transcriber.
Digitaline.
This active principle of digitalis was first obtained by Messrs. Homolle
Quevenne, of Paris. It is a white pulverulent substance, with neutral
chemical relations. Both of the more striking medicinal properties of digi¬
talis, its diuretic and its sedative action on the heart, seem to reside in this
principle. Dr. Christison has recently been experimenting with it as a
diuretic in cases of dropsy. The first two cases he tried it in were exten¬
sive protracted obstinate oedema in connection with disease of the kidneys.
In these cases diuresis commenced in one at the close of the second, in the
other on the third day. In both the flow of urine was profuse. In both
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the oedema entirely disappeared, but with the slowness not uncommonly,
observed in this form of dropsy. In both the albumen in the urine was
quickly and greatly diminished. In one it disappeared entirely in a few
days, and did not return. In the other it also disappeared but returned
some days after though ’in diminished proportion. It has also proved
equally serviceable in dropsy connected with heart-disease. It effected a
a complete discharge of the dropsical effusion, enabling the patient to
return to his occupation, though given in circumstances apparently des¬
perate.
In some local dropsies, especially ascites, either simple or combined
with anasarca of the lower part of the body it was tried, but not with
great results.
It caused in several instances the peculiar effect of digitalis on the heart
and circulation. The dose administered was Y 76 th of a grain 3 times a-day.
A tenth of a grain will kill a dog ,—Monthly Journal of Medicine ,
January , 1855.
Infusion of Common Oats as a Diuretic .
It is sometimes a desideratum in homoeopathic practice to possess some
dietetic agent which will act as a diuretic, and at the same time allow of
the undisturbed action of the medicine; the common oat presents these ad¬
vantages. Many years ago Dr. Themont called the attention of medical
men to the remarkable diuretic properties of decoction of oats. Although
the paper announcing his observations contained the narrative of a case of
cardiac dropsy cured by the sole use of this remedy, yet he did not
succeed in exciting much interest on the part of the profession in his dis¬
covery. We have seen the oat-tea tried pretty frequently of late in cases
of dropsy, in most of them in combination with other treatment, but un¬
assisted in a sufficient number to fairly test its virtues. That it does really
possess diuretic properties there can be no doubt. Its powers are probably
not at all superior to those of the decoction of broom; and as a good alter¬
nating remedy with the latter, its proper place in therapeutics should
perhaps be assigned. Its simplicity and freedom from injurious qualities
are great recommendations, since it may, without risk, be entrusted as a
domestic remedy to patients not under regular care. In several cases of
slight oedema of the extremities consequent on heart disease, the patients
succeeded by its use alone in getting rid of that symptom. The mode of
preparation is to take two handfuls of common oats (not in any way pre¬
pared) and boil them in three quarts of water for about a quarter-of-an-
hour. Of the strained decoction a tea-cupful should be given frequently
as an ordinary drink.— Medical Times and Gazette , September , 1854.
Progress towards Homoeopathy.
I am far from being able to tell you what is the action of each of these
different acids ? Though the highest authority may be quoted for their
conjoint use, yet if you wish to prescribe rationally and not empirically,
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yon will not use nitro-muriatic odd. For to which of its ingredients will
yon ascribe its efficacy ? or as the proportion of its ingredients is so liable
to vary with the mode of preparation, how can you tell what you are
prescribing? If we shall ever gain any knowledge of the actions of
medicines, it will he by giving one substance and only one at a time. If
our therapeutics are ever to advance, the first step will leave such com¬
binations behind. Give nitric acid, give hydrochloric acid, give chlorine,
or give hypo-chloro-nitric acid, but do not give all four together until the
separate action of each is well known.
In the use of any of the mineral acids, some care must be taken regard¬
ing the action of the acid on the teeth. I have known patients who for
years had been free from toothache, suffer again in consequence of the
action of an acid ordered for the treatment of the oxalate of lime in the
urine. The acid may be taken through a straw or tube, but the simpler
way is to wash the mouth with a teaspoonful of sp. ammonia arom. in a
glass of water immediately after the medicine is taken. If taken when
food is present in the stomach, the mineral acids probably all assist only
in dissolving the albuminous fund, and have no medicinal action whatever.
For the relief of indigestion they should always be given on an empty
stomach, and so diluted that they cause no pain or uneasiness. The pri¬
mary action of all the mineral acids is probably to lessen the irritability of
the stomach; to render it less sensitive of the irritation which may be
caused by the food. Perhaps, also, the quantity of acid thrown out by
the stomach itself is thereby lessened. If an over dose of the mineral
acids is given, the opposite effects are produced; still, if the excessively
acid taste permitted, far larger doses might be given than are usually
prescribed. In my experiments (Philosophical Transac. 1831) on the
effect of sulphuric acid, I constantly gave a drachm of dilute acid sp. gr.
118 in an oz. and a half of water thrice daily without the slightest uneasi¬
ness; but, on the other hand, 10 minims of the same acid in the same
quantity of water have caused uneasiness to some patients.—( From Dr.
Bense Jones’ Lectures on Renal Diseases.)
Tartar emetic in Rheumatism.
Dr. W. Arnold ( Zeitsch.f. horn. Klin, ii, 79,) recommends the employ¬
ment of Tartar emetic in muscular rheumatism. He considers it almost
specific in this disease. It matters little in what muscles the rheumatic
affection is seated, or whether it is accompanied by fever or not. In
twenty-four or at most forty-eight hours the patient is generally free from
pain, and he rarely requires several days for his cure. In recent cases the
cure is proportionally more rapid than in those that have already lasted
some time. The profuse perspiration that accompanies these rbeumatie
affections is speedily checked by its use. The doses Dr. Arnold invariably
prescribes are one to two grains of the second or third decimal trituration,
every three, four, or six hours. Sometimes the first dose caused vomiting,
but this was seldom renewed by the subsequent doses. In some rare cases.
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in robust individuals, he gave the remedy in doses equivalent to '/Jh of a
grain. He very rarely observed any of the toxical effects of the medi¬
cines from such a dose.
Allopathy applied to Theological Tenets and Tendencies .
It will be remembered that in his Counterblast against Homoeopathy, the
great Obstetrician of the North endeavours to fasten on homoeopathy some
theological extravagances. We beg to offer to his consideration the
following delicious morceau , illustrative of the practice of a Hottentot
allopath in the case of a patient infected with what were deemed theo¬
logical heresies. Possibly it may suggest to Dr. Simpson a method of
getting rid of the heretical homoeopathic tenets of some of his quondam pa¬
tients, and restoring them to the orthodox Mumbo-Jumboism of allopathy.
The old school is already indebted to savages and barbarians for many of
its favourite [medicines, so it would be no discredit to her to enrich her
materia medica once more from the therapeutic experience of a Hottentot.
To be sure the treatment in this particular instance does not seem to have
been very successful, but that should be no drawback to its adoption by
our opponents, as therein it especially assimilates to their own most
popular modes of treatment:—“A female, who had been for several
years in the service of one of the missionaries, attracted the attention of
a person of the opposite sex, who forthwith made the first instalment of
cattle to her father; the latter at once appeared at the station, and
demanded his daughter, with whom he was frantically exasperated, for
embracing the teaching of her white master and mistress. After some
explanation by the missionary, she was handed over to her father, but
much against her own desire. In about a month she returned to the
station, very much reduced in strength, but still strong in faith. Her
parents, it appeared, had kept her in a state of constant nausea and
vomiting, induced by, most likely, the ipecacuanha, under the idea that
the Christianity she had imbibed would be rejected! ”—( Extract of a
Letter from Port Natal.)
BOOKS RECEIVED.
Journal de la Soctet6 GaUicane.
Grundrits der Homdopathie, 2te Auflage, von Dr. Hirschel.
Quarterly Homoeopathic Magazine. Cleveland. Vol. iii. No. 4.
Lettre tur le Cholera , adressee au Dr. Nunez par le Dr. J. Perry.
Paris.
Archiv fur Arzneiwirkungslehre. Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
La Vaccination est non seulement inutile , mais dangereuse, par
Arthur Lutzb, traduit par C. F. Zimpel.
W. Davy & 8on, Printers, 8 Gilbert 8treet, Oxford Street.
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THE
BRITISH JOURNAL
OP
HOMOEOPATHY.
AN ADDRESS READ BEFORE THE CONGRESS OF
BRITISH HOMCEOPATHIC PRACTITIONERS,
HELD AT LONDON, JULY 4th 1855.
By Dr. J. J. Garth Wilkinson.
Brethren,
The temple of medicine, in which we have the honor to
tenant a cell-germ, was built by no mans hands, during the
same days as aU the other real temples. The dome of it is
round, and diversely blue; and the floor of it is round too,
a fixed photographic refraction of all-coloured, healing king¬
doms. There is not a piece in it that is not strictly medical in
its place: every brick of it has stood an infinite examination
before it was fitted in: the mortar and cement of attraction and
gravitation which hold it together, are medical too: and the
whole architecture, or systema mundi, is a moving system of
treatment for more maladies than an ignorant man exactly
knows. It could not well be otherwise; because friction, and
wear and tear, and quick loss and recovery of balance, always
with some cost of the first harmony, are as unavoidable in
convoys of worlds, as in an ordinary railway train. And
therefore repair has been thought of in all things, as well as
the first production of the machinery: and this constant
assiduity of repair is a medical fact: we may truly call it the
vis medicatrix natures. It is the pressure which all things
VOL. XIII, NO. LIV. —OCTOBER 1855. 2 m
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are made to exert, in general, and in singular, towards getting
right again, whenever they, or any truant one of them, go
wrong. So first there is the divine wisdom in the heart and
brain of the world, which as far as possible is prevention,
better than cure: then there is restoration, the remedial part:
and then there is adjustment of the movement of all for
crippled and present incurable things: reduction of nature’s
first velocity: tenderness : the crutches of Kosmos: or as we
may say, divine surgery. This last part in nature is the
opprobrium of its medicina: and all things are always treating
all things, in order to prevent it, in order to cure it, and in
order to abridge it.
Where nature ends, men and women and children begin,
and they also take up the medical necessity, draw its chain
through their lives, and work in never-ceasing gangs in repair¬
ing the mighty highway. Every human being is a medical
man, no matter whether he is one minute old, or whether he or
she surpasses the antiquity of Nestor; no matter whether he is
the last of the Bosjemans, living in scooped clay, or the court
physician to the most gracious Victoria. His very soul is
nothing else than recipes and prescriptions: if he, or she, is a
baby physician, you see how he treats himself in a moment:
he saves his own life in birth, by skilful crying, which adjusts
him to a new world. If he has lain a moment too long in one
position, he first cries again, and fidgets himself into another;
and floats in an ooean of movements, of which Ling’s are a
scientific thimbleful. And as we help ourselves from the first,
so also we help each other ; not alone, thank Ood, out of
druggist’s bottles; but from the better vials of eyes, mouth,
and influence; and of hands and hearts. And this we do,
more by grace and nature, than by any forethought. So that
the medicality (so to speak) of the human race, is the exact
counterpart of its humanity. An age end land in whieh man
is little remedial to man, is a time of hard hearts and mean
scoundrels. The epoch in which we all help each other medi¬
cally to the full measure of our powers, will be a crown of life
to nature: and thenceforth will date real progress.
As separate human beings are petty states, each with its own
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government; and as mundane governments are the confluence,
delegation, and united states of all the individuals: and as
human beings in like manner are all medical men, so the calling
and mystery of medicine is the delegation of public medical
service, accruing from the combined medicality of the indi'-.
viduals. Now the medical government of the world may be
either a despotism, oj a constitution, or a democracy, or lastly,
a freedom. And I have brought you to this point, because it
seems to me to be a matter of first-rate importance for you to
determine what your position as men of progress, and as
homoeopathists, will be, in the area of the universal medical
life.
Dont make the mistake of thinking that with a banner
uplifted among you, inscribed with a new word from the pages
of truth, you can quietly settle down into your places in some
of the regiments, or upon some of the staffs, of the old cor¬
porations. They wont have you. Besides which, you belong
to a new fact of startling import: a fact not long born, and of
course therefore small and weakly-looking; yet with a capacity
of growing world-size. That fact is, that medicine is no longer
a profession , but one of the humanities; and as such, freer
than the winds: in short, free as only man can be. Liberal
also, not in the old measure, of being more gentlemanlike than
trades, as marked by daily fees instead of weekly bills; but in the
new immeasurable measure of making the public service stand
.always first, and the private accruings be merely its unwanted
surplus: a liberality in whioh every honest calling may and
must emulate it.
The established medicine will perhaps last some time yet,
unless unforeseen events hasten its ruin; for it is a vast
property, or plant, representing a capital of many millions
sterling: with the force of many ages in its trunk: with the
fact that not long ago it was the best thing going, because it
was the only thing; defended too by a disciplined and instinc¬
tive army of respectable gentlemen, in this country fifty or sixty
thousand strong, with all their numerous connexions and
dependents: and now, in its old age, when it has got through
the stratum of living soil, rooting deeper and deeper in the
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tough clay of orthodoxy, apathy, respectability, general deaf¬
ness, flourishing journalism, scorn, infidelity to new ideas,
white chokers, hard-heartedness, and extreme propriety. A
sick tree like that, may, as Sir Hamilton Seymour said of
Turkey, be a long time in dying. And even when it is dead,
it may make a good show of everything but leaves and fruits,
and in the winter, which is seven months out of the twelve, and
the profitable medical time, it may stand bare among the hare,
and challenge a very good comparison. Nevertheless, there is
a score upon it, a deathy chalk mark, which is a providential
hieroglyph of the coming axe.
Now, in this old corporation, medicine is an art and mystery:
not only a separate profession, but a fenced, paled, and invisible
park of society, with advertisement of man-traps and spring-
guns to all intruders. The public has no business there; for
it is corporate private property. Under that regime, the people
has nothing to do with prescriptions, hut to swallow them.
’Tis a medical despotism, with secrecy and espionage working
as right and left eyes in the head of absolute power. The
secrecy is humanely couched: the apparatus of medicine is con¬
cealed, lest the ignorant public, like children playing with loaded
pistols, should kill themselves, and thus enter the other world
without making that seemly difficult bow to this world which is
implied in dying according to art. And the secrecy also inci¬
dentally brings grist to the mill, and keeps up the proper
monopoly of the medical guild; whose aim is thus accomplished,
of limiting domestic medicine to the smallest, and beyond that,
making it impossible. The espionage lies in the jealous over*
seeing of all and singular patients by the doctors, to keep
them pure from “ homoeopathy and its kindred delusions;" in
the insinuation that those persons who fall into these are of
unsound mind; whereby they are tabooed in their neighbour¬
hoods, medically excommunicated, and not only run risk of
not dying according to art, but also of not associating with
the best circles during their very improper and insulting
sojourn upon earth. Such is this old corporation, which is
protected by the state in a measure which the most favored
Church dare not now hope to be, and which veils itself from
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the public sight, in order to prey the more securely ex privi-
legio upon the public vitality.
Now what I mean to say is, that were homoeopathy the
recognized drug medicine to-morrow, it could never step up
into the old benches which its predecessor has occupied: that
as soon as they are vacated, they are sheer firewood, and not
the chairs for the new senators of the people’s medicine. For
three reasons, which might be three thousand. 1. The despotic
principle is dead then: for in admitting homoeopathy upon
medicine, .you must look out for endless transformations in
homoeopathy itself; for new principles more additional and
revolutionary to homoeopathy, than ever the latter was to old
physic: such being the plain law of the increment of velocity
in all movements : in short, you must court progress, and can
no more be bound by any good gentleman’s books. With this
open-eyedness, and open-heartedness, come humility, respect
for other men’s experience and opinions, faith in the future,
and its difference from, and betterness than, the present: and
in short, a state in which despotism is at a minimum.
But 2. Secrecy will have skulked out also: and even now
has skulked, without anybody at first knowing that it was
gone: light and eyes being so made together, that as soon as
eyes open, they see without acknowledgment, or even saying,
‘ all’s right.’ Does any one of you, brethren, think that
secrecy and homoeopathy, excepting for some special reasons of
disease, are compatible ? If there be such a man, I will be
bound for it that even he has executed, or contemplated, a
Manual of Domestic Medicine, possibly with the view of
limiting his public to a certain safe field of administration.
But he only differs in degree, as to the size of his first wedge.
The clever mother love which has soon mastered his well-
concooted pages, and made them into soft breasts of healing
sciences, from which her little flock can draw, is surely at the
end of some probationary time a claimant for a second manual,
larger and fuller than the first; and as our friend is not stingy,
away again he goes to work, to demolish another bit of secrecy,
and to set up a larger medical candle in the nursery and the
home. In a very few years, mothers, knocking at our friend’s
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friendly door, request explanations and additions, and his once
costive doctrine and pen has added a pathology to a thera¬
peutics, and given so much, that the plain inference is, that all
the noble fellow has, is to be had for the asking: and now he
ardently and fearfully desires that his clients could take all:
which gives him unwonted skill in teaching them.
In all this, brothers, I appeal to you whether I am not
borne out by the brief history of homoeopathy; which was no
sooner bom, than it at once became the first medical school¬
master of the nations. Moreover, who Can say that a less
progress than this lies in knowledge, and its public minister,
education ? The quantity of knowledge, of the most minute
and precise character, which a human head may profitably and
availably hold, is, in most departments, incalculable; with
proper management, a great part of what learned men now
know, might be easily put into children’s brains, without
overlaying them. Only look at languages. The uneducated
poor use few words even in their native tongue, and have no
knowledge of “dictionary words'." The children of other
classes speak three or four languages, all with nearly equal
fluency; and indeed, the number is only limited, because three
or four ensure the present intercourse of the world. So it is
with the human language of nature, which is science. The
properties of air and electricity, given as facts and bright
experiments, and repeated to familiarity, are not perhaps so
difficult as some of the deeper branches of marbles and peg-top.
Dont you suppose that Dr. Carpenter’s children are at least as
great dabsters with the microscope, as anybody else’s progeny
with the skipping-rope ? I have no doubt of the fact. And
when you add, that this affair of medical instruction is a matter
of the deepest heart; that the experience will be gained with a
lovingnoss of study such as can warm few other pursuits, and
with a pleasure of high household economy, and a triumphant
sense of new power to do good withal, can you doubt that there
lies in every public an incalculable force and faculty recipient
of medical education ?
Now this, which seems to destroy all our fees, and yet
which will be our main happiness and wealth, is the lever
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which will raise homoeopath; to its throne; and gently ease its
opponent, so far as it does oppose the public instruction, into
the posterior night: as we shall presently see.
But hark! our friend ories, “ Stop! This is ajl very well in
slight cases, which would get well of themselves: but then
there is that awkward thing called diagnosis, founded upon
anatomy, and morbid anatomy, and deep as the wells of old
colleges. What can the public do here ? ” I shall answer
that question precisely, when you tell me the limit to which
publio education will extend. In the meantime, three pointa
are observed. 1. The most of cases are slight at first, and by
promptitude, many can be extinguished in the bud; which
promptitude can only be achieved by domestic medication;
under the old plan of darkness, and doing nothing for home,
numerous diseases gain a fearful head before the doctor is sent
for; one reason of medical violence, to extinguish violence of
symptoms. 8. As a rule, where the medical consciousness in
a household is awakened, there is little fear of postponing the
call on a medical man until it is too late; on the other hand,
ignorance, at first frightened, afterwards may become callous,
and lose time beyond recall. 3. Diagnosis is at present chiefly
unattainable in what I will call private practice, or domestic
medioine, as contradistinguished from public practice, or the
medical man’s sphere, in cases where a medical man is sure to
he in attendance. In many other cases, such as bronchitis,
pneumonia, not of a desperate order, threatening inflammation
of the brain or its membranes, the diagnosis is surely not so
reoondite but that the public, carefully taught, as they must
and will be, may with tolerable certainty attain it. 4, I will
add further, that as our art is at last open and progressive,
new principles are to be expected; and as the fruit of each
such, new gifts to the public, of science and medical facility.
Take as a parallel of what may be done, what has already been
affeoted with a class not tbe most plastic, and with its applica¬
tion to life and death cases, and to matters of great freight and
property, of a science not the most easy. Suppose you had
lived 1000 years ago; and some visionary had told you, that
the rough vikings and ship captains were soon to have the
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practical mechanics of terrestrial magnetism, some branches of
astronomy, and a mysterious development of optics, also a
strange brass slice with a subtle mathematic soul, put into
their hands, to enable them to convoy the argosies of the
Indies, and the moving armies of the world, from shore to
shore: what would you have said of the chances of a good
handling ? I ween that any one of us might easily have said,
that each such vessel, and such ship captain, ought to have at
least a Sir David Brewster, an Augustus de Morgan, a Faraday,
and an Astronomer Royal on board: and yet the fact is, that
the rough captain does all this, and more; and has become no
longer so rough in the doing of it. Another illustration. If
you had lived at the same date as before; and been informed
that a certain remote branch of numbers would one day be
applied in and to associated families, with a view of preventing
the chances of poverty arising from the death of the principals
of houses; and that the public would have the doctrine of
chances very much in their own hands; you would very prob¬
ably have apostrophized the injured shade of Archimedes, to
protest against so impossible a vulgarization of abstractions.
And yet the public holds this very thing in its hands, and to a
great extent judges of it, in the wide and increasing fact of
life assurance. In fact we may now say, that all arts and
sciences put forth points by which the public is meant to lay
hold of them. And this will be pre-eminently the case with
medicine.
The third thing in which we, homoeopathists, vacate medical
despotism, and could not have it if we would, is, that we are
perforce destitute of espionage. Heretics to the backbone to
all but the truth of nature: refugees of old physic, watched
and hated by her,—we have had too bitter a lesson of what the
spy system, and the informer’s social insinuation is, to attempt
to renew an institution which has gone. So as everything has
a root in reality, we become grand spies of a new order; spies
of nature and utility: our espionage is telescope and micros¬
cope, humility and aspiration: and we ask jealously what is
new in our neighbour’s mind and experience, and thank him
for the peculiar contribution. We even put him on a high
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seat, where the old orthodox bastile once stood, whenever he
has got something beyond our brains; and after the momentary
shock of the impinging of his new truth upon our skins has
equilibrated itself, which it will easily do with a little hard
breathing, we thank him for stretching us out into a new
medical capacity. The old way indeed was the bed of Procrustes,
cutting men down to the stingy shortness of dogmas; but
every real new way is a bed of growth, and once to “sleep on it"
there, is to get up in the morning as long as the bed: aye!
and to demand a longer bed the next night, to save your ever-
extending frame from cropping its toes out into the cold.
Homoeopathy then, thus sending its ramifications through
every class of the community, and belonging to each, is no
beginning of a second medical despotism like the first, but the
cell-germ of a new freedom: and for various reasons it is also
the first constitution of a liberal art of healing. We often hear
that medicine is a liberal profession; but the former liberality
is spurious. It is founded upon a supposed honorarium of
payment; and a supposed love of truth for its own sake : also
on a supposititious scholarly somewhat which resolves itself into
Greek and Latin, and privileged education. All these are
false reasons. No calling has a lasting right to be paid on
any other principle than its public merits and services; or to
degrade any other callings by an assumption of modes of
requital superior to the divine law of business, the laborer
is worthy of his hire. If it aspires to do this, it is a mean
profession; founding itself upon the degradation of classes.
Nor can any calling of a practical nature pretend to love truth
for its own sake: it must be for the sake of its application and
use to man: and must therefore involve the giving the applied
truth away to men’s minds as fast as they are capable of taking
it: in short, it must involve not only its own practice, but
thereby, public education. Otherwise again it is a mean pro¬
fession. And for the same reason, scholarly attainments do
not constitute any part of a liberal name, so long as they are a
class badge; but those who use them as corked and wired
bottles of science, must have a mean name.
Nor indeed could old physic be reckoned a liberal profession.
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but only expectantly liberal, even if it stood in the dearest
fraternity with every other calling, if it gave all it had to the
poor, and if it talked English in the open day. To be liberal you
must have great good gifts to give: and that allopathy has not.
Pills as high as Felion upon Ossa, and black draughts “ deep
as the rolling Zuyder Zee,” tanks of public blood “let” for
nothing, and veins compensated by staoks of quinine; elec¬
tuaries large and redolent as the Siwash; the public skin
excoriated in acres by gratis acres of blisters; all, however
generous in measure, would but constitute a liberality of loss
to the recipients, from which in future time may heaven begin
to defend us. To damage us for nothing might be even worse
than the old way of charges. As I said before, it is only
things worth having which can be given with liberality: and
these homoeopathy has to bestow, and old physic has them not.
Yet apropos of medical freedom, are we not constrained at
present to make use of the means of education offered by the
old profession; and to draw the milk of our medical nurture
from the allopathio breasts ? What is to be our policy here ?
The old corporations will undoubtedly last long yet; and for
some time to come may possibly monopolize what is thought
to be education. I suppose in this matter our young men
must still go through the routine prescribed by the old cor¬
porations ; must sit under ohairs of instruction in the lecture
room, where all new truths of healing are apt to be derided;
and at last take degrees which have no referenoe to that com¬
petence, which is to be their peculiar arm and exercise in the
life-calling. There is no help for this. Only do not let us
laud it for anything else than what really lies in it Let us
give it its due. It is a needful sacrifice to respectability; a
purchased commission to practise homoeopathy entirely unearned
in the field of homoeopathy: like some gracious prince's field-
marshalship, with no field in it. Let us regard it as a simple
bow to the police system of old physic: something we do to
escape being taken up. But with this tone adopted, what oan we
say to “ the quacks,” as they are called ? There is no need to
associate with anybody, excepting on grounds of esteem; just
as it is unnecessary to enter into any closer alliance with
orthodox medicine, than suffices to keep you with a whole
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• skin in year neighbourhood. But for my part I know of no
quacks made such by the non-possession, of diplomas; because
I do not see that diplomas are any guarantee of healing powers,
or any security against wide hurtful powers. And therefore
once more we are emancipated here; and we look at all medical
men, quacks and the rest, from their medical life, and not
from their college papers. In this way let us give a liberal
educational tone, although at present we are unable to con¬
stitute an educational party: and let the tone have this spirit—
“ By your fruits ye shall know them.”
Often indeed have I thought, that old physic has in it all
the marks of quackery which it considers distinctive of that
thing: only that it is quackery on the corporate scale, not on
the individual. First, secrecy. The pharmacopeia is a vast
repertory of patent medicines, not public medicines: the profes¬
sion as one man keeps its own secret. The pharmacopeia is
ad clerum. 2. Arbitrary or spontaneous generation: self¬
dubbing. For the profession never had a grandfather, nor
hardly a father: it has not descended from the past, but starts
up anew, with a kind of animal life horn of the circumstance
that there is a vacant place for making a livelihood, and some¬
body may fill it: in order to have a human past, you must have
progressive principles, and these old physic has not: failing
them, it is a vast corporate quackery. 3. Enormous dragging;
and pay in proportion to enormity: the very essence of Mori-
son’s pills. 4. Pretence to Panacea; as shewn in the refusal to
look further; to look at homoeopathy: a prime indication of a
corporate quackery. 5. Pretence to property in physic; and
leaning upon the state for protection: the very opprobrium of
nostrum-mongers. 6. Glaring self-advertisement, in the public
lists of the colleges, and in the medical directories, which
indicate for all men the real Simons Pure, with whom medical
wisdom lives and dies. 7. The maintenance of journals, for
the derision of all but those Simons, and for their puffing.—
I could go on long with this: but enough has been said to
draft out the features of the corporate quack complete; in all
the armour of a large unrighteousness. On contemplating
these things, the poor individual quacks come cooing about me
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like very doves: and my heart asks, Who has called them s
quacks, and wherefore ? If it is the arch-quack of all, then
I maintain at once that they have the presumption of the best
diploma. Welcome, after that, mesmerists, kinesipathists,
herbalists, galvanists, even nostrum-mongers,—there is surely
some good in ye! Tou are at least warriors against those bad
old walls!
Because I ardently desire to see the medical freedom securely
founded, I fancy that I also see providential reasons why we
are not permitted to constitute anything very important at
present: for it might otherwise be too easy for us to build up
another little doctors fastness which might require a good deal
of storming before it oleared out of the new world’s way. If
we were to set to work with articles, and subscriptions, and a
book to swear on, we should soon be a branch of old physic;
and a bundle of effeteness, in spite of infinitesimal doses, and
similia similibus curantur. Because we should be ignoring
progress in principles, and merely affirming the development
of our one doctrine. That would be our crash; and our
candlestick would then have been moved out of its place.
Therefore let it be matter of thankfulness to us, that we have
as yet that one condition of early freedom, plasticity, out of
which, with a good nisus formations from Hahnemann, and all
other enlarging minds, the full organism of a healing art and
band may come, as soon as we are catholic enough to be
worthy of it.
If the views I have propounded be true, concerning the
gradual medical enlightenment of the public by the rising sun
of homoeopathy, it is easy to see that a vast revolution awaits
the medical profession. Given a state of things in which
domestic medicine is perpetually on the increase, and medical
counsellors edged off to a greater distance from most houses,
and only summoned by urgent distress; and you have also
given a great diminution in the number of medical men in
all large towns. Probably London would spare three-fourths
of its present doctors. With the diminishing numbers will
come increased responsibility for the remainder: the first crea¬
tion of medical posts of honor, accruing from the perpetual
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presence of medical difficulty: higher social position than has
ever yet awaited the men of healing; and as a necessity, higher
pay. And lastly, the prevalence of the gifts of nature and
genius instead of the diplomas of the corporations. This final
constitution is the end to which all things are slowly tending.
In other departments it is called the merit service: and rising
from the ranks is its great fact. The allopathic ranks are the
medical profession: for God’s sake, let the homoeopathic ranks
be the world. Whoever can be brave and successful with
nature’s truth and love on great occasions and emergencies,
let him be one court physician in the high republic of the
nations. If his hand can stream out magnetic life and rescue
to some otherwise lost body, or a hospital of such, let him
come up and live in head*quarters, no matter what his pedigree,
or his papers. If the galvanism of his brain can fraternize
with nature’s galvanism, and live amid its secrets, and if the
perceptions of new health pass between those twain, let him
too be no common soldier any more, but your brother tried by
fire in the medical honor. If water be his mean, and he
purges great disease with that, then he is yours again among
your high places, medically bom both of water and the spirit.
In short, heed respectability as a primary thing, no longer:
let function, and what a man can do, be first: be diploma:
and after that you will have a respectability of illustrious uni¬
form, all blazing over with ruby stars of good works, and with
diamond crosses of perceptive eyes flashing with soft nature’s
light.
We may be readily confirmed in the fact, that some great
merit service issue, favorable, and economical, to tbe public,
awaits the medical question, by a cursory glance at the other
professions: a legitimate mode of looking; because all things
hang together, and explain each other: and because in physi¬
cal things the greatest light comes from the putting together of
diverse parts of the world, and seeing them as the world: wit¬
ness physical geography, and its round suggestions. Now in
this old country, all the professions are similarly locked up,
unpublicized, and as it were Brahminized. It is a set of
systems of castes of corporations; not of individual, but of
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collective castes. Any man may be anything he can, bat no
man can be anything out of the caste. This is the state of
things which is the sick man of our epoch. And over and
above the fact that by virtue of it, the callings of life do not
call or choose their members from mankind, but from privileged
classes, it has the further disability of making administration of
the grand functions of life enormously expensive to the com¬
munity. Things the simplest to do, and which will do them¬
selves, are done with ponderous machineries out of all propor¬
tion to want. Look at the Church. A high caste has got it,
and the simplest and purest of truths is encrusted with a
hierarchy of incalculable cost, and unknown dimensions:
whereas the most of the administration of these great things
might easily be put in commission of the people, and left as
costless work of God to the neighbourhoods; which would
come thereby straightway into active ecclesiastical life. Look
at the Law. What a fortress of leather, harder than stone;
what an annual bill to mankind. Is it not clear that the
arbitration of retired men of business in wisdom’s time of life,
eaoh in the department of the case to be adjudged, might do
near all the work of the law for comparatively nothing; and
begin it as a spirit giving life, instead of letting it go on as a
letter that killeth: instructing all the world moreover in the
principles of social justioe. And so, to the same extent, with
Medicine also. I make these remarks, because it is impossible
in treating of professions, not to associate professions: impos¬
sible not to see that in an order of things they all subsist
together: that the same old caste-system allows their life: and
that the departure of that system from any one of them, is the
knell of all their downfalls.
You will not fail to recollect, that this is the very matter
which is coming up in all the public services. The old theory
was that there was a kind of heaven-bom institution, called
government, with limitless powers, as of an enohanter’s wand.
But with the exigencies of these new times, this institution is
apt to work but poorly, unless where it commits itself to the
great firms and proved practical men of the country: a process
which is going on more and more, and the thorough admission
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of which will be administrative reform. Now what we want,
is administrative reform in medicine: the acceptance on inde*
pendent, merit principles, of any and every man who can heal.
This want can hardly shape itself into a party, without engen*
dering the very evil from which it seems to fly: but before it is
supplied, it can exist amongst us as a tone and a powerful
influence; and this is all which for the present I desire to see.
I feel no anxiety therefore that our good and true men should
be organized and perhaps oaeified into a chartered educative
body: they can do far bettor as a fraternal medical firm, rely¬
ing upon publio support from the mere excellence of its con¬
tribution of men to the public service. Let diplomas be
granted by this joint stock company of knowledge: but let
them be so earned, and he so honorable, that the impression of
a government stamp at the top can add nothing to the titles of
the candidate, or to the roll of names that attest his compe¬
tency to practise.
Let us now turn to more immediately practical things: to
our events of the last six months: to our prospects: and to
our present policy of movement. War is now the worlds
word: war in two seas, and in two out of the four continents:
war also in the hearts and minds of men who are far out of
the cannon smoke. Indeed, in what thing is there not war ?
Long has there been intestine division of all opinions, but now
the difference is declared hostility, and meeting of the edges of
those spiritual swords. And we at length may also say with
Cicero—“ Medicinam veterem ex occultis insidiis in overturn
latrocinium conjecimus .” It is a good time for us, because it
is a time of terrible action, which breaks insufficient tools
with amazing rapidity. What then has been the six months
medical upshot and history of homoeopathy, and of old physic,
in this war-time ?
The history of homoeopathy is a short one, and a private:
it has established its superiority to other Bystems in the treat¬
ment of cholera; and its returns, solicited by the Board of
Health, and in nowise discredited by Sir B. Hall and Dr.
Macloughlin, the Government Inspector, have been omitted
from the published documents of the Board of Health. This
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Address by Dr. Wilkinson.
power of benefiting mankind has been burked in the Govern*
ment office, and the hand that, brought it struck with a foul
weapon of unfairness. The Russian massacre at Hango was
villainous bad, but this is worse vile. Among barbarous tribes,
doctors who can really cure, are respeoted: even cannibals
would eat them last: but Sir Benjamin Hall’s Offioe allows no
truce to tbe unorthodox saviours of human lives. This is a
great fact, and in the face of fair England looking on, should
give us musole for our conflict.
And the rest of our winter's history is like unto this: we
have been burked throughout: burked by The Times and the
leading journals: burked by the war minister: burked by the
health Minister: burked by both Houses of Parliament: burked
by old physic, with all its connexions and dependencies. But
some of this is our own fault.
When our armies were festering with wounds, rotting with
disease, and perishing with want, humane homoeopathic gentle¬
men found that it was “ too bad,” and that homoeopathy, in the
hands of tbe government, might alleviate the evils. In what
voice of thunder did their pent indignation mutter? With
what efficient tools of argument did they address a power which
was known to have a heart of gutta percha, and a head of
brass ? Upon what great arena did they plead tbeir cause ?
And wbat doughty leader carried their challenge to the lists ?—
They met in a parlor. They mentioned homoeopathy in a
memorial. They drove towards greatness in a brougham.
They appeared in tbe full feather of respectability in the war
minister’s ante-chamber. Lord Grosvenor was their guide.
Unscathed in the conflict of compliments, they were bowed out
again; and duly informed that tbe war minister was an infidel;
which they knew before. And there the matter ended.
The memorial had its lesson. It was presented by earls and
lords. It was signed by one archbishop, two dukes, one mar¬
quis, and eighteen other members of the House of Lords:
by forty-nine peer’s sons, baronets, and members of Parliament:
and by many other “ great people.” Time was in old England
when a cause of such amazing and instant interest as this,
would have had a different concoction, another battle-field,
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a Runnymede instead of an exquisite’s boudoir, and rather
more of steel and less of gold lace about the leaders. The
Houses of Lords and Commons were not remote from those
spurless knightly gentlemen. There were at least twenty mem¬
bers of each Parliament among them. One would have thought
in the humblest common sense, that the floor of those houses
was the pleading-place for homoeopathy in an hour of national
wailing and peril. Yet all the forty sat voiceless there while a
hundred opportunities for striking homoeopathy into debate,
ran by unheeded. Nothing would have been easier than
to have caused homoeopathists to be examined before the
Sebastopol Committee, to hear what their suggestions were;
whether they could have done better: or could anyway repair
the medical incompetency and downfall. Nothing could have
been more justly glorious. A member of Parliament requires
some horse to mount, to carry him to honourable distinction:
and here was a brave one which would have borne him right
into the thick of his country’s honor. The occasion was ready:
the whole subject laid down: statistics were there: the break¬
down of the opposite thing was sun-plain: the country was
tender-hearted with calamity: the House was the sore point of
the cowering and cheeping ministers: dukes, by the momentary
flashes of the truths of sorrow, were seen to be flunkeys for
that hour: and there was not in fact a hindrance in the whole
horizon, unless it were the apparition-bugaboo of Mr. Wakley,
and the looming of medical antivotes at some remote election.
But a parlor was snugger: a small party was stiller: a memo¬
rial was less fatiguing and more polite: it pledged to no move¬
ment, and could easily be forgotten: and so the winter was a
winter indeed, and Lord Panmure, so far as homoeopathy is
concerned, has hybernated through it, after being comfortably
tucked in by his friend. Lord Robert Grosvenor, who then
retired himself, with London stones crying out at his windows,
into Sabbatical rest.
Yet somehow or other, the memorialists did good without
intending it: they accidentally caught the tail of The Lancet
in the shut parlor door, and made the creature squeal horribly.
It squealed on the 7th day of April. Its last about homoeo-
VOL. XIII., NO. LIV.—OCTOBER, 1855. 2 N
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patby,—and the last of everything is its tail,—was, that the
thing was utterly evaporated and earthless; whereas, in para¬
ding all the inverted comma “great people” who were now
knocking at Lord P.’s gate to introduce homoeopathy to him,
this mendacious tail was most undoubtedly caught: and there
is reason to believe, nipped off. Henceforth, then, at our
public dinners, Wakley’s brush shall hang as his sole life-
trophy over the head of Lord Robert Grosvenor.
Let us peruse somewhat this Lancet tail-joint, or article.
(I believe articulus is Latin for a joint.) The editor will not
“condescend upon this occasion to enter upon any facts or
argument to prove the transcendental folly of what is called
the homoeopathic system.” He is careful to explain what is
not going to be the staple of his remarks. I almost thought
after that , he was going to sing a song; because, barring facts
and argument, the next ready thing is certainly poetry. Yet
he went on in prose. He says, he “denies in toto that a
knowledge of theology, skill in manoeuvring soldiers, the art of
navigation and naval warfare, or a patent faculty for legislation,
carry with them the slightest competency for judging of the
effects of medicinal agents upon the human frame in health and
disease.” He is assuredly right here. It would he a shocking
look out for all common flesh if men did not know when they
are well or ill, and when treatment is making them better or
worse, unless they were profound divines, generals, admirals,
or peers of the realm. In that case they would he obliged to
take the doctor’s word for it; which is what we object to. On
the contrary, that which gives them competency for this de¬
cision, is their very skins, and the consciousness of ailing,
or well-being, which God has put inside them. To this must
he added the solicitous faces of friends about them, who by
signs that they fully understand, and which vitally concern
them, “judge of the effects of medicinal agents upon the
human frame in health and disease.” The same law by which
a patient would be precluded from judging a system of medi¬
cine, and changing it for another and a better system, would
also prevent him from calling in further advice in any case:
the ear of each patient would be nailed to the doctor’s door-
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post; and appeal to physician, or other doctor, would be
impossible. The sick would fihd it as difficult to move from
place to place, as it is difficult to get out of Bussia without a
permit from the Czar. We seem then to have the editor with
us so far. Yet subsequently we find that a knowledge of “ the
science of medicine" is indispensable “forjudging of the effects
of medicinal agents upon the human frame in health and
disease.” I can’t think so. If that were the case, none but
the most expert physicians could ever find out whether they
were ill or well. A consciously sick man would be an impossi¬
bility, except in the case of graduates, M.D.’s, M.R.C.S.E.’s,
mid L.A.C.'s. More impossible still would be a consciously
cured man out of the sacred pale of Esculapius. No man
could know whether his stomach-ache had been removed until
at the end of an entire curriculum of medical studies. The
old first make-talk of friends, “ How do you do this morning,”
would be like asking your coachman for the quadrature of the
circle, or examining clodpoles on the Eleusinian mysteries.
“ Pretty well, I thank you,” would involve a degree of presump¬
tion, for which no prosecution could be too sharp, and no
damages demanded by colleges, excessive. Nay, further, this
would tell badly for the poor doctors. For as the conscious¬
ness of being in good or bad health would not exist at all
among the laity, who would be more dnd more insensate to
pain the worse their complaints were, so by a kind of process
from the zoophyte to the angel, this consciousness would be
developed, grade after grade, through successive stages in the
medical profession, and only at the top be complete. An
apothecary, small in “ the science of medicine,” and “ in those
sciences upon which medicine is built,” might gropingly Mid
remotely suspect that he had a cough, or an influenza, ora
passing diarrhoea, and might even aspire on his twilight Pisgah,
or Primrose Hill of physic, to cognize a clap afar off; but that
would certainly snip his wings, and bound his narrow horizon.
An M.R.C.S.E, might rise higher, and disport himself through
the twinges of very slight inflammations. But the great
honors of disease, the manglings and truncations, the leprous
and encrusted crowns, are not yet for small deer like him.
2 n8
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Address by Dr. Wilkinson.
Bevelation in this Wakley sphere is sternly gradual, like de¬
grees themselves. The purest surgeons alone could feel the
noble pangs of the stone, and wear the poisoned chemise of the
syphilis. They, first of men, would know when their limbs
were lopped by battle, or their bodies crushed in railway col¬
lisions. But the last revealment and supreme prize money of
pain would be for the men stupendous in diagnosis, and awful
in technicality: the top and bigwig of the tree would have
agonies and parasites all its own: and the court physicians
would sit grand in very hells. Dire reversal of Jiat experi -
mentum in corpore vili! Exquisitely-consciously bursting
with dropsies; ruining with diabeteses; purpling and cauli-
flowering with motley funguses; mouthing and snorting
through dusky apoplexies; currying to their veriest grains
after unsearchable itches; withering with palsies; capering
with choreas; fizzing in fiery fevers; and spitting with con¬
sumptions,—the Wakley magnates would eat of the tree of
knowledge to ghastly purpose: and whenever nature or fortune
chose, they would be what they know. How dreadful would
the advances of the science of medicine, and of the other
“ sciences upon which it is based,” become! A prudent man
would not prelude with even the A B 0 of botany, or elec¬
tricity, or chemistry, or the remotest thread-ends of walks that
might conduct him, alas! too soon, into this infernal spider’s
web! For whose flesh would like to be the anvil on which these
blood-warm sciences are smithied? Schwann and Schleiden
and their malignant crew; Bowman unravelling his deep kid¬
ney ; and Kiernan brooding cruel amid the mystic meshes of
the liver,—would he malefactors of the deepest die! Prepari-
tors of beds of torture to which the inquisition is a coarse joke!
And the men themselves, if they had Bright’s disease, or gin
liver, would feel thrills of anatomic damnation such as Dante
never dreamed! Imagine their nicely-dissected screams from
behind the impenetrable curtain of degrees and honors that
would shroud their sacred suffering persons from the apathetic
populations ! 1st voice —“ Oh ! Kakangelist of pain! Oh!
heinous Dr. Carpenter! Oh! the impish nucleoli in my
abominable cell-germs ! ” 2nd voice —“ Oh! the cursed epi-
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thelial disks in my cursed tubuli uriniferi! ” 3rd voice —“ Oh !
the white-hot fiend’s dagger sticking in the fifteenth fibre
to the right round the comer, in my dreadful stylo-mastoid
foramen ! ” 4 th voice —“ Oh! crucified n. 11 in my glandulee
Peyeri sive solitaries.” Chorus of voices —“Villanous colleges !
ye have brought me to this! Father Esculapius undub me!
Father Esculapius unduh me! confer upon me the bliss of
ignorance of the horrid * science of medicine,’ and of the other
horrid ‘ sciences upon which it is based.’ ” This undoubtedly
would he the tune with which the wise Wakley would wind up
medical education. Of course his silly commonalty would
have all the maladies, just as at present; hut like stumps of
trees they would never know they had them. Furthermore,
as science of medicine is science of disease, the doctors would
he the only people that ever knew that they were ill; they would
in fact have no consciousness of any other kind; for they would
he essences too professional to trench on other departments;
and thus they would no longer be men, hut like Shakespeare’s
Trinculo, sheer abstract cramps and stomach-aches. The
laity on the other hand would be the only people who ever
knew that they were well. And this logical consequence would
come, that the laity, ignorant of the science of pain, and of
“ the other sciences upon which it is based,” could never have
the blind presumption to call the doctors in at all. And this
would be the wise Wakley's wind-up of medical practice.
The only consoling bit of verdure, brethren, that I see in
this man’s scheme, is, that the ladies, all through, would be on
the right side of the hedge; their ancient sorrow quite re¬
pealed: yet even this Oasis is not unalloyed: for the fair
creatures having no sympathies, (sympathies are always born
of the possibility at least of similar suffering,) would never
understand what the matter was with their writhing physician
lords; but would go on with music and accomplishments, as
usual; fiddling to Rome’s burning. Except of course the
lady doctors. But they are only Americans.
So far we have proceeded upon rails of deductions fairly
running from the Wakleyian “principles of medical human
nature,” and laid upon immovable sleepers of logic; hut as
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everything has its limbo of uncertainty, so here the state of the
quacks as to medical sensation and intellection in the Waklen-
nium may well he a matter of grave yet indecisive speculation.
I hope and trust the spirit of Lord Bacon, through Judge
Edmunds, will not be aggrieved at our thus casting about in a
dim region, beyond real science; sinqe we acknowledge to mere
conceit and hypothesis. Our notion is, that the quacks will
be the pure and useless intellect of medicine; floating above
the regulars, and seeing them suffer ; with no vibration
stronger than that of a delicate amusement slightly curling their
impassive nerves and facial muscles: mere airy laughters sailing
provocative in the roofs of the oolleges. Of course they can
never taste the cup of diploma-given suffering, yet perhaps their
neutral and null medicality may enable them to see it. In this
case they will he, in the Waklennium, what extraneous and
self-made reverends are to the true Church, and what philo¬
sophy is to creeds, and what Ariel to Caliban. But I doubt
my footing here.
But suddenly a light dawns upon me: I see I am wrong in
supposing that this Lancet article is a medical view of the
case: it is evidently written with a coroner’s nose as sharp as
a pen, snuffing afar off the dead body of his own calling, and
longing to hold an inquest on it. Every man to his trade.
Wakley, the Reineke Fuchs of the plot, has nothing to lose
by the ruin. He, guiltless of everything connected with medi¬
cine, practiceless, scienceless, reckless, only carrying the bag
of old physic, can undoubtedly claim benefit of laity: the first
rat that runs from the land of yells,—from the groaning Escu-
lapian edifice, he can bend his next Lancet into a toothpick,
and run to the ancillaries in the homoeopathic kitchen, squeak¬
ing with might and main—“ I know nothing of old physic!
I know not the allopathic man! ”
You will readily perceive in this farce, in which Wakley for
the first time in his life is a conjuror, that the regnant idea
is that of divine right, attached to particular individuals and
corporations, and trampling upon everybody else. The exor¬
cising of this killing fallacy has cost the world many a dire
struggle, and is not yet complete. Yet the hack of its harmful
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power is broken; although it still lives wherever there is a
privilege extant, unearned by special personal utility; and
wherever there is an exclusive pretension of any kind whatever.
In common life the fallacy is seen readily enough. My shoe¬
maker, who understands all about the making of shoes, of
which I understand, and desire to understand, nothing, is yet
absolutely my subject and servant, on my one point of interest,
whether the shoes fit or not. On that point, my corns sit in
judgment upon all his science. My mouth and digestion in
like manner sit in judgment upon all the science of my baker.
And so my trunk sits upon my tailor; and my head, upon my
hatter. For uses are the kings of which sciences are the
subjects. The public, therefore, for whose use every calling
exists, and which knows when it is served to its mind, or not,
is the lord and master of all professions: not of their sciences,
for of these it knows and cares nothing; but of their fruits,
which belong to its service, and fall beneath its ken. This is
because the proof of the pudding lies not in the cooking, but in
the eating. What we declare then is this,—in opposition to
Wakley, and all threatened legislation of which he is the type,
—that the medical profession exists for man, and not man for
the medical profession. Let that profession build up its insti¬
tutions as high as it pleases; and give them all the efficiency
of which they are capable: ,only let it not be empowered to
hinder other medical professions , as many as choose , from
coming into existence; and standing ready for the service of
the public, whenever it calls upon them to serve. I think,
brethren, we have got far enough from divine right in England,
to demand at least as much as this.
Passing gladly now from the Waklennium, and from all medi¬
cal protectionism, we find this sentence: “ The Archbishop of
Canterbury still enjoys the power of dubbing whomsoever he
pleases a Dootor of Medicine; and surely he who can make a
doctor, must be himself a greater doctor.” I thank him for
this piece of information, if it be a fact; and it increases ray
great respect for our Church, to find such a power reposited in
its archival laws. And though paper honors are none of the
greatest, I only wish the primate would now and then use his
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privilege. It would be delightful to find our ecclesiastical
chief selecting such grand unduhbed men as Priessnitz, or
Ling, to he called up into admitted firstrateness by his voice.
As to the other point, the editor is unhappy: for it does not
follow that he who can make a doctor must he himself a greater
doctor; as neither that he who can make a pot, must he
himself a greater pot. The creator of doctors, I should have
thought, must he greater than any doctors, even as the potter
is more than the clay. At present there are three creators
of doctors: God, by gifts; the state, by charters; and the
public, by patronage. The colleges are only the feeder of
certain doctors, not the makers. And when the state, or the
archbishop, create, each may, without any knowledge of medical
science, select appropriate men to be so created. Whenever a
man comes into their ken of whose performances it can be
said, “ the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the
lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear;” they may then bestow
their honorarium upon that man without any further enquiry.
And by so doing, they may honor the diploma-giving faculty,
as it has never yet been honored.
Another point with The Lancet , is the advice it gives Lord
Panmure. He is to follow the example of our allies. “ No
French minister,” says the article, “ would so far forget what
was due to science find to his country, or so far lose sight of
the bounds of his own understanding, as to decide upon ques¬
tions of special science. The course a French minister would
take, would be to consult tbe Academy of Medicine." Now
Harvey and Jenner did take this course of consulting the
Academy of Medicine; but, not liking their sentence, they
had to consult somebody else after that: they went to the
people of England, and to future ages of the world, and got
another sentence. The railway men were bolder: they did not
appeal to any solemn senate of old coaches; but went about
their constructions at once: and now even Mr. Wakley rides in
railway cars. Moreover, Napoleon III. did not consult the
Academy when he sent out Headland’s camphor bottles to the
Crimea.
The last point is, that “ several practitioners insist that the
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requisite steps should be immediately taken for ousting Lord
Robert Grosvenor from the representation of the metropolitan
county.” I am afraid that the dread of this has weighed with
members of the House of Commons, to prevent them from
bringing the great claims of homoeopathy manfully before the
legislature: for old physic is powerful in votes and influence.
Sir Benjamin Hall might lose Marylebone, as Lord Robert,
Middlesex, from a combination of canvassing doctors. Well,
if there is no more virtue than that to be had, we have
another reason for looking beyond Parliament for justice.
Quitting now what homoeopathy has done and elicited since
last you met, let us take a very brief survey of the position of
old physic during the same time. You all know what it has
done,—broken down. In council and in fight, in hospital and
in camp, it has shamefully broken down ; yet still it “ brokenly
lives on.” The question has been asked all round, and dif¬
ferently answered,—Who killed last winter's noble army of
victors in the Crimea ? I reply unhesitatingly, old physic
killed it. All the doctors there did their best; and I subscribe
to the monument of those of them who died, and to the praises
of those who survive : yet it is not less a fact that old physic
destroyed that fine army. It had destroyed hosts of armies
before; yet not culpably then; because until now the new light
of homoeopathy had not been proffered to it, and without fair¬
ness, rejected.
The Czar Nicholas uttered a great fact when he said that he
had three Generals, January, February and March, who would
fight his battles well in the winter time. Those three old
generals, which we may take to represent the destructive forces
of all seasons of the diseaseful year, succeed in killing ten men
for one that falls in battle. What is their counterpoise ? What
generals can we bring into the field against them ? The men
of medicine must be such, or we have none to offer. But old
physic is essentially incompetent to form medical generals:
surgeons and assistant-Surgeons, and various degrees of head
to them, are as high as it can go. So little are the doctors
able to do, that they come into relation with head quarters
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only incidentally: their army practice is bat private practice
on a great scale: they can give no general medical orders; and
consequently can gain no general authority. In a campaign,
no chieftain ever thinks of consulting them on strategic medi¬
cine, or abides by their advices; because it is patent from of
old, that Generals January, February and March carry on the
warfare quitd over their heads. The manner then in which old
physic wrought the ruin, is, that it lacked medical power and
authority on a great scale: it could not appear in my Lord
Raglan's council chamber, coequally with his other generals,
and dictate its own importance, as foreseeing, and preventing
one half of the casualties of the service. It had no title to
appear there: no title earned by works. Without a voice
in the matter, (though it would have had a voice if it had
had a brain,) it let tbe men be landed without tents; it let
them be surgeoned without Arnica and vulneraries ; it let them
be worked to death in the trenches: and in short it let those
80,000 human bodies go their own way, war's way, and
weather’s way, to inevitable wreck. And this it did, because
it had no authority; and it had no authority, because it had no
genius, or science, or past good deeds under similar circnm*
stances, to make authority.
This absence of authority is a thing which strikes old physic
itself as rather queer oftentimes. They see other professions
rising to the highest places in the State, but a Lord Doctor
they do not see, and they wonder piningly why not. It is that
they do not deserve it, having no public vitality. Important as
medicine is, second only to the church, there is no reason why
its gifted men should not have many coronets among them;
but then these must come from public services; from service
to the State.
Homoeopathy is already on the high road to a different kind
of consideration, and to wider honors. By the possession of
an ever-increasing number of specifio medicines, it attacks
disease in its strongholds; by the certainty of these, it can
prescribe for masses of sufferers at once; by the ease of the
administration of its means of cure, it can serve a thousand
sick where scarce a hundred could be served on the old plan; by
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their harmlessness it abridges convalescence. In short, it is
public medicine; where the old plan, giving it all its defenders
claim, is only private practice. And moreover, it can be
taught, and given away, to the public; which old physic
cannot be. Am I wrong then in predicting that homceopathic
medicine, in its progress, will also tread the path to a ooequal
distinction, because a coequal public life, with the law and the
Church ?
Old physic then broke down in genere, because it had no
general clement in its soul; and in specie, because it had no
specifics; and here I take leave of it as a dead form of galva¬
nized respectability, which exercises no humane movements
any longer, but keeps its greater heir, homoeopathy, out of its
rights.
Now what is our present policy as homoeopathists ? For
some time past I have discerned most clearly, that homoeopathy
is the first system of public drug medicine yet given: the first
system wide as the world of nature, and progressive as her
ages. And when my heart, with all our hearts, bled with our
bleeding army, I wrote a rapid little book commending our art
to those high folks to whom the better preservation of men and
armies appears, by heaven, or somebody else, to be committed.
And I also specially addressed the Minister of Public Health,
pointing out to him a shining path of public medicine. But
the great people and Sir Benjamin Hall had their ears turned
another way: they were snoring; and he was consecrating a
churoh in Wales, and sighting a peerage. This set me
upon another tack. For I found that fair publicity was not
to be had. The British ministers were deaf to us : the Board
of Health utterly irresponsive: The Times newspaper hard
shut: homoeopathists in Parliament quite dumb: the medical
profession with both thumbs in its ears, and roaring vengeance
on us with its roundest mouth: in fact, every avenue to truth
and voice from any homoeopathic man, precluded. There is
then, I said to myself, only one other man, but that is a grand
man, left: that man is the commonalty of these realms; is the
heart of the British people. And to them, I feel convinced,
we must carry ou* cause.
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Address by Dr. Wilkinson.
How shall we get at them ?
As we are the depositories of a sacred ordinance of public
medicine, it devolves upon us, in the virtual absence of a board
of health, to constitute such a hoard, and administer it for our¬
selves, in the public service. A small joint stock company of
private persons, may easily engender an institution of the kind,
which will shame the government pretences to the same thing.
My suggestion is this. Let a medical man be appointed at a
liberal salary, (mind, I dont want the place,) to follow the run
of disease; and to prescribe for it week by week, or at any
stated times, frequent or distant according to circumstances.
Let his prescriptions, in the selection of the maladies to be
considered, be based, if you please, upon the government
returns of disease, or upon any better knowledge he can obtain.
For example, if scarlatina is epidemic, let him instruct the
people what to do in all simple cases of that fever. And in
this way, let him embrace the morbid year, and girdle it with
homoeopathy. Let these prescriptions be regular advertise¬
ments in the journals; and accompanying each, let there be a
statement of where and how the medicines may be obtained.
In all this, there will be nothing more than we give in our
domestic manuals, only that it will be distributed piecemeal, and
brought home to everybody : and at a time when it is exactly
wanted. The plan may be begun on the smallest scale, say,
by an advertisement of some plain prescription, varying by the
weeks, once a week in The Times for a year. Before long,
the probability is that numerous journals of the new band of
journalism which the recent act will call into existence, will
insert the prescriptions gratis, not as advertisements, but as
information: that the public of each journal will require not
less than this. For it will be evident in the face of the country
that a charity is here, and the sound hearted country will
appreciate it. In no very long time the patent medicine adver¬
tisements may begin to dwindle under the steady pressure of
homoeopathy, thus introduced. After three years perseverance,
I leave you to guess the effect of it upon medical practice all
over the country: and upon the extension of the number of
homoeopathists in every great district. Probably in ten years
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time even the government may begin to rub its eyes, and ask
what is the matter, and whether any body has knocked at its
door. But our private enterprize can then afford to say to some
future Lord Panmures and Sir Benjamin Halls, always down
late in the worlds morning—“ Sleep on now.”
If no company feels inclined for the enterprize, one of our
zealous and able chemists can execute it single handed: and
what is of great import in these days, can make it pay. I
question whether Mr. Headland, or Mr. Turner, with a sound
medical friend at his elbow, could not manage the whole scheme
far better than Sir Benjamin Hall, even if the so-called health
minister had good-will and public courage. One quarter of the
sum already spent in advertising, nay, ten shillings a week
would begin it.
And never fear that the public will dabble too long with
important cases, and that harm will aocrue. All the fear at
present lies the other way. Remember that your business is
not to attain at once some ideal impossible standard of health,
hut simply to rescue fair more patients than old physic saves.
Statistics come in aid here; demonstrating, as they sternly do,
that nopathy is better by a long score than allopathy ; and that
homoeopathy considerably eclipses doing nothing. But in the
worst cases, in which the stereotyped prescription is least to the
mark, instead of allopathy, you will have the benefit both of
homoeopathy, imperfect though it he, and of the expectant
system, or great nature’s chance; which will be a mighty
rescue for the people: and fully justify the safety of the new
league of healing.
I foresee indeed the bare possibility that some of our breth¬
ren may dread the consequences of thus sowing the knowledge
of homoeopathy broadcast over the land; yet I would submit
to them that their fears are groundless. In the first place, the
thing is inevitable; being a part of the very essence of the light
of homoeopathy. In the second, though it will drain allopathy
of its life-blood, it will so rapidly extend homoeopathy among
the public, that in spite of all domestic practice, it will vastly
increase the clientelle of every good homoeopathic practitioner.
For our numbers are very small as compared to the present
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public demand, and cannot be very rapidly augmented. This
plan then, I firmly believe, is the only means we at present
have, of compensating the vast inroads which homoeopathy
quickly makes upon the practice of each of her medical sons,
by the improved health of families: and it effects this compen¬
sation by embracing a geometrically increasing share of the
people within the pale of the homoeopathic creed. Let us then
cast away base fear; and play at once this great card for the
public service.
In a very short time after the homoeopathic public-health
league is constituted, the large towns will take up the same
matteri for themselves, and work the local case more efficiently
than a general board can do. You will begin to tell upon the
hospitals, infirmaries and dispensaries; and to convert some of
their medical men. By what you can show to governors of in¬
firmaries, to town councils, and to poor law guardians, you will
soon have signs of a majority in your favour in hospital elec¬
tions ; and the movement inaugurated by Dr. Pearce at North¬
ampton will spread apace. You will be carried on the shoulders
of the free people into the wards of the hospital, and the feet of
homoeopathy be planted there, no more to come out thence, but
to run its daily round of saving.
In the remarkable pamphlet published by Dr. Pearce, ad¬
dressed to the governors and subscribers to the Northampton
County Infirmary, he shews that that infirmary spends nearly
£ 500 a year more than its income; the deficiency being made
up in different ways. This, as you know, is the universal and
chronic malady of all these institutions; in all of them, allo¬
pathy and beggary kiss each other. The excess of expenditure
over income, necessitates charity sermons, bazaars, indifferent
concerts, and many other taxes upon the public. Now Dr.
Pearce proves that in the Northampton infirmary, homoeopathy
would at one blow save £ 500 a year. This of course ap¬
plies to all similar institutions throughout the country. What
a remarkable testimony this, to the love of God which pants
and palpitates in the heart of any one honest truth well applied;
How much more charitable that hard-looking formula, similia
similibus curantur, is, than the best wishes of those who ignore
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it, since it would at once pour into the lap of the country’s
charity, a sum for disposal equal to the best collections that
could be made from the richest congregations, after the moving
discourses of thousands of eloquent clergy. After this, is any
clergyman henceforth justified in preaching a charity sermon
for a sick hospital, until he ascertains that homoeopathy has
been tried ? that is to say, in one sense, that economy has been
tried ?
Nothing will be more beneficial in another way also to these
charities, than their election of homoeopathic officers. At pre¬
sent the public supports them tardily enough; and they live a
kind of dull, frowsy and faithless existence ; uninteresting, yet
indispensable; vamped up by seedy annual dinners. But put
into them this new fire, and what a keen gaze of the public
eye will at once fall upon them. They will become foci round
which will be grouped the lovers of science, of humanity, of eco¬
nomy, of the art of healing, admiring students also of the
wonders of nature: and ultimately there is reason to think,
that the poorer classes, loving them, will claim them, and sup¬
port for themselves.
I have no doubt The British Journal of Homoeopathy will
tell you presently that these are some of my visions; for it is
excellent in all things, and peculiarly natty in notes: but never
mind, with your good assistance, we shall see. And now our
main business would appear to be friendship and brotherhood.
The great thing that we want for our living cause, is organiza¬
tion ; and the main requisite of organization, is unity of end
and principle, and harmonious diversity of opinion. Already
we have the diversity well enough marked. We have men of
high dilutions, and men of low dilutions, and men of no dilu¬
tion at all. It strikes me that all these are simply different
temperaments in the all-embracive body of our art and science,
and that they are necessary and natural sects. For each man
must handle that in which he can have faith. Without the
faith, the healing means has no palpability of grasp. And
undoubtedly there are material minds which require a little of
what they call substance; and also another different order of
minds for which science itself is a substance, and resultant
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facts of cure are sufficient to attest its power. By no chemistry
of controversy can the one set at present dissolve the other:
but they may cooperate under one end.
Yet whether we differ harmoniously, or disagreeably, though
the result to ourselves will he important, yet in either case the
great purpose of progress will go on. There are so many
great innovations now, such revolutions within revolutions,
such blue patches of sky seen through the thickest and smokiest
of our limitations, that many good people deem that the world
is coming to an end. But I very much hope it is coming to a
beginning, and will soon commence. For hitherto there has
been no world, but only separate and discordant nationalities.
Now nations die, in order to make room for the world, which
wants all their spaces; their room, but not their company. And
so it is with medicine: its national corporations are passing and
deciduous, and so to speak foetal organs and phenomena, and
now its permanent and planetary day is dawning. We stand
around the cradle of this world-medicine; the cradle in which
the great spirit of Hahnemann, and other great spirits, deposited
it. And already as it turns its infantine countenance to the
human race, it wears and sheds as its first expression, the
universal smile of medical freedom.
ON “BRIGHT’S DISEASE,’’ & ITS HOMOEOPATHIC
, TREATMENT.
By Joseph Kidd, M.D.
(Read before the Congress of British Homoeopathic Practitioners,
July 4th, 1655.)
Organic diseases present many impediments to medicinal
influence, to elucidate some of which in the homoeopathic treat¬
ment of Bright’s disease is the object of the present paper.
In defining the nature of the disease, we find its most con¬
stant characteristics to be the presence of albumen in the urine,
and dropsy resulting from degenerative changes in the minute
structure of the kidneys, ascertainable during life by chemical
and microscopic examination of the urine.
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5C1
For the purpose of prognosis and treatment, clinical expe¬
rience divides it into (at least) two* well marked forms, regarded
even still by some as different stages of the same disease, but
most clearly proved by late investigation to be separate, and
separable by well marked characteristic symptoms during life,
and post-mortem examination.
The first form, or the enlarged kidney, is a disease chiefly
seated in the cortical structure. Although more suddenly and
extensively causing dropsy, it is slower to destroy life, and more
amenable to treatment than the second or contracted kidney,
which is chiefly referrible to the medullary portion of the kidney,
and is one of the most insidious and intractable of all diseases,
so much so as to seem like death commencing in the kidney, or
as the gradual extinction of function in an organ essential to
life, by destruction of its tissue, as complete as cancer corroding
the stomach or bladder.
The symptoms of the enlarged kidney generally come on in
feeble relaxed states of general health, with aching pain and
languor across the loins, loss of appetite and strength, furred
tongue, dryness of skin, oedema about the ancles, rapidly in¬
creasing and spreading upwards till all the cellular tissue be¬
comes anasarcous. Dyspnoea, especially on ascending and lying
down, comes on as the serous infiltration invades the lungs and
pericardium. Stupor and heaviness also frequently appear.
The urine generally scanty, full coloured, specific gravity from
1014 to 1020, contains a large proportion of albumen, and
under the microscope f is found frequently to contain blood
globules and fat cells, but a less proportion of casts of the
tubuli uriniferi and of epithelial debris than in the urine from
the contracted kidney.
* Excluding from consideration simple congestion and inflammation of the
kidney, as also desquamative nephritis following scarlatina.
■f- The use of the microscope is of easy application to the detection of
Bright’s disease, some of the worst cases of which are unattended by an albu¬
minous condition of urine, yet may be recognized by the microscopic exami¬
nation.
VOL. XIII, NO. LIV.—OCTOBER, 1855 . 2 O
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On “ Bright’s Disease,"
The natural progress of this disease leads to a gradual ex¬
tinction of life, through the exhaustion and suffering resulting
from the obstructed functions. Nature frequently attempts to
remove this obstruction by critical fluxes—as by long continued
diarrhoea or diuresis—less frequently by profuse perspiration.
In severe cases of this disease the success of our treatment will
be in proportion to the possibility., of removing this organic
obstruction.
The second form of Brights disease, or the “ contracted
kidney,” dependent on granular degeneration, generally comes
on most insidiously, so as to escape detection, until the diseased
process is far advanced.* The earliest symptom is an unusual
and long continued prostration of nervous and physical power,
unrelieved by generous diet or change of air. Drowsiness also
attracts attention, and if now (in the early stage) the legs are
examined, little or no swelling appears on a superficial glance,
but the skin looks firm and hard, and on pressure pits deeply.
The urine is also found to be abundant, (from 50 to 80 oz. in
the 24 hours) pale, opalescent, very low specific gravity, 1010
to 1014, neutral or slightly alkaline, and on careful addition of
Nitric acid a granular deposit of albumen is seen to form very
slowly. On boiling the same, scanty granular deposit occurs.
To the naked eye the urine is seen to contain casts of the tubuli
uriniferi, but more clearly if a drop is examined under the
microscope, when epithelial cells and granules in all phases of
evolution and destruction may be recognized.
As the disease progresses, even with a small amount of ex¬
ternal dropsy (anasarca), the internal organs and cavities become
engaged, and oedema of the lungs, asoites, hydro-pericardium,
and effusion into the spinal and cerebral arachnoid appear, and
also more and more lassitude and drowsiness. As the epithelial
scales are cast off without reproduction, the elimination of urea
ceases in great part, and the denuded basement membrane of
* In few diseases is early detection of so much importance as in this. A
few months delay may convert a good chance of cure into a hopeless im¬
possibility.
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563
the tubuli uriniferi allows a constant draining away of the
serum of the blood (in which the urea being retained renders it
unfitted to carry on nutrition), and leads to excessive exhaustion
of the nervous centres.
Finding the natural outlet for the elimination of urea blocked
up, nature institutes a vicarious action through the allied func¬
tions, especially of the mucous and serous membranes and. skin.
The perspiration—at times excessive—has been proved to con¬
tain urea (by Schottin), also the abundant mucus expectoration
from the bronchial tubes. In like manner nausea, vomiting
and diarrhoea occur, and on adding acid to the secretions, brisk
effervescence frequently occurs from the escape of carbonate of
ammonia.
Effusion into the joints, simulating rheumatism, and into the
pleura and pericardium, causing palpitation and oppression of
the breathing, although painfully, yet serve the same beneficent
purpose of prolonging life to the utmost. Towards the last the
same action of accommodation reaches the arachnoid of the
spine and brain, mid causes spasms, convulsions and insensi¬
bility, in which death gradually steals on without much pain oe
distress, and ends the appointed cycle of organic life.
The predisposing causes of fatty degeneration of the kidney
do not admit of a well defined separation from those of the
granular. Still the former are more usually asoribed to the
sorofiilous or phthisical diathesis; deterioration of blood through
want of sufficient nutritious food, or by great anxiety, or
hemorrhage, (especially in torpid lymphatic temperaments),
abuse of alcoholic fluids, occupations exposing to frequent
changes of temperature, or to great privations, and also constitu¬
tional syphilis. The exciting or immediate causes generally
are: sudden suppression of perspiration, or of eruptions, espe¬
cially from exposure to cold before the desquamation after
scarlatina is over; * also blows on the loins, or great strains.
The reaction after suppression of urine in cholera, the abuse of
stimuluting diuretics, and of Mercury, occasionally also pfeg-
* Until the fourth week has elapsed flannel should be worn next the skin,
and unless the weather be warm no out-door exposure should be allowed.
2 O 2
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On “ Bright's Disease,"
nancy, with great anxiety and weakness, acts as the immediate
cause of this disease.
Of the true granular degeneration, or the “ contracted
kidney,” the predisposing causes are more frequently traceable
to prostatic disease, stricture and intemperance ; a certain
peculiar constitution, or diathesis, that may be called “ degene¬
rative,” seems in most cases however to be the only assignable
cause. This stamp of constitution is most frequently met with
in large towns, where anxiety of mind combines with irregularity
of meals to cause mal-assimilation of food, and want of brisk
open air exercise prevents true depuration of blood. In the
mad struggle for wealth, so many, alas, deny themselves the
true requirements of nature, until from 50 to 60 they find
themselves suddenly arrested by a complete break down of
constitution.
The exciting cause of granular degeneration of the kidney is
most generally some long continued over exertion of mind or
body, or a change from a warm climate to a cold one. Certain
impure states of the blood seem to act as the directly exciting
causes of degeneration of the kidney, (as seen in erysipelas). In
such cases the destructive process set up in the kidney may
serve as an outlet to the vitiated ingredients of the blood, in the
same way as Mr. Simon has suggested that the destruction of
the glandular organs in cancer is set up by nature as a new
organ of elimination for the escape of the cancer cells from the
blood.
The post-mortem appearances of the “ enlarged kidney” from
fatty degeneration are chiefly referrible to the cortical portion,
which is seen to be flabby and expanded, of a pale grey colour,
the capsule loosely adherent. The cut surface looks infiltrated
by a plasma of albuminous exudation in the cortical portion,
but in the tubular looks swollen, and speckled with red.
A thin layer under the microscope, disoloses the diameter of
the tubules to be enoroached upon by the enlarged epithelial
scales, the number and size of which are increased and mixed
with various cells and nuclei in different stages of dissolution.
The tubules are also frequently expanded into cysts.
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The post mortem appearances of the contracted kidney are—
capsule adherent to the cortical structure, which is more
shrunken than the medullary; the cut surface is of a dull deep
red colour—granular looking and tough. A thin section under
the microscope shows the epithelia swept away into mere gran*
ular debris, and the basement membrane denuded or destroyed,
so as to allow of constant draining away of serous urine of low
specific gravity in large quantities, yet only aggravating the
dropsy by its exhausting influence.
If the blood in the vessels be now examined, it is found to
contain a very small proportion of red globules—yet nearly the
average proportion of fibrine and of inorganic salts, but the
serum is of very low specific gravity, and the amount of
albumen much lessened and of low feeble organization.
The medicines I have found most useful in the treatment of
Bright’s disease, are Terebinthina, Cantharides, Arsenicum,
Mercurius, Nitric acid, Phosphorus, Ferrum sulphuricum and
China. I have also used, and for special complications, Nux
vom.. Cuprum aceticum, Opium, Ipecac., Bryonia.
Finding only palliative relief from Canth., Arsenicum,
Mercurius, in this disease, I was led to investigate the cause of
it, when it seemed to me that none of those medicines corres¬
ponded in their true and least variable pathogenetic effects to
the essential nature of Bright's disease. This for the purpose
of treatment, resolves itself into a disorganization of the secreting
structure of the kidney, which causes the nutritive material of
the blood to escape constantly, and at the same time prevents
the natural elimination of urea from the blood.
To this pathological condition no medicine seemed to me so
truly to correspond as Terebinthina, which in the healthy subject
causes hematuria with frequent micturition and albuminuria,
aching pain and weight in the loins, depression of muscular
power, vertigo, stupor, and also increased secretion from the
bronchial and gastro-intestinal mucous membranes. It perfectly
cured the first case (that of Miss D. of Woodford, in the
sequel) I used it in, and that when death seemed inevitable, and
when Cantharides failed to produce any amendment. The second
case it also cured (that of Capt. S. of Bridgnorth.)
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On “ Bright’s Disease"
The symptoms indicating its use are, scanty evacuation of
urine, rather deep coloured, (and occasionally containing blood,)
coagulating abundantly with heat, or Nitric acid—extensive
anasarca —irritability and relaxation of bowels, anorexia; also
abundant mucous expectoration.
Cantharides is more useful in aeute or chronic nephritis, and
in desquamative nephritis, than in the fully formed degenerative
disease of the kidney, in the acute or early stage of which,
however it is most useful, especially when occurring from blows
on the loins, or sudden ohanges oftemperature. The symptoms
most indicative of its use, are scanty secretion of high coloured
urine, with soalding irritation of the bladder and urethra, aching
pain across the loins, or in the testicles. Urine containing
an excessive proportion of swollen epithelial scales, and rapidly
coagulating by heat or Nitric acid. Acute anasarca. In cases
complicated with old strictures, or with prostatic enlargement
or prostatic gleet, it also proves useful.
When urgent symptoms of effusion on the brain from urea
poisoning occur, with stupor and insensibility, it is also indicated;
as well as in aotive hsematuria, more so if the blood comes from
the bladder mixed with shreds of membranous exudation.
Arsenicum is more usefal in the albuminuria following scarla¬
tina (in desquamative nephritis) than in any other disease of
the kidney. It is especially indicated if rapid desquamation
of the skin accompanies the same process in the muoous mem¬
brane of the kidney (as seen in the excessive proportion of
epithelial scales in the urine under the mioroscope.) Also
when anasarca gradually follows scarlatina, in weak exhausted
states of the system, induced by poor living, or damp situations.
In ascites following desquamative nephritis, I have also found
it very useful, as well as in the constant coryza attendant upon
the advanoed stages of granular degeneration. When the letter
is connected with repressed eruptions it may do good, but the
majority of cases seem to derive but little permanent benefit
from it.
Mercurius corrosivus is also only useful in the acute, or early
stages of albuminuria, especially when caused by the abuse of
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alcoholic fluids, by cold, or by obstructed portal circulation.
It is especially useful when the disease is accompanied with
effusion of flbrine, or fat globules in the urine, as well as when
profuse secretion of pale albuminous urine occurs. Also when
bilious diarrhoea, or profuse slimy secretion from the mouth and
throat, accompany the disease.
Nitric acid I have derived much aid from in the worst oases
of the contracted kidney disease, especially when nausea,
—excessive slimy secretion from mouth and throat—yellow
coating all over the tongue with bitter or acid taste exist; also
bilious diarrhoea or constipation, with piles and anorexia.
At my friend’s (Dr. Grey of New York) suggestion, I have
tried Phosphorus in Bright's disease, but without much result.
Nux vom. is useful when heaviness and stupor accompany
the disease, but acts only as a palliative. The same may be
said of Opium also. China and Ferrum sulphuricum (1st and
2nd dil.) prove of great service in relieving the exhaustion and
lassitude complained of in every stage of the disease. Ipecac,
frequently relieves the irritable dry cough caused by oedema of
the lungs. It also acts well when nausea and abundant mucous
expectoration exist. In the same case, Pulsatilla frequently is
of service.
In the treatment of albuminuria dependent on granular
degeneration of the kidneys, we find such a constant vis inertise
(from the retained urea poisoning the blood), opposing our
efforts to cure, or to prolong life, that we must not depend on
medicinal influence alone, for in this disease above all others,
we find how futile is the purely symptomatic treatment. If
we feel it to be our calling to prolong life to the uttermost in
this disease, and to make that little the most endurable, we
must grasp tbe physiological processes set up by nature,
vicarious one to the other, in eliminating the urea when its
natural channel is blocked up. To these conservative func¬
tions we must apply the ever-acting law of “similia similibus
curantur.”
Thus the pathogenetic effects of Nux vom. and of Opium,
resemble most closely the symptoms of drowsiness and stupor
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from urea poisoning. Yet those medicines prove of little or no
true benefit, because of the physical obstruction to their action
from the retained urea. It is precisely analogous to a foreign
body in the eye, resisting the action of Aconite in the sympa¬
thetic inflammation resulting therefrom. It is clearly as much
our duty to promote the elimination of the urea in one case,
as to extract the foreign body in the other, and help by natural
means to increase the secretions, that we now find take up the
actions correlative to the functions of the kidney. In propor¬
tion to the success of our efforts in this direction, we may be
enabled to prolong life, and ward off much distress and pain.
Free action of the skin above all, is most essential. The
occasional use of vapour baths at 96 to 98 degrees for five to
ten minutes, and regular daily ablution with tepid soft water
and soap, followed by brisk dry friction, fulfil this most satis¬
factorily. The increased activity of the lungs and liver, we
must seek to promote by regular exercise in the open air
(in dry elevated situations if possible). The action of Hepar
sulphuris and Terebinthina also aids us in this. A change to
an equable warm dry climate (as to Egypt, Malta, or Malaga,)
is of vast moment, and if the disease is of recent origin, may
completely cure it. Increasing the action of the skin, it also
enables the patient to take open air exercise all through the
winter, wonderfully exhilarates the spirits, and increases the
appetite.
It is also of great moment to supply abundantly all the
elemepts which are being carried out in excess, by the use of
unstimulating albuminous and farinaceous food, in the form
most easy of digestion, milk, eggs, fowl, fish, mutton, beef,
peas, beans, bread, biscuits, cocoa, tea. Also a very little
fresh vegetable, and ripe fruit every day.
The use of alcoholic fluids in albuminuria dependent on
degeneration of the kidney requires great tact and judgment.
In that oalled the fatty or enlarged kidney, they are borne very
well if moderately used at meals only, but in the cases of
granular degeneration they aggravate the urea poisoning, and
tend to cause effusion on the brain^and spine. (Serous apoplexy.)
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Still in many cases the patients cannot do without their
accustomed stimulus. In such cases, good Bordeaux wine is
the least objectionable. Burgundy, or pale sherry, comes next
if necessity does not oblige pale ale or porter, to be taken.
When dropsy is increasing in the extremities or in the chest,
much aid will be found from brisk friction, or shampooing
downwards. This aids in the more rapid exhalation outwards
through the skin of the urea laden serum, and also seems to
cause its more rapid reabsorption into the vessels in a state
quickly eliminated. From this I have seen most rapid diminu¬
tion of dropsy; which, though temporary, yet afforded much
relief to the urgent dyspnoea, and to cramps in the limbs.
Case I.—Granular degeneration of the kidney, with (proba¬
ble) contraction following pregnancy. General dropsy. Death.
Mrs. 5. B—, of Gateshead, of a feeble delioate constitution,
and small, thin frame, aged about 28, was confined with her
second child in the latter part of 1852, under most agonizing
distress of mind caused by the unexpected death of her hus¬
band a short time before. Not regaining her strength after
her confinement, her medical attendant was induced to examine
her urine, which proved to be albuminous. His treatment
proving of no avail, she was removed to Edinburgh, and
placed under the care of Dr. Christison with no better result.
After some months she was removed to a friend’s house at
Ampthill, near Bedford, and sent for me, June 21, 1852.
I found her very emaciated and weak, much depressed in mind,
the appetite deficient, her nights disturbed by dry tickling
cough, and urgent dyspnoea dependent on oedema of the lungs.
Feet and legs much swollen towards evening. The urine col¬
lected for twenty-four hours and mixed, was of a pale colour,
with light flocculent deposit. Sp. gr. 1010, reaction neutral.
Uric acid and urea nearly quite absent. On boiling the urine,
a deposit of albumen was collected equal to twelve grains in
the fluid ounce. For about one month I treated her with
Cantharides, 1st and 3rd dilution, under which the proportion
of albumen lessened, the urine became slightly acid, and its
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On “ Bright's Disease,
sp. gr. rose to 1014. Her nights became much lose disturbed,
and her appetite and spirits improved a little. Soon however,
under renewed anxiety, she got rapidly worse, and the dyspnoea
became excessive. I then prescribed Arsenicum 3, 2, 1, with¬
out any benefit, also Nux vom. 3 and 1, for the irritable cough,
which it relieved somewhat. She was then removed to her
mother’s (house) near Berwioh, where I subsequently visited
her, and found general dropsy rapidly increasing, with total
prostration of strength. In this state she lingered for two
months, under the care of her former family physician, and
gradually sank with total break-up of the lungs, through
miliary tnbercle towards the end.
Case II.—Fatty degeneration of kidney (enlargement).
General dropsy. Cure. Miss D —, of Woodford, «t. 26, of
a feeble, relaxed constitution; lymphatic, sanguine tempera¬
ment; in March 1852, during the prevalence of cold east
winds, was attacked by pleurisy, and severe pain across the
lumbar region, accompanied with the secretion of thick white
urine. She gradually lost the symptoms of pleurisy, but
anasarca gradually came on in June, with great prostration of
Strength. Under skilful allopathic treatment, she got worse
and worse, till November in the same year, she came under my
care. Her limbs were then enormously swollen, so that the
skin—deeply pitting on pressure — was distended nearly to
bursting, and she could with difficulty move a step. The in¬
tegument of the body and chest, was also universally anasar-
cous. She complained of much general muscular weakness,
but her appetite was good. Bowels regular. Catamenia absent
four months. The urine collected for twenty-four hours was
of a deep, smoky, opalescent colour, sp. gr. 1018, and average
quantity, 30 to 35 oz. in the twenty-four hours. On boiling a
little it became a nearly solid mass of albumen, so as to allow
of the test tube being inverted without escaping. The same
also by the addition of nitric acid. Under the microscope,
blood globules were visible. For three to four weeks I treated
her by Cantharides, but she became gradually worse, the dropsy
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increased to that degree that she coaid scarcely leave her bed
from the enormous size of her limbs. Disheartened at this
result, I reflected long and anxiously on the nature and treat¬
ment of her disease, with the result before mentioned* of
selecting Terebinthina. This I accordingly prescribed, in the
dose of four drops three times a day, of the pure spirit (occa¬
sionally for a few days the first and third dilutions were sub¬
stituted). The most marked improvement resulted. The
specifio gravity of the urine became higher, the quantity of
albumen lessened. The dropsy steadily diminished as the
amount of urine increased (from 30 to 45, 50, and eventually
to $0 oz), and the strength and activity soon surprised all her
friends who had given her up as hopelessly lost. The same
medicine was continued for three months, and at the end of
that time the most careful examination failed to detect albu¬
men or blood globules in her urine, which was then perfectly
transparent, of a dear amber colour, and its specific gravity
1080. Every vestige of dropsy was removed, and the cata¬
menia appeared with perfect restoration of health and strength,
in which she continued up to the last time I saw her, nearly
two years afterwards.
Case III.—-General dropsy, dependent on degeneration
(probably granular) of the kidney. Cure. Capt. Thos. S—,
Of Bridgnorth, set. 50. Bihous temparament, deep sallow
complexion, and of a family in whioh kidney disease carried
off several members about his age. Given up as hopeless by
the allopathic pbysioians of Bridgnorth, he was with difficulty
moved to his mother-in-law’s house at Groom’s Hill, Green¬
wich, to try what homoeopathic treatment could do for him.
The morning after his arrival (10th of May, 1854), I found
him, after a night of much suffering through dyspnoea, propped
up in bed, soarcely able to breathe, with his legs and body
oedemsitous, the entire posterior inferior region of the right side
of ohest perfectly dull on percussion, and in the upper and
middle parts moist crepitating rales. The same on the left
side, but to a slighter extent. The heart’s action muffled and
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indistinct. On the least exertion, or on lying down in bed,
sadden faintness and oppression of breathing came on. His
tongue was dry and red, and the bowels constipated; no appe¬
tite; extreme prostration of strength, and lassitade. The
urine was abundant (three to four pints in the twenty-four
hours), of a pale colour, specific gravity 1010, reaction neutral,
freely coagulated by boiling, or nitric acid. Under the micros¬
cope, broken down blood discs were seen entangled in casts of
the tubuli uriniferi, also epithelial scales of irregular forms
mixed with stringy mucus. The history given me was that his
constitution had been severely tried in India and at home by
enormous quantities of Calomel, and by various accidental
falls; that for years past he was accustomed to pass bloody
urine, and in January 1854, after a severe kick on the loins
from his horse, bloody urine was passed with severe aching
pains across the loins. He was confined to his house at
Bridgnorth, under the care of two allopathic practitioners for
four months, during which dropsy gradually came on and
steadily increased, notwithstanding the most vigorous treat¬
ment, including the free use of Calomel, and of warm
baths. Being the second case of dropsy with albuminuria
which occurred in my practice, after the cure of Miss D— by
Terebinthina, I immediately prescribed it in doses of three or
four drops, three times a day for a few days. This dose caus¬
ing bilious diarrhoea (although in the old system he required
very large doses of Calomel to operate on the bowels), was
changed to one drop, and continued for three months twice
a day (occasionally substituting the 1st and 3rd decimal dilu¬
tions), and with the most rapid improvement. All dropsy was
gradually removed; the breathing became good; appetite and
strength increased; bowels acted regularly once a day; and
about the 28th of June he returned to Bridgnorth, to the
astonishment of his former medical attendants and his friends,
as well able to walk as ever, and in perfect health. In May
1855, he called on me in London, and reported “ that he had
continued in perfect health, able to hunt, and to go about in
the coldest weather, till about a fortnight ago, when the
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stomach getting deranged, he had foolishly allowed his old
allopathio surgeon to give him smart doses of Calomel for a
few days, which upset his general health, and his limbs became
a little cedematous again.” Under the Terebinthina, one drop
night and morning for ten days, he became again quite restored
to his usual activity and strength.
The cure in this case I do not regard as permanent, for upon
careful examination in May 1855, I found the urine still
albuminous, and of low specific gravity (1010 to 1012).
The patient and his fiiends regarded him as completely cured,
which to all external appearance was the case.
Case 4. —Granular degeneration of the kidney (contraction),
following prostatic enlargement and stricture. General dropsy.
Death. In the autumn of 1858,1 was consulted by G. F—,
Esq. of New York, aged 50, for symptoms of gradual Enlarge¬
ment of the prostate gland, accompanied by painful contraction
of an old stricture that had been operated on six years before
(by the late Mr. Stafford), during which interval it seemed to
have been cured. Struck by the general exhaustion and irrita¬
bility of nervous energy, I requested him to collect the urine
for twenty-four hours, and bring me a little. It was pale,
opalescent, like freshly made whey, and of specific gravity 1014.
On standing, it deposited much flaky debris, which even to the
naked eye was seen to contain casts of tubes. Boiled, a fine
granular deposit slowly fell down (increased by addition of
Nitric acid). Under the microscope much epithelial debris of
the bladder and prostate was seen. In addition to the urinary
symptoms he complained of irritability and depression of spirits,
indisposition for muscular exercise, dryness and yellow fur of
the tongue in the morning.
I gave a gloomy prognosis, and to his friends expressed the
opinion that he was suffering from the most intractable form of
Bright’s disease, dependent on granular degeneration of the
kidney, and that dropsy was inevitable, and most probably at
a later stage would cause serous apoplexy.
Notwithstanding the most careful general management, and
the persevering use of Cantharis, Terebinth, and Nux vom.
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the frequent irritation to pass urine day and night increased,
and the proportion of albumen in the urine also. Becoming
gradually weaker, oedema came on about the legs. Ferrum
sulphuricum, China, Phosphoric acid, were successively pre¬
scribed without any permanent effeot. In the winter of 1854-5,
he suffered sadly from the cold weather. Cramps and rigidity
of the muscles, with neuralgic pains disturbed his sleep. These
symptoms were easily relieved by Cuprum aceticum—1st dil. or
the 2nd, but not by the 3rd dil., nor yet by Cuprum metallicum,
1st trit.
During the long continued frost in February, oedema of the
lungs came on, obliging him to sleep in a chair. The urgent
dyspnoea was unrelieved by Bryonia, Arsenicum, Phosph.
As the specific gravity of the urine fell lower and lower, to
1012, 1010, long continued fluent coryza, and slimy mucus
expectoration increased, although the general state was never
benefitted by Nitric acid. In March and April constant vomit¬
ing after all food came on (palliated by Ipecac and China).
With this complication of suffering he now determined on a
voyage to Amerioa, and in May reached New York, but in a
few weeks gradual insensibility came on, and he died placidly
in his ohair, most kindly attended to by Dm. Gray and Warner.
TIC DOULOUREUX.
By William Morgan, M.R.C.S. London,
Member of the British Homoeopathic Society, and one of the Medical Officers to
the London Homoeopathic Hospital, <&c.
Being the substance of a paper read at the Annual Congress of British
Homoeopathic Practitioners, on the 4 th <f July, 1855.
Mr. President and Gentlemen,
In treating of the subject of neuralgia, or pain of the nerves,
I feel that I am taking up a subject neither new nor unnoticed;
on the contrary, the very anomalous nature of nervous diseases
has left them long a riddle to the medioal practitioner—a
riddle that the most patient investigation has too frequently
failed in solving.
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This much, however, we dearly know; pain is mainly ths
result of nervous irritation. If pain arise from mental causes;
if sorrow or anger, grief or passion, foe the sources of their
origin, the nerves are the wonderful and sensitive media
through which those emotions are enabled to act upon the
bodily frame; if pain arise from local injury, from fracture,
from dislocation, or from decomposition of bodily parts, still
the nerves are the active agents through which it is earned
from one organ to another; nerves are, so to say, the life and
death of the human system; through these nerves are con*
veyed its means, both of existence and destruction; through
these wondrous—as it were—wire springs of life, we receive
the influence that may stimulate or deaden all faculty; through
these nerves we receive consciousness or forgetfulness; we are
sensible to the minutest wave of the polarizing crystal, to the
most delicate magnetic influence, though produced from a
remote source; through them even the phantasies of mania
assume a strange, often a healthy tranquillity; through them
the powers of the soul develops themselves in all their might
and God-endowed grandeur.
For, whatever be our view of the first grand source of human
life and action, it is an undeniable fact, that electric force is
one of, if not the greatest means that a higher power has
seleoted for the production, sustenance, and reproduction of
both. And what is eleotric force but nervous influenoe dis¬
tributed more or less throughout the body? What is the
aotion of the blood but that of the most wondrous clockwork
ever devised, keeping up with unerring and steadfast measure
that motion which but some outward irregularity can disturb
or suppress ? What is the very medium through which life
and its attributes of sense and motion are distributed, but that
wondrous complication of small, sometimes almost invisible
nerves, the off-shoots, as it were, of some of greater size and
power, and finally terminating in their great nourisher and
supporter, the seat of the soul itself? Through these nerves
it is, that the human system is, as it were in a map, divided
and traced out; through these nerves it is, that heat and cold,
pleasure and pain are discerned; through these nerves, as it
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were through a living galvanic battery, we feel every emotion,
gain every perception; through these, the brightest impulses of
love and religion transmit their influence, and connect physical
matter with the soul, with which God has made it animate.
Yet this wondrous organization is no less susceptible of the
ills which flesh is unhappily horn to undergo. The very deli¬
cacy of the nervous system renders it the ready path through
which “pain and anguish rend the brow"; and hence the
almost infinite variety of neuralgia, or painful affection of the
nerves.
Neuralgia, in whatever form, or whatever chord of the
nervous system it may attack, is, it may be safely affirmed, one
of, if not the most distressing and painful affections which
invade the living organism. I need hardly say that the term
derives its characteristic appellation from the Greek vefyov and
&kyos, and is understood by most pathologists to apply to all
those painful disorders, which are, to all appearances, uncon¬
nected with any inflammatory or recognised lesion of a part:
in fact, it implies a morbid exaltation of sensibility, without
a perceptible organic change. As the whole system is lavishly
supplied with nervous branches varying in size and magnitude,
from the great sciatic down to the minutest silk-like filament,
so also may any part of the body be attacked with this dis¬
tressing malady. It restricts itself to no particular locality,
neither does it bestow any particular favouritism upon one
organ more than another. The head, the face, the neck, the
mamma, and testes, are alike subject to its influence, in some
while it runs its harrassing course along the intercostal, the
sciatic, and the ilio-lumbar in others.
The greatest authorities of the present day, more especially
the continental physicians, assign it a place among the affec¬
tions of the more vital and important organs. Under the
different titles of gastralgia, gastrodynia, colic, ileus, hepa -
talgia, nephralgia, splenalgia, hysteralgia, mastodynia, &c.,
while most of our own pathologists are also agreed that that very
distressing and painful affection, “ angina pectoris,“ arises from
a morbid excitability of the cardiac nerves, leading to spasm of
the muscular fibres of the heart and the great blood vessels.
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Neuralgia may therefore be said to comprise a large class of
prominent and important disorders, which, from their extreme
severity, obstinacy, and in very many instances, profound ob¬
scurity, demand the most serious attention, the most close and
careful investigation of the practitioner.
Neuralgia is a disease of no recent origin, neither does it (as
I have before stated) confine itself to any particular locality or
country. It did not escape the vigilant eyes of the ancient phy¬
sicians, as the works of Hippocrates,Ca/ius Aurelianus, Aretceus,
as well as the Arabian authors, such as Avicenna, and others,
teem with scattered allusions to this painful affection of the
nerves. The inhabitants of the high table-lands are not
more exempt from its ravages than those who are found on the
borders of forests, rivers and swamps. Indeed, the whole
human race are more or less liable to its attacks, whether they
be natives of the Torrid Zone, the icy regions of Behring’s
Straits, or the remotest isle of the Polynesian group. I myself
have met with it on the fair and beautiful isle of Madeira, on
the swampy hanks of the Demerara, as well as on the lofty
ranges of the West India Isles.
Having made these few remarks on the general character
and history of neuralgia, and as the limits of my address will
not permit of a more extended consideration of this important
subject, we will, if you please, devote a short time to dealing
with that species of neuralgia which has popularly obtained the
name of tic douloureux, and which forms the subject of this
paper.
Since the days of Sydenham, the acknowledged father of
English medicine, many able treatises have, by different authors,
been written on this subject, and I believe that Dr. John
Fothergill was about the first in this country, who, in a sepa¬
rate form, drew the special attention of the profession to it, and
called it simply " a painful affection of the face.” Soon after,
or about the same time, M. Andr6 of Versailles wrote upon the
subject, and gave it the familiar name which it has ever since
assumed, that of tic douloureux. I may also mention Dr.
Darwin, who speaks of it as “ hemicrania idiopathica,” i. e., an
affection by which one half of the nerves of the head are in a
VOL. XIII, NO. LIV.—OCTOBER, 1855 . 2 P
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state of pain; Heberden as dolor capitis intermittens; Sau-
vages, as trismus dolorificus ; Young, antalgia dolorosa;
Chaussier, the French writer, gave it the name of tteuralgia
facialis, which was slightly altered by Good into neuralgia
faciei; Kerrison and Hutchinson as neuralgia facialis spasi
modica. But these names after all amount to the same meaning,
viz., that of nervous and painful affeotion of the face, more or
less spasmodic in its character, but evidently to be distinguished
from many affections of a like nervous origin. Let us therefore
consider the expressive name of tic, &c. both as to its applica¬
bility, and the symptoms it indicates.
Those who have either suffered from, or have medically
treated tooth-ache, are aware that vibration is the active
medium of pain; just as in battering a wall, it is not one stroke,
nor another, that brings down the mass of masonry, but a
series of blows, continually multiplying their foroe as one
stroke succeeds another, and thus producing a gradual but
certain decomposition and separation of parts; so it is with
neuralgic pains, especially those which affect the facial nerves.
Hence the feeling as if something were beating or pulsating,
which is so repeatedly experienced by those suffering from
neuralgia, and hence the applicability of the name of tic to the
complaint.
The word tic implies a convulsive movement or spasm, and
as strong emotion, even when of a mental character, readily
displays itself by muscular twitching and contortion, the name
has been well selected by M. Andr6 to designate those feelings,
when, in the paroxysms of facial pain, the patient feels as
though something were moving in the cheek, osoillating like
the pendulum of a clock, and from the proximity of the ear
actually sounding. So clearly has this been felt by patients,
that they have spoken of feeling as though something in the
cheek went tic-tic-tic.
Another person speaks of the disease as commencing with a
slight concussion, or ticking somewhat similar to that of a
pendulum.
Several authorities have endeavoured to account for these
vibratory sounds, but, as an able writer on the subject of
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neuralgia well observes, that we can only guess at the cause of
this sensation. It may, he thinks, possibly be occasioned by
the spasmodic action of the nerve itself during the paroxysm ;
or, which is more probable, result from the implication of the
auditory nerve in the diseased action; the idea of sound arising
from irritation of the nerves of the ear, in the same way as
flashes of light appear to the patient when those of the eye are
disturbed.
As the principal object of our annual assemblies is to en¬
deavour to elicit praotioal facts from each other, rather than
theories, in furtherance of the grand object we have in view;
viz. that of raising a perfeot and imperishable monument to
the illustrious founder of our doctrine, I will not occupy the
time of this meeting by referring (in a formal manner) to tho
various symptoms, and manifold causes, whether they be of a
predisposing, an exciting, or of a pathological character, which
may produce an attaok of this disease. Neither do I consider
it requisite before a body of my professional brethren to enter
(beyond the neoessary limits required for our guidance) into
the anatomy and physiology of the parts in question. I shall
therefore after a very brief reference to those parts, merely as a
kind of refresher, submit to this meeting the result which has
attended the administration of two or three medioines in several
well marked and unmistakable cases of Tio Douloureux.
It is now, I believe, pretty well settled that the source of
misohief oausing this distressing complaint, rests with the ter¬
minal branohes of the fifth pair of nerves—-Me trifacial. This
nerve, as you know, arises by two roots from a tract of yellowish
white matter, situate in front of the floor of the fourth ventricle.
It passes forward to the petrous portion of the temporal bone,
where it spreads into a large semilunar shaped ganglion--—*' the
gasserian .” This ganglion divides into three main branohes:
the ophthalmic—the superior maxillary, and the inferior max¬
illary. The first, as its name implies, gives off (in the first
place) a frontal, laorymal and nasal branch, besides numerous
twigs to supply the surrounding tissues of the orbit. The
second, or superior maxillary, passes forwards and makes its
exit from the cranium through the foramen rotundum; it
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crosses the spheno-maxillary fossa, penetrates through the
canal in the floor of the orbit, and emerges at the infra-orbital
foramen, where it divides into a shower of branches, to supply
the muscles and integuments of the face. This nerve gives off
in its course, orbital, dental, muscular, and cutaneous branches.
While crossing the spheno-maxillary fossa, you may remember
it receives two ascending branches from Meckel’s ganglion, and
this appears to be the first communication which exists between
the nerves of the face and that vast chain which forms the
great sympathetic tract. The third, or infer-maxillary, leaves
the cranium by the foramen ovale, and divides into two branches,
internal and external; the first gives off four or five branches,
which are distributed to the temporo-maxillary region, consist-
• ing of the masseter, temporal, and buccal, &c. whilst the internal
divides into the gustatory, infer-dental, and anterior auricular.
In addition to this, there is another class of nerves which
becomes affected with this complaint; and although grave
differences of opinion did exist upon this point, still I should
presume that there are now very few practitioners who doubt
the possibility of the portio-dura of the seventh pair being
similarly assailed to the other more superficial and sensitive
nerves of the face. Whether this nerve, or its branches, be
directly affected by the exciting cause, or whether from the
close approximation, the extensive intertwinings and inoscula¬
tions which are well known to exist between this and the other
facial nerves, and thereby coming (as it w$re) into actual
contact with a diseased surface, and that of the most sensitive
character, I will not stop here to discuss.
There seems to he but one opinion as to the more frequent
occurrence of neuralgia of the face, than any other part of the
body; and there are many cogent reasons to be assigned for
this peculiar susceptibility. In the first place, its continual ex¬
posure to atmospheric changes—heat and cold, dryness and
moisture—its thin and fragile integument, scarcely defending
the delicate machinery beneath—its mental vicissitudes. And
once more permit me to remind you of the effects of mental
emotion (whether pleasureahle or painful, whether in the blush
of modesty, or the throe of anguish) on the skin, and so on
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the nervous system of the face. I may also point out to you
how fearfully the face is the index of internal indisposition, and
how often we have but to look in the face of the patient, to
probe and fathom as it were the whole nature of his disease.
In no case is this so apparent as in the disease of which I am
now speaking—in no case does pain speak more clearly or
more feelingly for itself.
There is another point connected with this subject which I
think demands a moment’s consideration. I allude to the
anatomical distribution of the facial nerves. We cannot help
being struck with the immense mass.of filaments distributed
“ net-like ” all over the face, their more than ordinary size,
their extensive inosculations, and above all their immediate
contact and blending (as it were) with the skin, which brings
them within the pale of those atmospheric changes, as well as
the grasp of the subtle malaria.
Those frightfully morbid feelings which attend a fully
developed case of Tic Douloureux, may upon the same principle
he easily accounted for, if we hut trace the extensive inoscula¬
tion not only of the nerves of the face themselves, but also the
connection of them with the great sympathetic ; hut as I have
already exceeded the limits of my original intention, I will
proceed to the treatment of this disease, and although I have
no new discovery to make known to you—no new therapeutic
agent to add to the materia medica of our school—no
talismanic agent — no Hogarthism whereby the old and
decrepid may he transformed into the young and blooming
youth, still if your success has been commensurate with my
own, we have every reason to look hack, not with sorrow and
regret, but with grateful remembrance to the time, when, heed¬
less of scoffs, of abuse, of persecution, and even prosecution,
we dared to adopt that simple but beautiful law, similia
similibus curantur as our guide in the cure of disease.
It is true, gentlemen, that comparisons are odious, and conse¬
quently it is with some reluctance, that I for a moment venture to
take you all back to the sombre shades of old physic, when
harassed, disappointed and chagrined, you in vain explored the
whole range of the pharmacopoeia, turned over and over again the
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On Tic Douloureux,
huge and ponderous volumes of its Materia Medica, in search of
some drug which would but give a moment’s ease and comfort.
How often have you tried in succession, the vaunted^specifics
so frequently extolled, whether of the animal, the vegetable, or
the mineral kingdom. If you consulted a physician or some
neighbouring friend, the result was equally unsuooessful. | Take,
says Dr. Elliotson, carbonate of iron in large quantities; it will
cure the disease: on the contrary, I have, says Sir Henry
Halford, seen a lady take during the course of her illness
twenty-seven pounds of that mineral, and she still died a victim
to neuralgia.
With despondency and despair knitting your brow, how often
have you resorted to bleeding , to leeching, to fomentations,*to
poultices, to lotions, to embrocations, to blisters, to issues,
to setons, and to moxas ; add to these the many times you
have applied powerful stimulants—the introduction of equally
powerful narcotics, or nervines, beneath the skin, by means of
a sharp cutting lancet, when all these have failed—what next
have you done. You have plunged heedlessly and recklessly,
(knife in hand) into the very substance of the flesh, and sought
out the poor tremulous and agonized nerve, crouohing with
fear and despair, like the timid bird under the piercing, fiery,
yet winning eye of the rattlesnake; and instead of removing
the cause of this disturbance, you wilfully destroy one by one,
those delicate and tender tendrils, which give so much beauty
and expression to the countenance—yes, you have severed the
nerve, (yet you have not removed the disease, for the cause is
still left) but you have by so doing produced palsy—you have
destroyed the features of your patient—you have transformed
a well formed face into a hideous and unsightly one—you have
exoluded him from society—in a word, you have destroyed his
happiness. Let us now to the contrast.
Case I.
Tic Douloureux of the three branches of the fifth or facial and
portio dura of the seventh pair.
Mrs. C., set. 42, residing at Pimlico, consulted me on 10th Feb¬
ruary, 1851; her statement was, that she had s uff ered on and
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off for some eight to ten years, from pain in the face—that
she had consulted several private practitioners, in addition
to which she had had the advantage of several eminent physi¬
cians, by attending at public institutions: the last gentleman
she was under, was Dr. Lankester, who (from his well known
talents) you may rely left not a stone unturned. She had
taken besides other medicines, while under this gentleman, large
quantities of Iron and Quinine, with very little beneficial result.
She was recommended to try homoeopathy, and placed herself
under my care. She had for some days previously to this
suffered from almost incessant pain, which appeared to implicate
the whole mass of superficial, as well as the more deep seated
nerves of the face. It confined itself entirely to one side of the
face, observing with the greatest exactitude, the mesial line.
The forehead and temple beat furiously—the eye sparkled and
almost started from its socket—the vessels of the conjunctiva,
as well as the more deep seated ones were highly gorged, attended
with sharp cutting piercing pains—there was profuse lacrymation
—the cheek, nose, and lips quivered with pain, producing the
most fantastic and hideous contortions of the features—bounding,
throbbing, buzzing pains shot through the ear, appearing at
the stylo-mastoid foramen, and passing forward along the side of
the face, upwards to the temple and downwards along the side
of the neck; this was followed by profuse salivary discharge,
evidently implicating the parotid and the other salivary glands.
The head was fixed, as well as the articulation of the upper and'
lower jaw—the slightest movement materially aggravated the
symptoms. The tongue was coated and foul—deglutition was
painful, even to the swallowing of a little liquid—every tooth
felt as if wrenched from its socket—there was considerable
gastric derangement—pyrosis and flatulency. The bowels were
inactive—urine was high coloured, but copious.
Treatment. — ty. Tinct. Aeon. <?> gtt. iij,
Aquse Distill. 3 is&- M.
One fourth to be taken every 3 hours.
Feb. 12. She called upon me to day and expressed herself
as being much better; considerable relief was experienced after
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taking the seoond dose of the medicine—the pains continued,
but were of a duller character—the digestive organs were in
about the same condition. I repeated the aeon., and gave besides
sulphur 3, a dose alternately every six to eight hours. Three
days after this she called to say she was quite well, the entire
pain had been removed, while the dyspeptic symptoms had also
disappeared.
Case II.
Tic Douloureux of the Superior Maxillary branch.
Mrs. D., set. 30, consulted me on the 27th of May, 1852. She
had suffered from facial pains for three years previously—she
had consulted several medical men with scarcely any benefit; the
pain commenced at the infra-orbital foramen. It affected the
lower eye-lid, side of the nose, and upper lip; it passed outwards
and upwards over the malar and temporal bones, and again
forwards to the forehead. Each attack lasted from six to
twenty-four hours. This patient was subject to obstinate con¬
stipation—in other respects she enjoyed tolerably good health.
Treatment .—Tinct. Bell. 0 gtt. vj.
Aquae 3 iss. m.
Colocynth. 3
Aquae 3 iss.
• To take a teaspoonful .alternately every two to four hours, to
commence with bell.
She called upon me on the following day, and stated that the
first dose had eased the pain, she slept well through the night
(which she considered as a great treat) but dull lingering pains
yet remained—the bowels were moved freely. I continued the
bell, at intervals of six to eight hours, and omitted colocynth.
On the 29th she called again and complained that those dull
pains were still remaining. In other respects she felt very well.
I gave her a few doses of bell. 3, which entirely removed the
remaining symptoms.
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Case III.
Tic Douloureux of the Inferior Maxillary branch.
Wm. Phillips, set. 24, came under my care as out door patient
at the London Homoeopathic Hospital, on the 7th May, 1855.
He had been suffering for a week previously, from pain in the
left side of the face; it first appeared at the mental foramen,
where it might be covered with the tip of the finger; it then
passed backwards along the ramus of the lower jaw, and
upwards over the side of the face—his general health was
good.
Treatment. —Tinct. Bell. 3.
A dose every two, four, or six hours, according to the severity
of the symptoms.
May 17th. He attended again at the Hospital, and stated that
three doses entirely removed the pain. He now applied for
further advice, as the pain had reappeared on the opposite side
with great severity. I repeated the bell., but prescribed a higher
dilution, the 6th.
May 31st. Reports himself as cured; a few doses of this, a
higher dilution, removed every vestige of pain.
Case IV.
Tic Douloureux of the Inferior Maxillary.
Ellen Mills, set. 22, came under my care as out-door patient
at the London Homoeopathic Hospital, August 2, 1854. She
had suffered for some months from facial pains: the symptoms
present when she applied for advice were as follows: Darting
shooting pains in the left side of the face, which appeared to
commence at the mental foramen; it extended upwards to the
temporal region; the gums were tender; there were no de¬
cayed teeth; the bowels were regular; urine was clear and
copious; the catamenia had stopped for fourteen months. She
complained of aching pains in the lumbar region, thighs and
legs. There was puffiness of the legs and feet, increased
towards night.
Treatment. —Bell. 6, a dose every six hours.
August 9.—The pains and other symptoms are about the
same. Nux vom. 6, a dose every 4 to 6 hours.
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August 21.—She has been very much better, a few doses of
the Nux removed the pains; this was followed by a very impor¬
tant change in the system. Oertain peculiar sensations in the
abdomen led her to suppose, that she had unknowingly become
pregnant. She had no recolleotion of seeing any signs of the
menses for fourteen months, and these slight agitations were
evidently the first movements of the child.
Note .—This case presents features of peculiar interest, in¬
volving as it does two questions: First—Is the removal of the
pain to be attributed to the change of the medicine ? or
Secondly—To the shock given by nature to the mother in the
quickening of the foetus ?
Case Y.
Tic Douloureux of the Inferior Maxillary.
Wm. Raper, set. 34, applied for advice at the London Homoeo¬
pathic Hospital on the 29th January last; he had suffered from
faceache for the last five months; he has been scarcely free
from pain during the whole of that time; the paroxysms vary
in duration; the pain commences near the septum of the
lower jaw, it extends backwards along the ramus of the same,
and as high up as the inferior half of the temporal region. His
general health appeared tolerably good.
Treatment .—A few doses of Bell. 2 removed all unpleasant
symptoms.
Case YI.
Tic Douloureux of the Portio Dura , implicating the branches
of the fifth or trifacial.
On the 12th of November, 1862, I received from a lady
residing near Shrewsbury, a written statement of her case, with
a request that I would prescribe for her. She stated her age
to be 36; of ardent temperament; strong feelings and acute
sensibility; circulation rapid; had been subject to faceache
for seven years. It was at first thought to arise from tooth¬
ache, and having several decayed teeth, they were extracted,
but with no relief; the pain came on in paroxysms, and some¬
times lasted many days, during which she suffered the greatest
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agony. She stated that the mouth was clenched, whioh pre¬
vented her from eating for days, although the appetite was
good. She had consulted several practitioners in vain. She
found galvanism relieve her for a time, but this powerful agent,
as well as iron, quinine, chloroform, morphia, cum multi*
aim, had all lost their charms. The hop-pillow, from its
well-known soothing properties, sometimes acted beneficially;
but this was merely temporary. With this imperfect picture of
her condition, I ventured on belladonna, and sent her some
globules, saturated with the 3rd decimal dilution, to be dissolved
in half a tumblerful of water. A teaspoonful to be taken three
times a day.
On the 28rd, I heard from her again, requesting a supply of
the same medicine, as it had done her some good, and the
pain had shifted from the face to the back part of her head.
I therefore forwarded a supply of the same medicine.
On the 26th, she writes again, stating that she was much
more free from pain, that she felt much stronger, and purposed
visiting London in a few days.
On the 30th, I had my first interview with this lady, and
found her written statement materially correct. She had suffered
from this frightful complaint for seven years, and as time wore
on the paroxysms became more severe, and their duration more
lengthened; she was scarcely free from pain a fortnight at
a time; the pain commenced at the etylo~mastoid foramen ,
implicating the whole of one side of the faoe and neck. It
extended forwards as far as the mesial line, producing profuse
lacrymation, an increased discharge of mucus from the nose,
and a dribbling of saliva. There was considerable stiffness of
the articulation of the lower jaw, whilst the slightest attempt to
open the mouth produced the most agonizing pains. There
was a throbbing buzzing pain in the ear ; twitching and qui¬
vering of the muscles, which threw a well formed face into a
series of hideous contortions. The bowels were generally
regular, and the catamenia were natural. I farther ascertained
that she resided in a low swampy locality, and as it has been
very ably and satisfactorily pointed out by Dr. Maccnlloch in
his Essay on Marsh Fever and Neuralgia, published in 1828,
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that malaria is a frequent cause of this complaint, it struck me
very forcibly that such may have been the case with this lady.
I therefore gave her in addition to bell., arsenicum 3, a dose to
be taken alternately from every 12 to 24 hours. She continued
with these two medicines for some weeks with marked relief, and
a daily improvement in her general health. I had the gra¬
tification of receiving, after the expiration of three months,
a most flattering letter, stating that every symptom had disap¬
peared, and that her general health had in a great measure
been restored.
After the enumeration of the above cases—cases in which
the most inwardly painful, the most outwardly apparent symp¬
toms are so fearfully and so clearly set forth—after my compa¬
rison of the old and new treatment of a complaint which has
long baffled the most experienced and time-honored members
of our noble profession—I may perhaps hope that you will
give me credit, at least, for the desire to bring some little
amount of experience to bear upon a field of human suffering,
which has scarcely received due attention in any age—upon a
style (so to say) of suffering, against which no human patience
can afford a refuge, but from which I believe, from constant
and honest experience, Homoeopathy may rescue many a
sufferer—may raise up many a new disciple, who shall stand
in the breach between death and life, between pain and comfort,
between the gratitude to the real medical man and the doubtful
feeling towards those who still do battle for a fast-decaying
system.
[Without wishing in the least to undervalue the success obtained in the above
cases, and making full allowance for the gratification to both practitioner and
patient from the rapid relief given in a class of most painful affections, yet we
must confess that we are hardly disposed to admit Mr. Morgan’s nomenclature
of the disease he describes. We should be rather inclined to enter those cases
under the general heading of prosopalgia than to consider them as examples
of tic douloureux. To justify this criticism, we shall quote a few sen¬
tences from Dr. Romberg’s recent work on Diseases of the Nervous System,
as he is considered to be the highest modern authority upon the subject And
let us add that in the present disposition of our opponents to disparage the
credibility of our statements, it is of the utmost consequence to strive after
the most rigid accuracy even in so apparently a trifling matter as how wc
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entitle the diseases we undoubtedly cure. At p. 49 of Dr. Romberg’s first
volume, the following sentences occur:—
44 There is no nerve of sensation whose activity is so frequently called into
play as the trigeminus; the number of Aliments at its point of insertions,
allows the assumption that its cerebral connections are the most extensive of
alL This accounts for the frequency and ease with which sympathetic affec¬
tions are excited in the nerve, and for the difficulty of distinguishing them
from genuine neuralgic conditions. To avoid this error it is necessary to
attend to the following points.
“ 1st. The relations of facial neuralgia in regard to time and space; it is
confined to a certain distribution of nerves, and occurs in paroxysms separated
by free interval; in sympathetic pains we notice change of seat and extension
of their range, and the pain is a mask to some other complaint, such as
disease of the facial bones; when this becomes worse the facial pain increases
in a corresponding ratio. A case is detailed in the tenth vol. of the “ Journal
de M6decine,” in which the disease originated in a wound of the arm, and
was cured after two years spent in torture, by cauterization of the cicatrix.
The case quoted from Swan (p. 21) is of an analogous character. Hunt gives
an instructive case of a woman, who when in the seventh month of pregnancy
was seized with violent toothache, recurring night and day, in attacks lasting
one hour, and with intervals of two. It occupied the ramifications of the
infra-orbital and supra-orbital nerves, so as to resemble tic douloureux. In the
second night the patient was awakened by the pains, and the waters broke,
the pains ceased, and the night after the sluggish actions of the uterus being
stimulated by Secale comutum, parturition was effected. During parturition
the neuralgic pain attained its maximum, but ceased after its completion.
The placenta was retained a considerable time, and when the hand was
introduced into the uterus for the purpose of removing it, the pain instantly
returned with great severity, and lasted while it was being extracted. It
vanished immediately after this was done, and did not return.
a 2nd. The peculiarity of the exciting cause of the pain.
a 3 rd. The sensitiveness of the affected surface of the face to unexpected and
slight contact, especially if the disease be of long standing; strong pressure
at the same time, not only does not increase, but often diminishes the pain.
“ 4th. The preference shewn by neuralgia of the fifth pair for mature age,
as it occurs only after the 35th year.
44 5th. The rarity of the disease which must increase our scepticism in forming
a diagnosis. Painful sympathetic sensations in the face belong to the daily
experience of the practising physician; whilst cases of facial neuralgia,
except of the acute typical kind, are counted among the rarities of medical
experience, even in large and populous towns.
44 It is quite excusable that, until recently anaesthesia dolorosa of the fifth
pair should have been mistaken for tic douloureux, as the former has but
lately been properly understood. The most important criterion by which it
may be recognized, is the insensibility of the painful surface to irritation,
while in tic douloureux the parts become morbidly sensitive to the most
superficial contact.”— Eds.]
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500
€ASES OF GLEET, AND INFLAMMATION OF THE
KIDNEYS AND BLADDER, TREATED BY
AGNUS AND PAREIRA BRAVA.
By Dr. Hastings, M.R.C.S., L.S.A., Cheltenham.
May 14th, R. L—, Esq., aged 23 years, a student at Cam¬
bridge; nervous, bilious temperament; much addicted to
smoking oigars, but temperate in stimulants; contracted a
gonorrhoea three months ago, and has been under allopathic
treatment ever since, but not cured.
At present he suffers from slight erections at night, and has
a continual discharge of gleety mucus from the urethra, with
no pain or scalding on voiding urine. General health good.
Prescribed Bals. cop. glob. 4, dil. 12, in coch. mag. 8, capt
coch. mane nooteque.
20th.—No improvement, nor any change. Repeat Bals. cop.
30th.—In statu quo. I may just state that I gave this
patient a variety of medicines, such as Cuhebs, Sulph., Nux,
Phos. acid., &c., but with no benefit whatever. All the medi¬
cines were in the form of globules. Tinctures I could not
prescribe for him, as I had to send his medicine per post.
Getting, at last, tired of making no progress, and the patient
becoming rather dissatisfied, I now left off giving him medicine
internally , and sent him an injection oomposed of mother
tincture of Agnus, 40 drops to half a pint of water, with direc¬
tions to inject an ounce twice a day.
I did not hear from him after this for a fortnight, when he
wrote as follows:—
“ I am happy to inform you that I have used the injection
you sent me with the happiest results. After having used it
four times, the discharge entirely ceased, and I waited until
now before I wrote to you, to see if it returned, but it has not,
and, I think I may now safely say—I am cured.”
As I have not heard from this gentleman since, I conclude
that he is “ cured.”
Since then, I have prescribed Tr. Agnus in several other
cases of gleet, and always with marked results, and as I am
aware that it is not the usual homoeopathic practice to give
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591
injections in such cases, I thought I would submit this case to
the profession, as I can vouch for the excellent results of the
practice.
We must all confess that cases of gleet give us great trouble,
to treat bomoBopathicaljy, from, I suppose, the great difficulty
there is in fixing upon the remedy, owing to the latent nature
of many of the symptoms, and therefore if we oan suoceed in
curing that whioh proves so intractable, under all treatments,
by simple injections of Agnus, we are bound to do so, notwith¬
standing that it may not be considered strictly homoeopatbio.
The next case which I intend to direct the attention of your
readers to, is of a more serious nature, and, in my opinion,
highly interesting.
The gentleman has been constantly under my care for the
last eighteen months, and has been subject to chronic catarrh
of the bladder for years. Allopathic treatment failing to afford
him any relief, he gave it up, and placed himself entirely under
my care. The nature of his case is this: He suffers severe
pains, at times in the baok and bladder, with painful retraction
of the left testicle; pain in the thigh extending down to the
big toe and sole of the foot; frequently there is an irritable
eruption on the legs, and great irritation of the scalp; the
urine passes with great difficulty; he feels a great desire to
pass it, and fancies that quarts of it will come away, but finds
the greatest difficulty to get any to pass, notwithstanding the
severe pressive pains whioh attend it. So awfully severe are
these pains, that he is obliged to get down on his knees, press
his head firmly against something, and remain in that position,
forcing until he sweats profusely, “ and roars like a bull,” to
use his own expression. After remaining in this situation for ten
or twenty minutes, the urine dribbled away with great pain and
frequent stoppages, scalding and lacerating at the point of the
penis. It has a strong ammoniacal smell, and is loaded with a
thick tenacious mucus. These paroxysms generally occur
from three to six o’clock every morning. During the day he is
comparatively easy. The bowels are generally regular. His
age is 68 years, and has been a very regular and temperate
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Cases of Gleet, dc.,
man all his life. Never had either syphilis or gonorrhoea. Ho is
in no profession or trade, but lives privately. Fearing that he had
enlarged prostrate, stricture or stone in the bladder, I sounded
him frequently, and used bougies , but could detect nothing
further than a cartilaginous condition of the inner coat of the
bladder, which felt very hard to the sound. In this opinion, I
was confirmed by Mr. Fowler, who kindly examined into the
oase with me. For upwards of twelve months, I tried every
homoeopathic remedy, viz., Cubeb, Canth., Cann. sat., Uva
ursi, Nux, Sulph., Mer., Puls., Tereb., &c., with Nitric acid
injections, as recommended by Sir B. Brodie, together with
Sitz-baths, abdominal compresses, wet-sheet packing, but with¬
out curing him.
Certainly he derived more benefit from homoeopathic treat¬
ment than he did from allopathic, as the fact of his remaining
so long under my care will testify. The patient was goiDg on,
much as usual, up to the 26th July, when our town was visited
with one of the most awful floods in the memory of the oldest
inhabitant, and my patient’s house happened to be one of those
which was completely inundated, the consequence was that he
got his feet and legs wet, and the result was inflammation of
the kidneys and bladder. I need not detail tbe treatment of
these complaints, suffice it to say, that with Aconite, Bella¬
donna, Mercurius, Cantharides, &c., they entirely disappeared
by the 10th of August, or in about eight days after their first
incursion.
During the time he suffered from these, the ammoniacal
smell, thick, tenacious and ropy mucus of the urine disappeared,
and he even passed it with greater ease than usual. But by
the 10th the old symptoms set in again, the urine smelled agaiD,
became loaded as usual, and he passed it with great difficulty,
accompanied by the common paroxysms, every morning. I now
prescribed, Bals. cop., mane nocteque, but with no avail. He
was still unable to leave his bed, and was very much troubled
with night perspirations, and hammering and buzzing noises
in the head. I now gave him China, which effectually checked
his perspiration, and relieved his head, but had no perceptible
effect upon the urine-
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All the proved homoeopathic medicines, known to have an
influence on the kidneys and bladder, having been hitherto
tried, in all forms and in all doses, I had prepared sometime
ago a mother tincture of Pareira brava, so highly recom¬
mended by Sir B. Brodie in these cases, and although I was
aware that to prescribe it thus was acting empirically, it not
having been proved, I nevertheless resolved to try it, and accor¬
dingly on the 17th inst. I gave him the first dose, prepared as
follows—ten drops of mother tinct. to six ounces of water,
succussed violently, a table-spoonful to be taken night and
morning.
On the second night after having begun it, he had, early on
the following morning, a terrible paroxysm in endeavouring to
void his urine; “something white came away,” he said, and
after that he passed his urine comparatively well and easily.
On examining the urine the following morning, it was neither
acid nor alkaline, nor did it smell much; quantity greater than
usual, and a thick, tenaceous, whitish mass lay at the bottom
of the vessel. Specific gravity was ’20. No medicine next
two days, during which time, he progressed most favourably.
21st.—Mucus appeared again in the urine, but scarcely any
pain in passing urine. No paroxysms in the morning. For¬
mer medicine repeated. Bowels rather obstinate, but a dessert¬
spoonful of castor oil, occasionally, together with simple enemas
of warm water, keep them regular.
22nd.—Good night; sat up two hours to-day—first since
attack. Continue medicine.
23rd.—Progressing favourably; came down stairs to-day,
and remained up for eight hours. Medicine to-nigbt, omit it
to-morrow morning.
24th.—Doing well; recovering so rapidly, that he was driven
out in his carriage for two hours to-day. No medicine.
25th.—Considerable perspiration last night; urine abundant,
and passed easily; no mucus. Par. brav. to-night.
26th.—Very little perspiration last night; no pain in urina¬
ting,' and no mucus in urine. Doing well. Par. brav. to-night.
27th.—Quite comfortable.
Ten days having now elapsed since I first prescribed the
VOL. XII, NO. LIV.—OCTOBER 1855 . 2 Q
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Far. brav. and during that time the patient having continued
to progress most favourably, all his former pains. See. having
nearly disappeared, I think we may safely infer, that this im¬
provement is due to the Far. brav. It cannot be, that the
inflammation of the bladder had any influence in checking the
catarrh, as we find that on the 10th the discharge of mucus
was as copious as formerly.
It may perhaps be advisable to state' that the mother tincture
was made from the root of the Far. brava.
EXPOSITION DE PARIS.
To the Censors and other Elects (the President only excepted)
of the Royal College of Physicians, certain advocates of
an heretioal mid illegitimate practice, called homoeopathy ,
greeting.
May you and eaoh of you (the President not excepted) never
want a patient; nor a phial to pour into him,—until you all
take to globules together.
In the strifes of opinion, most learned physicians, by whioh
the maintained of truth and those of error both contribute to
the disoovery of the answer to Pilate’s question, it is the usual
practice of venerating men, who are bound together by the love
of recognized and established formula and by the hatred of
all that is without the pale, to wear a uniform, sometimes of
dress, but always of thought and of speech. To this wholesome
ordinance your establishment has conformed, so that, for the
most part, we know the high member of the College of Physi¬
cians by moderate orthodoxy of English idiom, moderate atten¬
tion to correctness of terminology, and severe adherence to the
London pharmacopoeia.
If you must fall, we know that your last endeavour will be
to die with the robe of scholarship round your bodies, and the
mask of science over your faces. There is, and always has
been, a sacred tone of medieevalism pervading your proceedings,
by which we are assured that, when the day of fate arrives, the
eulogist will hold up the robe, and say with confidence—
“ You all do know this mantle ”
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before he begins to point out the marks which Mesmer, Hahne¬
mann, and others, made in it with passes and globules.
Gentlemen! it behoves you to look after your President.
By the influence of some malesuada daemon, —some one; per¬
haps, of those wandering spirits, of whom so many have had a
rap at your college—he has broken bounds, and has been
discovered in the highway of public affairs, showing such
acrobat performances with the mantle, that, by and bye, when
it comes to be held up for a solemn effect, some vulgar fellow,
with no more medisevalism than a cockatoo, will call out—
“Aye, aye, we know it well enough! it’s the one the doctor
used to play up his May-games in !”
We bear no false witness against our good doctor—your
primus inter pares —your elect of the elect. False witness, as
the little girl said at the charity school, is when nobody does
nothing and somebody goes and tells of it. But your President
has not been doing nothing: he has been playing such tricks
before high heaven and the Board of Health as make angels
stare and secretaries laugh; and the House of Commons has
printed it. Far be it from us to accuse your dear bargain and
our dear friend of any departure from due allegiance to Phar¬
macopoeia. On the contrary, he goes before her as king David
went before the ark; but, like David, he dances. Now, gentle¬
men, the son of Jesse never was a fellow of your college. We
doubt his qualification. His contemptuous rejection of esta¬
blished methods of killing, his exhibition of an infinitesimal
dose of silica, mark him for a homoeopath. Is he an example
for your President ? Our dear doctor is for legitimate praotice,
and none other, but in a manner which reminds us of that
execrable Moli&re, who mingled wicked burlesque with sacred
principle.
“ De non jamais te servire,
De remediis aucunis,
Quam de ceux seulement doctse facultatis;
Maladus dtit-il crevare,
Et mori de malo suo.”
This is his principle; but alas ! he shows it—and shows it in a
slip-slop mixture of the vernacular and the technical. The cat
which you envelope in the robe we have spoken of, for want of
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Exposition de Paris.
a bag—you must get one, you must indeed; this is not the
seventeenth century—that cat has been seen by the House of
Commons, to the full extent of tail and hind legs, uncovered
while the doctor was practising his steps.
In a publication made by order of the House, we, the homoeo¬
paths, have had such ventilation given to our efforts and
results, as, had it not been for your President, we might have
striven for in vain. He should have returned our cases as
results of treatment without medicine. He has a right to his
theory, as' much as we ourselves to ours. If he had liked
to say that our doses are too small to be of any effect, we
should have been the last to deny his right to say so, provided
only that he had proved it by putting our non-effects by the
side of his effects. Here was the case. The Board of Health
had employed your President and others to compare the results
of different modes of treating cholera. The Board of Health
wanted to know which method produced most cures. The
homoeopathists forwarded their returns, and on the face of
those returns it appeared that, whatever might be the true
theory of globules—medicine or no medicine, treatment or no
treatment—the results were exceedingly favourable. But glo¬
bules are not recognized by your college. What was to he
done ? The stupid world at large has no relish for pharma¬
copoeia above all things, Maladus dut-il crevare. Let them
choose, and the idiots would rather live on in illegitimate and
unsanctioned health, than die secundum artem under the ordi¬
nances of true and established medicine. If the returns bad
been challenged as false. Sir Benjamin Hall would have put
the globulists on their defence; and, as evidence is evidence,
they would have established their facts. If the competency of
the returners had been questioned, the homoeopathists would have
produced their diplomas in proof of their education having been
what the colleges call complete, and they would further have
dared their impugners to prove what they asserted: for, you
know, when a man has a diploma, the onus of proof lies on the
accuser. What then was to he done ? Why, clearly, the
claims of legitimacy demanded the suppression of the obnoxious
facts: we can never expect you to lecture your President for
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tHe mere omission, injudicious as it was. But what did he do
besides ? He forgot the advice of the old judge to the young
one: “ Give your decision, it will probably be right ; suppress
your reasons, they will probably be wrong.” Your President
got or allowed his committee to pass so ragged a resolution,
that the homoeopathists are delighted with it in every point of
view except one. We want to conquer your strength, not the
weakness which had institutions impose upon you as your
representative. We want to put out your fire, but not by
availing ourselves of your own ignorance of the way to keep it
up. Get a fiimace which consumes its own smoke, so that we
may be able fairly to compare our light with yours, and not
with a black puff of hot vapour. You must do one of two
things. Obtain a new charter, which shall destroy your mode
of electing your chiefs and substitute the free vote of a body
which, after all, contains no mean amount of what is wanted in
a liberal profession. You have corporationed yourselves so
v closely that the best qualities you have are in abeyance. All
the world knows it except yourselves. Bouse up: if homoeo¬
pathy be an error, you will never conquer it as you now are.
Your college is no alethometer: you deprive us of our fair
rights. Hundreds who see us prevailing against you from day
to day are at a loss to draw an inference, because they see
what your college is, and think it very possible that anything
about which men of education are in earnest may flourish with¬
out truth at the root, when a college so constituted is the only
visible hindrance. And in this way, and in none but this, do you
check the progress of homoeopathy.
But if you cannot mend your system, we will tell you the
next best course to take. Choose advisers for your President
from among the homoeopathists themselves, putting them upon
honour to do the best they can for you. To show you how wise
this plan would have been, we point out the resolution which
your homoeopathic advisers would have recommended, putting
themselves in your place, you insisting on the suppression.
When we come to make a few comments on what your President
actually put forward, you will be at no loss to feel how differently
you would have stood if we had advised you.
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“ Resolved ,—That the Committee cannot consent to entertain
the returns forwarded by homoeopathic practitioners, because, by
so doing, they would take a course whioh lies open to dangerous
misinterpretation. They believe that homoeopathists, when true
to their pwn mode of practice—and they have no reason for
thinking that the practitioners who have forwarded, the returns
in question have been otherwise—are, whatever they themselves
may think to the contrary, only physicians without medicine.
Had the Committee themselves—supposing they could have
justified such an experiment—treated as many cases as have
been forwarded to them without any medicine whatever, let the
success have been what it might, they could not have ventured
to present the results. By so doing, they might have tempted
some to dispense with remedies; and this is a responsibility they
could not have dared to face. The Committee, therefore, can
only leave it to the Board to make any use of the homoeopathic
returns which the Board, on their own judgment and respon¬
sibility, may consider them fit for.”
Such a resolution, had it been adopted, must have been for¬
warded to the Board, which would thus have been prevented
from publishing an incorrect statement, namely, that the whole
of the returns bad been carefully analysed: a statement convey¬
ing the impression that the whole were included in the report
made to the Secretary of State. It would be desirable that you
should apprise your President of the propriety of naming the
date at which a resolution is passed, when he communicates a
copy of it to those whose proceedings it is to guide. Did the
Treatment Committee pass their resolution at the tame when
they resolved not to notice homoeopathic returns ? Or was it got
up in a hurry, when a reason was asked for ?
Observe, we do not say we have drawn np a sound defence for
your President’s course: such a thing does not exist. Had
reasons grown on blackberry bushes, not one of them would
have fitted. We could easily fray and tear our own resolution;
but your President’s makes capital lint
Again—a logical homoBopathist, thinking for you, would have
warned you to meet your opponents first as infimtesimalists.
You ought to say that you have nothing to do with similia
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similibm until ex nihiio nonnihil has been disposed of. * Grant¬
ing,’ say you, * the possibility that the same medicine both
■causes and cures, we must first be convinced that you do give
that medicine.’ We shall be very glad when you haye got over
the vulgar notion that the same word expresses the rationale of
(pur cures, and the quantity of our doses. Remember that when
you, .believing us to be very foolish, meet us with very foolish
arguments or invectives, you fall into the heresy of treating
us homoeopathically, even if your folly be administered by the
bushel; but that when, desiring to cure us by logic, you exhibit
your President, you are then proceeding infinitesimally. Keep
(dais distinction in mind.
Sir Benjamin Hall, instigated by globulists, asked why the
globule cases were omitted ? I am to inquire, said Mr. Campbell,
the secretary; which meant, Thou art to make answer. Your
President directed his reply to Mr. T. Taylor, the other secretary;
probably because Mr. T. Taylor is an excellent judge of English,
having professed that literature in a college. But the ex-pro¬
fessor was mute to the appeal: he now writes farces, and sees
-orthodox medicine from another point of view; so that Mr. Camp-
hell acknowledged the receipt.
The answer itself consists of two paragraphs:—
1,-—“For the information of Sir Benjamin Hall, I hog to en-
iclose a resolution unanimously passed by the Treatment Com¬
mittee of the Medical Council of the General Board of Health,
which I trust will be a satisfactory answer to the inquiry
addressed to me regarding the reasons which induced the Com¬
mittee to pass over without notice the homoeopathic returns of
their treatment of cholera.”
We stood quite aghast 1 Remember that, at that moment, we
had not found out that the doctor was putting himself through
his positions. We then knew of no dance in medicine, except that
of St. Vitus. Hid the Treatment Committee practise homoeo¬
pathy ? If so, what induced them to pass over their returns ?
A pronoun refers to a noun substantive; never to an adjective.
We looked for such a noun. Returns cannot treat cholera:
a committee may. Even if returns could treat cholera, they
could not treat it before they existed: and, by the nature of the
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case, returns of treatment could not exist till after treatment.
Was our doctor so deep as to insinuate that the returns were
fabricated, and that, except in returns, there had been no treat¬
ment at all ; so that, after a sort, the returns might be said to
have treated the cases ? Alas ! neither the second paragraph,
nor the secretary’s answer, will support this view. The plain
truth is that the President writes slip-slop English; and, with
deep sorrow, we call upon you to admonish him thereof.
Mark his satire. Eumour says that Sir Benjamin Hall prefera
globules to globes, and a spoonful of water to a glass of black
mixture. Our doctor writes for his ‘information,’ and trusts
he sends a ‘ satisfactory answer.’ Now Sir Benjamin knew all
about it: he only wanted something to send back officially to his
querists, who, in their turn, knew all about it too. Maladus
d&t-il crevare is a well understood thing. If Sir Benjamin be a
homoeopath, the answer must have been more satisfactory than
he expected. Was it a concerted plan between wicked globule-
makers, and sly globule-takers, who knew that if they caught
the President out of the council, they could make him shew his
paces ? Perhaps it was. Be it your business in future to take
care that he never leaves the college without what homage would
call an escort and prudence a guard. Do you feel what we
say ? If not, wait till we have discussed the resolution in the
second paragraph. We know it, by the pronouns, to he of the
President’s own drawing.
2.—“ Resolved ,—That by introducing the .returns of homoeo¬
pathic practitioners, they would not only compromise the value
and utility of their averages of cure, as deduced from the ope¬
ration of known remedies, but they would give an unjustifiable
sanction to an empirical practice alike opposed to the main¬
tenance of truth and to the progress of science.”
Of all the dangerous pit-falls which lie in the way of a public
man, there is hardly one more dangerous than the prooess of
manufacturing the explicit phrase “ See you hanged first!” into
fine writing and official propriety. Let us first examine the
English of this resolution. Who are they ? The substantives
preceding are returns and homoeopathic practitioners. We
give up the first. If we take the second, the sentence means—
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awkwardly enough, but your President would naturally feel
awkward at such an admission—that the homaeopathists would
compromise their returns hy introducing them among those of
the orthodox physicians, and would sanction empirical practice
to the prejudice of truth and progress. Could we think this
was meant, we should exclaim with Sir Anthony, “ Why, now
you talk sense—absolute sense : I never heard anything more
sensible in my life. Confound you! you shall he Jack again.”
As though we should say, so long as you sang Maladus ddt-il
crevare, you were of another age: at the very highest you were
hut Vir Clarissimus Johannes de Villd Aeris Lutetiensis.
But so soon as you come to finding out that the best medicine
is that which works most cures—so soon as your faculties begin
to predominate over your faculty—you then become Jack—sen¬
sible Jack—Jack of the nineteenth century—Jack of the good
time coming. But we dare not suppose that our friend meant
us a sly compliment: we rather incline to think that he had
again launched a pronoun into practice, without a qualified noun
to call in. Pray instruct him that a pronoun is a general
practitioner. Your noun is in grammar what a Fellow of the
College is in medicine: it can stand alone; it can sign its own
prescriptions. Your pronoun ought never to stand alone:
neither ought it to refer to an adjective;—that resembles nothing
hut calling in a pure surgeon to a physician’s case. It is the
committee, then—the we of the situation, not the they —which
would compromise their averages. This is both slip-slop,
and, independently, ambiguous in meaning. For compromise
read lessen , and we may get a view of the ambiguity. First, if
by averages your idiomatic President meant the separate results
of separate hospitals, each having what your doctor calls its
average of cures—meaning its percentage or proportion of
cures—then the idea of any other returns, properly headed,
compromising the returns of the orthodox physicians, is pure
nonsense, the imbecility of which is visible the moment the
meaning of the sentence emerges out of the slip-slop. He
might as well say that a diamond is compromised hy being com¬
pared with Bristol stone. 0, foolish man ! Make him see that
if the globulists be enemies of truth and science, the placing of
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their results by the side of those of the college ought to enhanee
the college glory, and make it appear that truth and science are
settlement doctee faoultatis. If showing how a wrong practice
actually works by the side of a right practice be dangerous—if
such juxta-position tend to compromise the value and utility of
the truth-and-seienee affair—then King Truth, and Science the
mother of his children, ought to be driven from their palace—
we mean of course your college. Balderdash and his trull Slip-
slop ought to be inducted into their places. The President
ought to beat the pestle and mortar before them, and you, the
elects, with your robes of scholarship inside out, ought to follow,
singing Digni, digni, estis intrare.
But though we think we have—may we bring in a word from
the French ?— approfounded your President’s meaning, yet, as
bis custom is, be gives us choice of two.
His words, taken literally, signify that bis duty was Jto lump
together all the results of all the hospitals and private prac¬
titioners, and present a general average—such as the sea makes
of a mixed cargo when it gets into the hold. In this case, no
doubt, the value and utility of his returns would be compromised:
for average is compromise. If Bartholomew’s tell a different
Story from Ouy’s, average effects an arithmetical compromise
between the two. In this sense he does not want to mix with
homoeopathy, and homoeopathy does not want to mix with him.
His business was to make comparisons , not averages. He was
not asked how much all methods cure, one with another, but
to hie h cures most. Now he did not want the world to see bow
the matter stood with respect to homoeopathy. Teach him how
bungling a method he adopted. Tell him that the House of
Commons has 658 members, of whom any one can get a return
printed for which there is so much as a primd facie probability
of a primd facie case. Point out that suppression is for des¬
potisms ; mystification for free states. Bead him the resolution
we should have advised, as hereinbefore given; and when he
puckers his face into Timeo Danaos et dona ferenies , do you
pucker yours into Fas est et ab hoste doceri.
He interprets bis duty as being to form averages from known
remedies. Known to whom ? Settlement doc tee facultati ?
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If unlicensed persons stumble on a new and good remedy, is
that remedy not to appear ? If heretical physicians invent
extra-collegiate methods, are those methods not to be tested ?
Does he suppose that the nation is so satisfied with the power
of the college over cholera, that it wants nothing hut choice of
known remedies ? wants no inquiry into the unknown ? How
came the Government to establish a Board of Health at all ?
Partly because it knew that you were nothing but a Board of
Pharmacopoeia. Lecture him well about letting out maladw
d&t-il crevare with his known remedies- Tell him he ought to
have put a bolder front on the matter. What! a president of
the college unable to face facts, and obliged to suppress them !
Facts are stubborn things; but who ever, until now, imagined
they were as stubborn as physicians? Time was when the
meanest licenciate, with legitimate practice at his back, would
not have feared to stand up against all the facts that ever hap¬
pened. Bring back that time, or you are gone. Learn to face
facts, or you will never bring it back.
We have often felt sympathy for a physician, apparently candid
and well-informed, when we heard him complain that in his pro¬
fession both the competent man and the pretender work in dark¬
ness. At the bar, said he, the man who does not know his
business advertises the fact in open court. We shall never
feel that sympathy again* An open court has been found, and
the country is looking on. The alleged pretenders bring forward
their results, aud challenge comparison. The College of Phy¬
sicians is represented by its President, who sneaks off the ground,
covering his retreat with miserable common places, and appa¬
rently trusting that before his pursuers can see him through his
foggy English he will be clean out of distance. It is for you to
teach him how to retire boldly, with his face to the enemy.
By inserting homoeopathic returns, he declares that he would
give them a sanction. This is very hard upon you. No one
supposes that they would receive more sanotion than they brought
Mrith them. Here is a distinct admission that exclusion and
sanction are the only alternatives. We knew this; but we
never thought the President would shew us he knew it too. Oh,
take him in hand—take him in hand!
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Homoeopathy is an “ empirical” praotioe. Teach your Pre¬
sident to use technical terms like a man of art. The word
empiric may have degenerated into inveotive, like Deist; bat
learned theologians do not use slang meanings, nor should
learned physicians. An empiric is one who studies experience.
Aristotle, as opposed to Plato, is an empiric. In a derived
sense, a resalt is empirical which, duly attained from observation,
is not yet attached to a system. There are empirical formula
in mathematics and in physics, not yet deduced from first prin¬
ciples and from simple and fundamental properties of matter.
To the honour of the true physician, he has always been an
empiric; and the English physician more than any other. Ask
a French tnedecin what he thinks of his English confrere, and
he will tell you, with a compliment to sagacity and learning, that
the Englishman is trop empirique.
All old medicine has had an empirical foundation : it could
not have been otherwise. Most of it is empirical to this day.
When Astley Cooper—hang those snrgeons ! they will be attack¬
ing us next—said that medicine was founded on conjecture and
improved by murder, he phrased it much too harshly. Strong
in the art which almost deserves to be called a science, he looked
down upon the science which hardly deserves to be called an
art. There is conjecture in empiricism, but it is conjecture pre¬
ceded by observation : and as to murder, the less surgery says
about that the better. The physician must leave his patient
whole, if he cannot make him so. He forms external conjectures
about internal combinations. The surgeon cuts his way into the
interior, and may chance to find ground for more than conjecture
that he had better have kept on his own side of the patient’s
skin. Nothing but homoeopathy can ever be certain that it is
not the active cause of death.
The ignominy of the word empiric dates from the ages in
which scholastic philosophy deduced physical consequences
a, priori ;—the ages in which, because a lion is strong, rubbing
with lion’s fat would have been held an infallible tonic. In
those happy days, if a physician had given decoction of a certain
bark, only because in numberless instances that decoction had
been found' to strengthen the patient, he would have been a
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miserable empiric. Not that the colleges would have passed
over his returns because they were empirioal: they knew better.
They were as skilful in finding causes for facts as facts for
causes. The president and the elects of that day would have
walked out into the forest with a rope, and would have pulled
heartily at the tree which yielded the bark : nor would they ever
have left it until they had pulled out a legitimate reason. If the
tree had resisted all their efforts, they would have said “ Ah !
no wonder now; the bark of a strong tree makes a strong man.”
But if they had managed to serve the tree as you would like to
serve homoeopathy, then it would have been “ We might have
guessed it; all the virtus rpborativa has settled in the bark.”
They admitted, as we know from Moli&re, the virtus dormitiva
of opium, for no other reason than that opium facit dormire.
Had the medicine not been previously known, they would,
strange as it may seem to modern pharmacopoeists, have accorded
a virtus dormitiva to the new facit dormire. On this point
they have often been misapprehended. They were prone to infer
facit from a virtus imagined a priori ; and they were ready at
supplying facit in favour of an orthodox virtus. They might
have gone so far, for example, under pre-notional impressions,
as the alliterative allopath, who, when maintenance of truth was
busy opposing the progress of science called vaccination, de¬
clared that some of its patients coughed like oows, and bellowed
like bulls: but they never refused to find virtus when facit
came upon them, no matter whence. They would' rather have
accepted Tenterden steeple than have rejected the Goodwin
Sands. They would have laughed their modem imitators to
scorn : but as they are not here, we do it for them.
Of all the systems of medicine which have ever been held by
a school, the homoeopathic, as presented to the learner, is the
least empirical. Until tested, it disgusts by the singleness and
universality of its principle. If it be true, the day of empiricism
is gone, and medicine is unity of system, or in a perpetual and
rapid approach to unity: what empiricism it must have, is only
the provisional imperfection of an incomplete development.
Teach this to your President;—tell him, that should an antipath
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find out that hellebore cures insanity, he not only begins in
empiricism, but probably rests in it, college without end, amen.
But tell him that if a homoeopath should make the same dis¬
covery, he remains empirical, quoad hellebore. Only until he has
found, or thinks he has found, that hellebore produces insanity.
If he neglect to ascertain 'this, he is indifferent to his own
principle. If, on trial, it should not be found true, he either
finds a remedy of which the principle is true, or, until he can
do so, he lives, quoad hellebore, in allopathic or antipathic
empiricism.
What are your own methods of treating cholera ? Are they
empirical, or are they not ? Shew* us, if you can, that they are
not empirical in any sense in which that word has been used in
learned discussion. Of course they are not empirical in the 1
slang sense. We know that the state establishment is with you,
and against us: the state quietly reposing on the fiction that
you make your maintenance of truth co-extensive with the pro¬
gress of science. But what, after all, did the argument from
state patronage amount to, even when it was an argument ?
Nothing but the old argument from Jacko, the monkey:—
“ If you have Jacko in your hand, you can make him bite me ;
but if I have Jacko in my hand, I can make him bite you.”
And even this argument is now obsolete; for you learn, when¬
ever you go to Parliament for a protection bill, that you can
make Jacko bite no longer.
Your President ought to have accused the globulists, not of
empiricism, but of rashly abandoning the safe empiricism of
orthodox medicine, and wrongly generalising from a meagre and
incipient induction. If homoeopathy be not true, this has,
beyond doubt, been the error of the schoolnay, even if, as we
believe, it be true, there probably was a time when the oharge of
rashness might have been justly made. Green truths have often
been plucked, and brought to ripen in the bam ; but those who
would knowingly let a troth within reach ripen on the tree, have,
as experience shews, been those who would have left it there to
rot. Make your President understand all this: there are far
more logical heads among you than his. And then, unless he
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himself be caput msanabile tribus Anticyris, we shall never
hear him, in grave assertion, call homoeopathy too empirical.
We leave him the slang meaning for common use, for patients, &c.
Heaven forbid we should deprive him or you of the weapons
which are necessary for your defence in general society.
Again, he will not give “ an unjustifiable sanction to an
empirical practice alike opposed to the maintenance of truth
and to the progress of science.” This is the doctor’s master¬
piece. The algebra men say—what they mean, heaven knows—
that impossible roots enter in pairs, which we do not believe i
they will never convince us that if a man can contrive to get
down an impossible potato, he must also get down an impose
able carrot. But the doctor has achieved something of this
kind: his sentence has two grammatical constructions, and
each construction has two meanings, one favourable to homoeo¬
pathy, the other unfavourable. Now as—who dares oppose the
contrary ?—a sense favourable to homoeopathy must be impos¬
sible in your President, we consider algebra fairly matched:
those who receive one must receive the other; those who can
swallow the doctor’s impossible potato must Bwallow his impos¬
sible carrot Glory to the doctor! if orthodox medicine be
the large cat and homoeopathy the little one, he has cut a hole
for both. Should any munificent testator found a prize for the
best specimens of medical double-entendre, to be awarded by
the college, your president may conscientiously nominate' him¬
self: nor would delicacy even require that he should first
nominate you to find out his merit.
The duplioity of construction is as follows. The words in
italics may refer either to the sanction or to the empirical
practice. In the first case it may signify that the sanction
of the college is a thing unfavourable to truth and progress,
which it would therefore be unjustifiable to give to homoeo¬
pathy. In the second case, there is an equal possibility (we
mean of course impossibility) of leaning towards us. We firmly
believe we are alike opposed to truth and to science: just as
the Sardinians before Sebastopol are alike opposed to the English
and to the French. There is no proposition whatsoever but is
alike opposed, and alike indifferent, and alike favourable to
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Exposition de Paris.
both. Bat we have now learnt Parisian English, and we pro¬
ceed to dissect the doctor in the sphere of his own ideas.
Pilate again : what is truth ? Horne Tooke said, it is what
the speaker troweth: and the doctor follows him. What is
science ? What the doctor knoweth. The order of his words
shows us his meaning: he first maintains what he believes
or trows, and, subject to such maintenance, he allows progress.
St. Paul inverted this order: he would have us prove all things,
and then hold fast that, which is good. How can anything
but the progress of science dictate that which is to be main¬
tained as truth ? By this mode of sequence the doctor implies
his admiration of the manner in which the college has always
subordinated the progress of science to the maintenance of
what it took for truth. Teach him that, without abandoning
maintenance in favour of progress, the world has grown so
wise—so overwise, if you like—that progress must take theo¬
retical precedence of maintenance.
The error of your college has resembled that of the churches.
They ought to have superintended the progress of religion : they
have given their chief care to the maintenance of doctrine. All
the sciences connected with healing, or accessory to it, look with
complacency, some with gratitude, on the Royal College of
Physicians— except medicine , its own peculiar charge. And
why is this ? Why do candid physicians every now and then
astonish casual hearers by a hint of the very small progress
which therapeutics have made since the time of Galen ? Why
does poor little Medicine, stunted and wizened, cast so wistful
an eye at the strong limbs and bouncing proportions of cousin
Chemistry? Simply because your unhappy child has been
brought up on little but maintenance of truth , while her relative,
lucky in not being committed to the care of Royal Colleges, has
been brought up on progress of science. Go for progress, and
let truth maintain herself. Like other ladies, she loses her
character under protection.
Show your President how to deal with the globulists. Cite
Wakley to him; not as a general practitioner, but as coroner.
Wakley has not a rag of the robe of scholarship: but he has a
sharp head, and a keen perception of things. When an inquest
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was proceeding upon a patient who had died under homoeopathy;
and when, to strong testimony that the bowels should have been
relieved, was opposed the post mortem fact that the bowels
contained nothing; and when the medical witness, greatly
hampered by the opposition which the progress of the science
of that case offered to the maintenance of its truth, was stam¬
mering for a word to express how homoeopathy had failed; the
ooroner mercifully interposed with—“ You mean general nullity
of treatment ? ” Yes, said the grateful witness, as much pleased
as your President, when his evil genius—his malesuada daemon
—suggests something to round off with. Stick to that, gentle¬
men, and make him stick to it too ! If you have a hope of
escape from homoeopathy, it is in nullity of treatment. Your
President should have said that he used the globulist returns in
the same manner as the globulists use their patients—that he
administered a dose of nullity of treatment.
But what, you will say, if people should be led to imagine
that the abandonment of active medicines, with care of diet
and circumstances, answers better than pharmacopoeia ? You
are learned men, and you know that some eminent physicians
have ended their lives in a lowly muttered conviction of this
kind, as concerns the old medicine. You know that some have
done more than mutter. You know—and we forget—the name
of the physician who declared that if all the physicians and
apothecaries and drugs in the world were pitched you know
where—and we forget—there would be less mortality than now.
You know how small your own doses compared with those of
your predecessors. You know how little medicine you take
yourselves. Never fear! never fear! Establish nullity of
treatment, and the world will not believe in success, be the
proofs what they may. Ages will pass before any but a physi¬
cian will feel himself cured without chemistry. The homceo-
pathists are at a disadvantage already for want of nauseous
tastes and griping pains: their patients do not feel between
visits that the physician is earning his money. What did the
man say to the dentist ? “ Why, sir, the last man pulled me
about the room for a quarter of an hour, and you have done it
VOL. XIII, NO. LIV.—OCTOBER, 1855 . 2 R
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at a jerk; and yet you charge as much as he did! ” The
patient is apt to be dissatisfied unless the physician have said to
his pill and draught—in reference to the disorder; mind! only
in reference to the disorder— Ita feri ut se sentiat emori.
The doctor’s admission that globules constitute treatment,
conveyed in his antithesis of homoeopathy to legitimate medicine
as an empirical practice contending with known remedies, is of
so incautious a character that you must open your eyes to its
probable consequences. Not that the term is wrong, even on
what ought to be tbe doctor’s premises : attention to diet, &c. f
with spoonfuls of water named after drugs, to attract the mys¬
terious force of imagination towards the seat of the disorder,
is unquestionably “ treatment.” If a number of private families,
each for itself, had renounced the pharmacopoeia, you would
have been interested in the “ treatment without medicine,” and
in its results. The mischief is, that when the doctor does
happen to use or imply a term correctly, he resembles the
diplomatist who once told the truth, and was of course so
misunderstood that it took five reams of protocols to set mat¬
ters right, or duly wrong, again. Your President will certainly
be misunderstood as admitting that injinitesimalism contains
an active operation, though, in his and your opinion, on a
wrong principle. You will have the other branches of the
profession upon you. Even if the surgeons begin to have an
inkling that the time is approaching when they will have to
declare themselves neutral between systems of medicine, still
you must remember that there is another Hall besides Sir
Benjamin. The judicial committee of the Privy Council will
have nothing to say to the question how much latitude of
opinion constitutes a medical hpresy. 0 ye purgative powers!
Shall we live to hear of another see of Exeter threatening to ex¬
communicate its metropolitan ? Will homoeopathy be declared
a nullity, and the West-end College heretical on a question of
efficacy, by a diocesan synod in Bridge Street, in the midst of
such an odour of pharmacopoeian sanctity, that each delegate
will affirm he has snuffed up more medicine, in drawing his
breath at the pauses of the eloquence, than all the infinites!
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611
malists pat together could administer in a century ? We hope
not. We would combat your united strength, and we should
feel humiliated if we had to enter by the breach made by your¬
selves in each other’s walls.
Think how the public would receive from you the assertion
that there actually is something, be it even something wrong,
in the school of Hahnemann. You must never allow this.
You can stand long against nullity of treatment, even though
nullity should be proved more successful than aliquiddity ; but
you must be the only aliquiddities. Grant and cause to be
granted that the opponent system is something, and you turn
attention upon the manner in which that other something has
been thriving, in spite of opposition, until its directory is a
goodly volume. The two propositions,—“ There is nothing in
homoeopathy, and therefore nothing to encourage; ” and “ There
is something, and therefore something to discourage,” are of
very different idiosyncrasies. The first is a sequitur per se ; one
of your ex vi terminorum chaps : the second may be a sequitur
per fallacias in medicines orthodoxy institutis latentes, and
it is for you to make it something better if you can. The first
may be fired from a cross bow, by the machinery of the instru¬
ment ; the second will require the long bow, possibly a longer
one than even legitimate medicine can draw. Teach your
president—he ought not to want this teaching—how easily
the world is led captive by an ambiguity. Warn him of the
danger of allowing men to say, “ So, then, the College of Phy¬
sicians does admit that there is something in homoeopathy, after
all."
Make him understand, and first understand it yourselves, that
the traditional modes of dealing with medical dissent must not
be promiscuously applied to all cases. You have often had
to contend with the individual opponent, who avails himself
of a secret remedy, which he expects to be taken upon his word.
Of these individual opponents you have had hundreds at a time :
but they have only been hundreds of parties, not a party of
hundreds. Further, many of these parties have not had know¬
ledge of physiology and chemistry: and they have addressed
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themselves, in very many cases, to the uneducated world. They
do not demand public inquiry into their suocess. Their systems
die with the founders, and are as limited in place as in time. In
every particular homoeopathy shows itself to belong to another
class of phenomena. It numbers hundreds of practitioners who
have received the same sort of education as yourselves. It
hides no secret: its literature is now a library. Its supporters
are united by associations, by hospitals, and by a periodical
press. It appeals to the educated for support, and has obtained
it from the educated. It challenges comparison of its results
with yours. Before many years are over it will have completed
its first century. It is making rapid progress in every oountry
in which the law permits its existence. Do you think you can
put down this sort of union by slanging its practitioners as
empirics—meaning charlatans— and its patients as dupes ? If
you do, you are as truly infinitesimalists as Mrs. Partington
with her mop. Ask yourselves what you would have said to
the general assembly of the Scotch Kirk, if they had treated
the secession as they might have thought it reasonable to treat
Joanna Southoott. We speak for your good. You cannot do
better for us than you have done: hut we want a stronger
enemy. There is nothing to oppose us now except Jacko on
his death-bed.
Above all things, never let your President out into the world
without priming and rehearsal. Amend his phraseology, and
curtail his admissions, if you can: if you cannot, keep him at
home, or else it is gone goose with the college.
Cure him of dancing in his and your robe before Pharma¬
copoeia. A ballet master will tell you that dignified scorn of
heretical pravity is not expressible by any combination of
gesture and step. If, in his present state, the doctor should
continue to roam the highways of life, you will be subject to the
kind of mortification with which, no doubt, Mr. Pickwick read
the account which Diokens felt obliged to give of his wrath.
“ The heroio man," is all that that conscientious reporter could
say, “ threw himself into what the bystanders supposed to he
an attitude of defence." Your President is not a combatant for
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this age of the world. He neither knows how to cover himself
with the old shield, nor how to strike with the new sword.
And now we bid you farewell. Are you not thankful for the
trouble we have taken ? And do you not feel envious of the
position in which we stand with respect to ohoice of weapons ?
Your organs of the press in public, and the lower intellects
of your profession in public and in private, are profuse in
charges of dishonesty, fraud, and all baseness, against those
who believe in and practise homoeopathy. Now no reader
would imagine, from any thing we have said or implied, that
your President, or yourselves, or any of your professional
brethren, are morally and socially one single globule below the
value which he has hitherto assigned to you and them. As to
your President, though we may have compromised his average
a little, we have sought our materials in his English, his
technology, his logic, his philosophy, and his public conduct:
as to his character and motives, private and personal, there has
been a complete nullity of treatment. His very name is a
mystery, French or Latin. We believe so well of you (the
President included) that we almost say we know you will feel
at once that we have you here. The time must soon come
when fear of opinion, if no better, will impel all that is decent
and respeotable in what is called legitimate medicine to move
for a non tali auxilio against evil-thinkers and evil-speakers.
Until that time shall arrive, you have one weak point the more;
and that is all: we beg pardon,—not quite all; you show one
weak point the more.
Will you accept a joint-interest in a morsel of old poetry ?
I will furnish a motto, such as may make coming events
cast a shadow before, for the next edition of your very prosaic
book. We mean the book in which the first paragraph declares
that none but troy weight shall be therein used, and the second
paragraph uses avoirdupois weight. We cannot convey the
quotation to you in fee, because we desire to retain an interest
in it for ourselves: but we make you heartily welcome to any
share which you can be prevailed on to accept. The old poet
was a bit of a sage: and—be it coincidence or sibylline mean¬
ing, we know not which—the only consonants in the speaker’s
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On Mineral Waters ,
name are M. D. There seems to be some idea of what the
progress of science may do for the maintenance of truth.
Namquam ita quisquam bene subducta ratione ad vitam fait,
Quin res, ®tas, nsus semper aliquid adportet novi;
Aliquid moneat; nt ilia, qtue te scire credas, nescias;
Et quse tibi putaris prima, in experiundo nt repndies.
ON MINERAL WATERS.
By Dr. H. R. Madden.
It is not an unfrequent occurrence for us to be requested to
decide what mineral water we consider the most suitable for
a given case, and it has often struck me that it would be well
to have some clear ideas as to their modus operandi, so that
our reply to such a query might be founded upon something
like a correct appreciation of their probable effects, and that we
should neither abstain from recommending upon the plea that
they have not yet been admitted among the list of our proved
remedies, nor give an indefinite permission for the patient to
try this or that spa. With a view therefore to obviate this
dilemma, I have examined certain standard works on both
Foreign and British mineral waters, and carefully contrasted
their chemical analyses, to ascertain what light is thereby
thrown upon their remedial action, and by comparing the nature
of their constituents with their alleged curative virtues, I
have endeavoured to determine upon what, if any, principle
we could either sanction or recommend their employment.
Before entering however upon the direct investigation of
their modus operandi, I would make a few general remarks;
and first: There can be no question that mineral waters do
prove curative in the strictest sense of the term. It is doubt¬
less true that their effects are greatly enhanced by the change
of air, scene, and occupation necessitated by a journey to, and
residence at the Spa, and that the early hours, unwonted exer¬
cise, and in many cases, restricted diet which so frequently
accompany their libation, contribute likewise in no trifling
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615
degree towards the cure of the patient; but I think there are
few practitioners who have had much experience of the effects
of mineral waters, who will not acknowledge that after all such
deductions a considerable margin remains for the specific cura¬
tive effect of the springs themselves. It behoves us therefore
to examine this point carefully, and answer, if possible, the
following questions.
1. Is the action of mineral waters simple or complex, and if
the latter, in what does this complexity consist ?
2. Do they cure in virtue of any homoeopathic relation
existing between their mineral constituents and the diseases
benefited ?
And lastly. Can we as homoeopathists prescribe a course of
mineral waters, and can we lay down any rule for selecting the
proper Spa for a given case of disease ?
1. Is the action of mineral waters simple or complex, and if
the latter in what does this complexity consist? The first
thing that strikes one on examining the class of diseases bene-
fitted by mineral waters, is their general resemblance , to each
other. All are chronic, and all are more or less characterized
by what humoral pathologists would denominate impurities of
the blood, or what the physiological school of Germany would
term dyscrasy. Whatever nature a disease may have originally
possessed, it must have continued sufficiently long to give rise
to a state of mal-nutrition before the patient becomes a fit sub¬
ject for a course of mineral waters, and accordingly if an allopath
were required to define in one word their modus operandi, he
would assert that however much they may differ in certain
respects among themselves, they are all more or less alteratives.
When we class together, gout, rheumatism, glandular diseases,
calculous affections, chronic congestions, &c. we at once per¬
ceive that we have to deal with maladies whose very essence
consists in mal-nutrition, and if we investigate a little deeper,
we find that the sort of perverted nutrition which is common to
them all is that which consists either in the retention of effete
matters in the system, or in the production of substances more
analogous to excretions than to normal constituents; in other
words, in all the diseases which are benefitted by mineral
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On Mineral Waters,
i waters, the system is found to be loaded with unhealthy hu¬
mours, constituting a real materies morbi. Let it not he sup¬
posed, from these remarks, that I wish to deny the essentially
dynamic origin of all diseases, upon which the very foundation
of homoeopathic treatment rests; far from it, I feel satisfied
that every perversion of health originates in a disturbance of
the dynamics of the organism, and requires for its cure a
dynamic remedy; and yet it is equally certain that many dis¬
eases in their progress pass far beyond the dynamic oondition,
and owe their continuance to the presence of a true materies
morbi circulating in the system, and itself keeping up the
very dynamic perversion which originally caused its production.
Now it is not difficult to conoeive that disorders of this class
present two distinot indications for treatment, viz. a means of
correcting the dynamic perversion, and a means of removing
from the system the morbid, material; and practically we must
all have found how greatly the cure of suoh cases is expedited
when a treatment can he followed which fulfils both these
purposes.
If the above reasoning be applicable to the cures effected
by mineral waters, we should expeet that during their employ¬
ment the action of the great emunctuaries of the system, the
skin, the mucous membranes, and the kidneys, will be increased;
while at the same time this excess of action will not be pro¬
duced in such a manner as to lead to a proportionate exhaustion
when the exciting cause is removed. We all know that diapho¬
resis, diarrhoea and diuresis, produced by specific stimuli, very
frequently fail altogether in curing the class of diseases at
present referred to, for although the patient may be relieved
during the treatment, he is at the same time reduced in strength,
and when the so-called remedies are discontinued, the original
malady is very apt to return with an inveteracy all the stronger,
from the debilitated condition into which the patient has
sunk.
Experience shows that when mineral waters are admi¬
nistered in suitable oases, they almost invariably produce
either diuresis or an increased action of the bowels, and
although the patient is apt after a few days to feel exhausted
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617
and weakened by the overaction, yet these effects prove tran¬
sient, and he soon experiences the reaction of returning health;
and when the course is completed, he can discontinue the
waters without any marked decrease of these functions below
their normal standard. It behoves us therefore to enquire
wherein the purgative aotion of mineral waters differs from that
of ordinary aperients, and thus explain, if possible, their immu¬
nity from the disadvantages so notoriously attaching to the
latter.
Chemical analysis has proved all mineral waters to oonsist
of various neutral salts dissolved in water, together with
certain gases which, though less frequent, are yet sufficiently
common to arrest attention. Now the neutral salts in the
vast majority of cases, consist of the muriates and sulphates
of soda, lime and magnesia, together with small quantities
of various other ingredients which will occupy our attention by
and bye, in other words, of what, in allopathic pharmacopoeias,
are classed together as saline aperients. To what then do
these owe their aperient properties ? Do they stimulate the
intestines dynamically, and thus create an increased action in
such' a manner that they might be applied homoeopathically
in small doses for the cure of diarrhoea ? By no means. Not
one of the true saline aperients of the old school is used in
the cure of diarrhoea by the new, and why is this ? is it not
tire very foundation principle of homoeopathy that those symp¬
toms which are producible by large doses of a medicine, are
curable by a minute dose ? and if therefore the sulphates and
muriates of soda, lime and magnesia, are purgatives in large
doses, ought they not to be found useful in minute doses for
the cure of diarrhoea ? A superficial enquirer might certainly
think so; and I wonder muoh that our sapient opponents
have not brought forward as one of their numerous accusa¬
tions against us the folly, as it might seem to them, of our
giving chanwmilla, dulcamara, china and veratrum, for
diarrhoea, when Glauber s and Epsom salts are surely more
decided and unfailing purges, and hence according to their
view should be the most available for our purpose.
Perhaps all my readers are not aware of the fact that these
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On Mineral Waters,
salines will purge the dead as effectually as the living, and
nevertheless this is simply true. If a piece of dead intestine is
surrounded by serum or any other fluid of the same density,
and a solution of any of these salts is allowed to flow slowly
through it, the osmotic force is thereby greatly increased, and a
strong current is set up from the serum to the saline, and this
is believed on good grounds to be the rationale of saline purga-
tion. To make this point clear, I must quote from Professor
Matteucci’s Lectures on the Physical Phenomena of Living
Beings, as referred to in the British and Foreign Medical
Review for April 1847. The Professor observes—“I must
not conclude without citing to you the recent experiments of
Poisseuille, with a view of explaining by endosmose, the purga*
tive action of certain saline substances. He found that endos*
mose took place through the animal tissues from the serum of
the blood towards Seidlitz water, solutions of sulphate of soda,
common salt, &c. This is precisely what occurs when these
medicines are administered internally. The excrements contain
an abundant and unusual amount of albumen; and we can
scarcely help admitting that endosmose takes place from the
serum of the blood to the saline solution introduced into the
intestinal tube, through the walls of the capillary vessels of the
latter. But to remove all doubt of the justice of this applies*
tion of the doctrine of endosmose by Poisseuille, it was neces¬
sary to demonstrate that endosmose would continue, when one
of the liquids is in motion, or continually renewed. This has
been recently proved by Dr. Bachetti, who has shown that the
rapidity of the endosmose is considerably augmented when one
of the liquids is in this state of continual renewal.” Here then
we have an explanation of the difference between specific
and osmotic purgation. Scammony, Rhubarb, Aloes, &c.,
purge in virtue of a certain stimulation which they exert upon
the living tissue, augmenting thereby the amount of its secre¬
tion, or in other words, producing an excessive action, which
according to the known laws of physiology is apt to be followed
by proportionate diminution below the normal mean; while on
the other hand the saline solutions, acting according to physi¬
cal laws, increase the exosmotic current of the bloo^ to the
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by Dr. Madden. 619
interior of the intestines, and thus augment the alvine dis¬
charges, without necessarily producing any real excess of secre¬
tion, properly so-called; and hence this apparent, though not
real over-action, need not be followed by any counterbalancing
diminution. Thus much for the purgative saline constituents
of mineral waters; it appears from the above train of argument
that they have the property of drawing off certain portions of
the animal fluids independently of any abnormal excitement of
the secreting glands. Certain mineral waters however are
diuretic as well as purgative; how then do these act ? When
we consider that the quantity of fluid consumed by the mineral
water-drinkers varies from 18 to 60 ounces per diem, we need
only refer to our hydropathic friends to account for a consider¬
able increase of renal secretion; but besides this it appears, from
the analysis of those waters which are most decidedly diuretic,
that they all contain a tolerably large amount of alkaline car¬
bonates. If my readers will refer to the eighth vol. of this
Journal, at p. 197, they will find an account of the late Dr.
Golding Bird’s experiments on chemical diuretics, quoted by
me to prove that certain remedies act chemically, and produce
results dependent upon the laws which regulate chemical rather
than vital action, and that in the instance in question the alka¬
line carbonates increase very materially the solids in the urine,
by expediting the metamorphosis of the tissues. Perhaps some
may enquire how I can call an increased rapidity of metamor¬
phosis a chemical action, to which I reply that it is chemical in so
far that in the present case it is induced by that peculiar reaction,
termed catalysis, in virtue of which the presence of a chemical
agent possessing an affinity for an unformed compound, the
elements of which are present, will cause the production of that
compound. Numerous instances of this are familiar to chemists,
and in the present case, the alkaline carbonate having an
affinity for the effete organic compounds which normally find
their way through the kidneys, causes by its presence an in¬
creased rapidity of that disintegration by which those portions
of tissue which are no longer capable of serving any useful vital
process, are reduced to the condition of excretory matters. The
rationale of the action of alkaline carbonates, and the cause of their
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On Mineral Waters,
utility, I believe to be as follows: Where there is inal-nutrition
from any cause, at least where such mal-nutrition is accompa¬
nied by an accumulation in the system of more or less deteriorated
material, and where moreover the natural exoretory organs are
not in a sufficiently active state to carry off this redundant mat¬
ter, the alkaline carbonates determine its more complete disin¬
tegration, and then combining chemically with the resultant
compounds, pass off by the kidney, and thus relieve the system.
Let us now pause a moment, and ascertain how far our
reasoning has oarried us, and let us also if possible test the
safety of the foundation upon which bur theory of the action
of mineral waters is built; and here I must beg my readers to
pardon the somewhat desultory character of these remarks; but
the subject is so large and complex that I feel it would be a
far easier matter to write a book than condense all I would wish
to say into the space of an ordinary paper. I need hardly
remark that in speaking of the various modes of action of
mineral waters in general, I do not mean to assert that they
all aot in the same way; far from it; on the contrary I shall
endeavour to prove before I dose that the therapeutic action
of mineral waters is widely different in different cases: all I
mean to affirm is, that those waters which are characterized
by the presence of neutral salines, owe their purgative property
to their physical influence upon the osmotic force , and that
those characterized by the alkaline carbonates owe their diure¬
tic properties , in so far as mere quantity is not concerned,
to their chemical influence upon the disintegration of tissue.
Thus far I have endeavoured to shew that the diuretic and
purgative actions of spa waters, are not dependent upon the
specific or dynamio action of their constituents, but are con¬
sequent upon certain physioal and chemical processes which
they set up in the system, and from this I conclude that their
depurating effects are produced without the induction of any
such overaction as results from the employment of specific
aperients or diuretics.
All mineral waters, however, which have acquiredany degree
of celebrity, are found to contain, in addition to a greater or
less proportion of neutral alkaline salts, certain less common
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621
chemical compounds in much smaller proportion, and which
nevertheless impress a specific virtue upon the water in which
they occur. Let us therefore turn our attention to these, and
ascertain, if possible, their modus operandi. When a patient
drinks an imperial pint (twenty ounces) of Harrowgate water,
a quantity which is considered a full dose, he imbibes 108
grains of common salt, and 11 grains of muriate of lime, to¬
gether with rather less than two cubic inches of sulphuretted
hydrogen, which corresponds to about half a grain of Sulphur;
nevertheless the aotion of this water is unhesitatingly attributed
not to the muriates of soda and lime, but to the sulphur. Again,
the Montpellier well at Harrowgate contains in the same
quantity of water, 81 grains of muriate of soda, 22 of muriate
of lime, together with less than half a grain of iron; and yet
this latter ingredient stamps the effeots of the water sufficiently
strongly to give it the name of a chalybeate. Nay, more,
the waters of Saratoga, Kissingen and Kreutznach, are found
to be useful in scrofula, and their virtues attributed to Iodine
and Bromine, although the quantity in the strongest does not
amount to a quarter of a grain, and is mingled with common
salt in proportions varying from 20 to 55 grains.
Again, if we examine the analysis of various waters, and
compare them with their reoorded effects, we find two points
pretty clearly supported, viz., that the activity of mineral waters
as depurating agents is in direct proportion to the amount of
neutral and alkaline salts which they oontain, but that their
curative powers are by no means equally proportional to their
saline strength, but appear to depend upon sundry other cir-
cumstances, and especially upon the presence of oertain less
common ingredients. We can therefore in a measure predict
the effect of a mineral water, when we beoome acquainted with
its chemical constitution, in so far that we shall know that it
will be aperient and diuretic in proportion to the amount of its
neutral and alkaline salts, while it will possess other and more
specific curative virtues, if it contains certain of the rarer ingre¬
dients which occasionally exist in solution, even although these
compounds exist in very minute quantities. A careful examina¬
tion of these more specific virtues, shows clearly that there
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On Mineral Waters,
exists a homoeopathic relation between the compound which
(though minute in quantity) impresses the specific virtue on
the waters, and the diseases cured: thus the Sulphur waters
prove curative where a homoeopathist would order Sulphur.
The Chalybeates act where Iron is the homoeopathic remedy,
and those waters which contain Iodine and Bromine are charac¬
terized by virtues known to he possessed by these substances
when employed homoeopathically. Space will not admit of my
examining the actions of certain waters, especially the hot
springs, whose virtues are experienced more by bathers than
drinkers, and which virtues can scarcely he attributed to their
mineral constituents, but I must confine my observations to
those waters whose saline impregnation is considerable, and
whose curative action has always been attributed to their
mineral contents. I would therefore sum up here the result of
these investigations as follows :—There seems good ground for
concluding that the salines which occur in considerable quan¬
tities produoe in the system certain physical and chemical
actions which give rise to increased exoretion, while the rarer
compounds which are found only in minute proportions act
homoeopathically, and thus impress specific virtues on the
water in which they occur. In other words, we have presented
to us in mineral waters certain homoeopathic remedies , with
the addition of agents capable of depurating the sgstem by
increasing the excretions and promoting the disintegration of
effete or subvitalized tissue.
I have thus replied to the first and second questions at one
and the same time, viz., that the action of mineral waters is
complex, consisting as it does of physical, chemical and specific
actions, and secondly, that there does exist a homoeopathic
relation between certain of their constituents, and the diseases
they are found to cure; let me now proceed to answer the third
question, viz.—Can we as homoeopathists prescribe a course of
mineral waters ? and can we lay down any rule for selecting the
proper spa for a given case of disease ?
Can we as homoeopathists prescribe a course of mineral
waters? We have endeavoured to show that mineral waters
consist of homoeopathic remedies, and something more. Now
ty Google
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by Dr. Madden.
623
this “ something more ” is both an advantage and a disadvan¬
tage: a disadvantage, because it excludes the use of mineral
waters in a large number of cases, and yet an advantage because
it affords a means of cure in a given few which might otherwise
prove intractable. I believe that it will very seldom be judicious
to prescribe mineral waters in the commencement of treatment,
i.e., before pure and simple homoeopathic measures have been
tried. If a patient labouring under chronic disease presents
himself to a homoeopathic practitioner, I consider that however
evidently he may be labouring under a disease requiring depu¬
ration of the whole system, it is nevertheless the wisest and the
safest plan to commence a purely homoeopathic course of treat¬
ment. It is impossible to decide beforehand whether these
remedies will or will not be sufficient to effect all that is re¬
quired, since it often happens that the necessary depuration
occurs under their employment. If, on the contrary, homoeo¬
pathic treatment has been fairly and perseveringly tried without
success, and if moreover the class of remedies indicated should
be those which occur in mineral waters, it will then become a
matter for consideration whether these should not be resorted
to. If it be objected by anyone, that to use mineral waters
is to return to the polypharmacy of the old school, seeing the
ingredients are numerous and diverse, I would remark, that
these waters have after a certain fashion been proved in their
present complex state, and hence the objection does not validly
apply. It is true the provings have been chiefly ab usu in
tnorbi8. But nevertheless, since the results are in general
accordance with the purer results obtained by the careful
provings of the individual specifics which characterize the
various spas, I suspect that enough is known for practical
purposes. It is not to be supposed that a course of mineral
water will ever be ordered for a case owing to a minute corres¬
pondence between the detail of the symptoms, with those
produced by the specific contained in the spring selected.
General correspondences can alone be looked for, and where
these exist, they are detectable in the rough proving which
may be deduced from the therapeutic employment of the water.
It must not be concluded from these remarks, that I would
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624
On Mineral Waters ,
recommend the use of mineral waters in all chronic cases where
a depuration of the system is required, and the ordinary
homoeopathic remedies have failed to produce it, as this is by
no means the case. Other, and in many instances, preferable
mddes of treatment exist by which the same purpose may be
effected, among which hydropathy stands prominent. The
baths and packings of the water-treatment effect in a marked
degree the same depurative effect which is found to result from
the use of saline solutions, and I do not hesitate to affirm that
in cases where both methods of treatment are equally applica¬
ble, I should undoubtedly prefer the former. A much purer
homoeopathy can be combined with hydropathy than can pos¬
sibly be carried out by means of mineral waters, but it requires
no great experience of the former method to become aware that
certain cases exist where, from a defective reaction, or some
other cause, the water treatment cannot be carried out with
sufficient energy to produce these depurating effects with safety
to the patient, while a course of mineral waters would in such
instances be borne with impunity. I believe therefore that
each method of treatment will serve in its turn, and that while
for a large number of the class of diseases of which we are
treating, simple homoeopathio treatment will do all that is
required, and while beyond these a olass will exist wherein
hydropathic appliances will be found a most useful adjunct to
the homoeopathic remedy, there will yet remain a margin for
whose cure, tuto, cito et jucunde , a well selected mineral water
will afford the greatest desideratum, and accordingly I now
proceed to the latter part of the question, viz.—Can we lay
down any rule for selecting the proper spa for a given case of
disease? The general reply to this query is involved, as it
were, in the observations which have gone before, since it
follows, that if the specific part of their action is dependent
upon homoeopathic remedies, the spa must be selected in accor¬
dance with the known actions of its characteristic ingredients.
I do not therefore propose to give a list of mineral waters, and
assert dogmatically that such and such waters will be the most
suitable for certain diseases, but I shall give a series of lists of
those mineral waters which have been analysed, arranging
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625
them in classes according to their characteristic ingredients,
and thus afford a ready means of reference, by which any prac¬
titioner desirous of testing the accuracy of my views of their
modus operandi, may be enabled to do so.
Having examined carefully the analyses of 85 mineral waters,
I have drawn up the following tables, which will be found
useful as references when the probable action of any spa is to
be determined. The tables are preceded by a list of the springs
arranged geographically. Table I. gives the total amount
contained in an imperial pint of the water of those salts which
have been shown to possess the physical property of increasing
the osmotic currents, namely, Sulphate and Muriate of Soda,
Sulphate and Muriate of Magnesia, and Muriate of Lime.
Table II. gives the amount of Alkaline Carbonates in an im¬
perial pint, for the purpose of distinguishing those spas which
are capable of increasing the disintegration of tissue in the
manner referred to above. N.B. As both these actions are
dependent upon quantity, those springs are not included in the
tables wherein the total quantity amounts to less than 5 grains
per pint. Table III. gives the amount of Sulphates of Soda
and Magnesia. Table IV. the amount of the Muriates of
Soda, Lime and Magnesia, as it is probable that the Salts of
Sulphuric acid may differ from the metallic ohlorides in some
of their more minute effects, and hence it may be well to be
able to distinguish them in practice. Table V. commences
the notice of the more specific or homoeopathic ingredients,
and gives a list of the springs containing Iron, arranged iff two
classes, viz., 1st, Iff the order of their osmotic powers, that
containing the largest quantity of the neutral salts standing at
the head of the list; and 2nd, In the order of their disintegra¬
ting power, that containing the most alkali standing first.
N.B. In this and the following tables the amount of the specific
is given, but believing that the action is more qualitative than
quantitative, the latter is not allowed to influence the arrange¬
ment of the tables. Table VI. gives the springs which contain
Iodine. Table VII. The Bromine springs. Table VIII. The
Sulphuretted Hydrogen springs. Table IX. The springs con¬
taining Phosphates. Table X. The Manganese springs.
VOL. XIII, NO. LIV. — OCTOBER, 1855. 2 S
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026
On Mineral Waters ,
Digitized by
Table XI. The Strontia springs. Table XII. The Lithia
springs. Table XIII. The Baryta springs. XIY. The Silica
springs. XY. Springs whose Saline ingredients are in too
small proportion to produce osmotic or chemical action.
List of Springs, whose analyses have been examined,
arranged geographically.
Baden and Wurtemberg. — 1. Baden-Baden. 2. Rippoldsau.
3. Wildbad. 4. LiebenzelL Deinach. —5. Saurequelle. 6. Dinten-
quelle.—7. Cannstadt. 8. Boll. Heilbron.— 9. Adelheidsquelle.
Salzburg.— 10. Gastein.
Bohemia. — Marienbad. —11. Kreuzbrunnen. 12. Ferdinandsbrunnen.
Egra. —13. Franzensquelle. 14. Salzequelle.—Id. Carlsbad. 16. Piillna.
17. Seidschutz. 18. Seidlitz. 19. Toeplitz.
Bavaria. —20. Liebenstein. Kissingen. —21. Ragozi. 22. Pandur.
Booklet. —23. Ludwigsquelle. 24. Schwefelquelle.
Nassau. — Bruckenau. —25. Bruckenauer. 26. Sinnberger.—27. Hom-
bourg. 28. Soden. 29. Wiesbaden, 30. Schlangenbad. Schwalbach.
—31. Weinbrunnen. 32. Paulinen.— 33. Seltzer. 34. Fachingen.
35. Geilnau. Ems. —36. Kesselbrunnen. 87. Kraenchenbrunnen.
Prussia.— Silesia. —38. Obersalzbrunnen. 39. Kreuznach.
Germany. —40. Pyrmont
Belgium. — Spa. —41. Pouhon.
France. — Auvergne .— 42. Vichy.
America.— 43. Saratoga.
England.
Durham. — 44. Shotley Bridge. 45. Butterby. Cumberland. —
46. Gilsland Spa. Westmorland. — 47. Shap-well. Yorkshire. —
48. Guisboro. Croft. — 49. Old Spa. 50. New Well.— 51. Dinsdale.
Scarboro. — 52. North Well. 53. South Well.— 54. Aldfield. Harrow-
gate .— 55. Old Well. 56. Walker’s Saline. 57. MontpeKer. 58. Saline
Chalybeate. 59. Old Chalybeate.— 60. Knaresboro. 61. Crickhill. 62.
Thorpe-arch. 63. Calverley Spring. 64. Horley Green. 65. Slaithwaite.
66. Lockwood Spa. 67. Askeme. Lincoln.— 68. Woodhall. Derby. —
69. Buxton. 70. Matlock. Leicester — 71. Ashby-de-la-Zouch. War¬
wick. — Leamington. — 72. Victoria. 73. Old Well. Stratford. —74. Vic¬
toria Spa. Hereford. — 75. Tenbury. Worcester.— 76. Malvern.
Gloucester.— Cheltenham. — 77. Pitville. 78. Montpelier. 79. Old
Well.— 80. Gloucester Spa. 81. Clifton Wells. Somerset. — 82. Bath.
Essex. — 83. Hockley Spa. Kent. — 84. Tunbridge Wells. Isle of
Wight. —85. Sandrock.
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627
Table I.— Mineral Waters arranged according to the quantity of neutral
salts, viz. Sulphates of Soda and Magnesia, and Chlorides of Sodium,
Calcium and Magnesium which they contain in an imperial pint.
Ashby-de-la-Zouch
GRAINS
970.
Piillna
217.
Woodhall
194.25
Harrowgate, Old Well ..
123.
„ Montpelier Well
109.5
Seidschutz
107.5
Seidlitz
107.
Leamington, Old Well ..
103.
Tenbury
98.
Leamington, Victoria Spa
95.5
Hombourg
Harrowgate, Walker’s Sa¬
94.25
line
83.
Cheltenham, Old Well ..
81.5
„ Montpelier ..
80.5
Thorpe-Arch
73.
Victoria Spa ..
72.
Kreuznach
65.
Pandur
63.75
Gloucester Spa
60.25
Hockley Spa
53.25
Kreuzbrunnen
51.5
Wiesbaden
50.
Shap Wells
44.5
Cheltenham, Pitville Spa.
44.5
Cannstadt
39.5
Ludwig’s-quelle
34.25
Ragozi
GRAINS
34.
Franzensquelle
Scarboro’, South Well
33.
31.75
Ferdinandsbrunnen
31.5
Knaresborough
30.
Adelheidsquelle
29.
Carlsbad
28.
Salzequelle
Aldfield
28.
25.
Sandrock
23.5
Shotley-Bridge
22.
Scarboro’, North Well
21.25
Saratoga
21.
Baden-Baden ..
18.
Soden
17.5
Seltzer
16.5
Rippoldsau
16.
Croft, New Well
• •
11.
„ Old Well
10.5
Crick Hill ..
9.
Kesselbrunnen
9.
Butterby
• »
8.
Liebenstein
• •
7.5
Kraenchenbnmnen
2.
Bath
5.5
Vichy
5.25
Pyrmont
• •
5.25
Table IL —Mineral Waters arranged according to the quantity of Alkaline
Carbonates which they contain in an imperial pint.
Fachingen
Vichy
Kesselbrunnen
Seltzer
Tceplitz
Geilnau
Kreuzbrunnen
Xraenchenbrunnen
GRAINS
43.
Salzequelle
GRAINS
9.
21.
Carsbad
9.
20.
Ferdinandsbrunnen
8.5
15.
Franzensquelle
8.5
12.
Obersalzbrunnen
7.5
12.
Harrowgate, Walkers’ Sa¬
10.
line
6.5
10.
Adelheidsquelle
5.
Table HI.— Mineral Waters arranged according to the quantity of the
Sulphates of Soda and Magnesia they contain in an imperial pint.
GRAINS
Piillna .. 217.
Seidschutz .. .. 106.
Seidlitz .. .. 104.
Victoria Spa .. .. 60.5
Hockley Spa .. .. 41.25
Leamington Old Well .. 40.
Kreuzbrunnen
GRAINS
38.
Leamington Victoria
Cheltenham, Montpelier .
Scarboro’ South Well ..
28.5
28.5
28.
Franzensquelle
Ferdinandsbrunnen
25.
22.5
2 S 2
Digitized by
Gck igle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
028
On Mineral Waters,
Digitized by
Table III.— continued .
GRAINS
Cannstadt
20.
Carlsbad
20.
Sandrock
19.5
Salzequelle > ..
18.
Scarboro’ North Well ..
18.
Cheltenham Pitville
17.5
Rippoldsau
15.5
Cheltenham Old Well ..
GRAINS
14.5
Gloucester Spa
10.25
Croft, Old Spa
„ New Well
9.25
8.5
Ludwigsquelle
Crickhill
6.25
5.
Table IV .—Mineral Waters arranged according to the quantity of the
Chlorides of Sodium, Calcium and Magnesium they contain in an
imperial pint.
GRAINS
GRAINS
Ashby-de-la-Zouch
Wooahall
970.
Ludwigsquelle
# #
28.
194.
Cheltenham, Victoria
• •
27.
Harrowgate, Old Well ..
123.
Aldfield
• •
25.
„ Montpelier..
107.
Shotley Bridge
• •
22.
Tenbury
98.
Saratoga
21.
Hombourg
94.
Cannstadt
19.5
Harrowgate, Walker’s Sa¬
Baden-Baden ..
18.
line
83.
Soden
17.5
Thorpe-Arch ..
73.
Seltzer
16.
Leamington, Victoria ..
Cheltenham, Old Well ..
67.
Kreuzbrunnen
13.5
67.
Hockley Spa ..
12.
Kreuznach
65.
Victoria Spa ..
11.5
Leamington, Old Well ..
63.
F erdinandsbrunnen
9.
Pandur
62.
Salzequelle
9.
Cheltenham, Montpelier.
52.
Carlsbad
• f
8.
Gloucester Spa
60.
Franzensquelle
8.
Wiesbaden
50.
Butterby
8.
Shap Wells ..
40.
Kesselbrunnen
8.
Ragozi
32.
Kraenchenbrunnen
7.
Knaresboro ..
Adelheidsquelle
30.
29.
Liebenstein ..
6.
Table V. —Mineral Waters containing Iron.
A —arranged according to their Osmotic power.
GRAINS
Harrowgate Montpelier Spa .37
Seidschiitz
Hombourg
Thorp Arch
Kreuznach
Pandur
Kreuzbrunnen.
Wiesbaden
Cannstadt
Ludwigsquelle
Ragozij
Franzensquelle
Scarboro* South well
Ferdinandsbrunnen
.012
.46
.22
.149
.45
.176
.078
.14
.65
.68
.068
.22
.4
Adelheidsquelle
Carlsbad
Salzequelle
Sandrock
Shotley Bridge
Scarboro’, North Well
Saratoga
Baden-Baden ..
Soden
Rippoldsau
Croft, Old Well
Crickhill
Kesselbrunnen
GRAINS
.012
.028
.016
8ulphate.
.. 41.40
.92
.23
.017
.1
.16
.76
.14
.39
.062
Gck igle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
by Dr. Madden.
629
GRAINS GRAINS
Liebenstein
2.
Vichy
.007
Kraenchenbrunnen
Bath
•016
.03
Pyrmont
.321
B— Arranged according to the amount of Alkali they contain.
Fachingen
.089
Salzequelle
.016
Vichy
.007
Carlsbad
.028
Kesselbrunnen
.062
Ferdinandsbrunnen
.4
Toeplitz
.036
Franzensquelle .. \..
.068
Kreuzbrunnen
.176
Obersalzbrunnen
.035
Kraenchenbrunnen
.. .016
Adelheidsquelle
.012
Table VI.— Mineral Waters containing Salts of Iodine.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic power.
Woodhall .. .. .07 Pandur .. .. traces*
Leamington, Old Well.. .011 Glo’ster Spa .. .0025
Tenbury .. .. .013 Cheltenham, Pitville .. traces.
Leamington, Victoria .. .0125 Ragozi .. .. traces.
Cheltenham, Old Well.. .002 Adelheidsquelle .. .15
Cheltenham, Montpelier .004 Saratoga.. .. .0046
Rreuznach .. .. .0024 Vichy .. .. .0002 .
B— Arranged according to the amount of Alkali.
Vichy .. .. .0002 | Adelheidsquelle . .15
Table VII.— Mineral Waters containing Salts of Bromine.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic power.
Ashby- de-la-Zouch .. 1. Glo’ster Spa .. .. .0125
Woodhall .. .. 1.02 Ragozi .. .. .70
Tenbury .. .. .008 Adelheidsquelle .. .306
Leamington Victoria .. .0125 Shotley Bridge .. .10
Hombourg .. .. .004 Saratoga .. .. .1613
Cheltenham, Montpelier.. .025 Vichy .. .. .0007
Rreuznach .. .. .2304
B —Arranged according to the amount of Alkali.
Vichy .. .. .0007 I Adelheidsquelle .. .306
Obersalzebrunnen .. .0051 | v
Table VIII. — Mineral Waters containing Sulphuretted Hydrogen.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic power.
Woodhall .. .. traces. Aldfield .. .. 2.62
Harrowgate, Old Well.. 1.93 Croft, New Well .. 2.78
Victoria Spa .. .. .64 „ Old Spa .. .23
Glo’ster Spa .. .. traces. Crickhill .. .24
Shap-welk .. .. 1.25 Butterby .. .. 1.44
Knaresboro .. .. 1.
None of the Alkaline waters whose analyses I have seen appear to
contain Sulphuretted Hydrogen.
Digitized by Gougle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Digitized by
630 On Mineral Waters,
Table IX. —Mineral Waters containing Salts of Phosphoric Acid.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic Power.
Piillna
GRAINS
.. .003
Ferdinandsbrunnen
GRAINS
.005
Seidschiitz
.. .026
Carlsbad
.003
Hombourg
.. .0046
Salzequelle
.004
Pandur
.. .05
Seltzer
.723
Kreuzbrunnen
.. .003
Bippoldsau
.420
Ragozi
.. .170
Vichy
.0026
Franzensqueile
.. 2.033
Pyrmont ..
.011
B-
-Arranged according to the amount of Alkali.
Fachingen
.. .018
Salzequelle
.004 ,
Vichy
.0026
Carlsbad
.003
Seltzer
.. .723
Ferdinandsbrunnen
.005
Geilnau
.. .739
Franzensqueile
2.033
Kreuzbrunnen
.. .003
Table X. —Mineral Waters containing Manganese.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic Power.
Seidschiitz
.. .042
Carlsbad
.007
Hombourg
.0218
Salzequelle
.001
Kreuznacn
.. .0072
Saratoga
.0202
Pandur
traces
Seltzer
.151
Kreuzbrunnen
.. .038
Rippoldsau
.570
Bagozi
traces
Kesselbrunnen
.125
Franzensqueile
.. .004
Kraenchenbrunnen ..
traces
Ferdinandsbrunnen
.. .092
Vichy
.0028
Adelheidsquelle
.. .0012
Pyrmont
.0364
B— Arranged according to the Amount of Alkali.
Vichy
.. .0028
Carlsbad
.. .007
Kesselbrunnen
.. .125
Ferdinandsbrunnen
.. .092
Seltzer
.. .151
Franzensqueile
.. .004
Geilnau
.. .160
Obersalzebrunnen
.. .0026
Kreuzbrunnen
.. .038
Adelheidsquelle
.. .0012
Salzequelle
.. .001
Table XL —Mineral Waters containing Strontia.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic Power.
Seidschiitz
.. .045
Hombourg
.. .0929
Pandur
.. traces
Kreuzbrunnen
.. .004
Bagozi
.. .0592
Franzensqueile
.0023
Ferdinanasbrunnen
.005
Adelheidsquelle .. .0387
Carlsbad .. .. .007
Salzequelle .. .. traces
Saratoga .. .. .0672
Seltzer .. ,. .0144
Vichy .. ,. .0134
Gck igle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
by Dr. Madden. 631
B— Arranged according to the amount of Alkali.
GRAINS GRAINS
Vichy
.. .0134
Ferdinandsbrunnen
.. .005
Seltzer
.. .0144
Franzensquelle
.. .0023
Kreuzbrunnen
.. .004
Obersalzebrunnen
.. .0170
Salzequelle
Carlsbad
traces
.. .007
Adelheidsquelle
.. .0387
Table XII. —Mineral Waters containing Lithia.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic Power.
Kreuznach
.0562
Ferdinandsquelle
.. traces
Pandur
.. traces
Carlsbad
.020
Kreuzbrunnen
.. .114
Salzequelle
.. traces
Ragozi
Franzensquelle
.. traces
traces
Pyrmont
.0067
B— Arranged according to the amount of Alkali,
Kreuzbrunnen
.114
Ferdinandsquelle
traces
Salzequelle
traces
Franzensquelle
traces
Carlsbad
.020
^ Table XIIL—
-Mineral Waters containing Baryta .
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic Power #
Hombourg
.0039
Seltzer
.0014
Kreuznach
.2566
Kraenchenbrunnen
.0022
Adelheidsquelle
.0024
B— Arranged according to the amount of Alkali.
Seltzer
.0014
Adelheidsquelle
.0024
Kraenchenbrunnen
.0022
Table XIV.-
-Mineral Waters containing Silica.
A— Arranged according to their Osmotic Power.
grains
GRAINS
Piillna
.176
Carlsbad
.577
Seidschiitz
.120
Salzequelle
.333
Tenbury
.100
Sandrock
.700
Hombourg
.313
Shotley Bridge
.400
Thorp-arch
.090
Saratoga
Baden-Baden
.1112
Kreuznach
.2255
.330
Pandur
1.55
Soden
468
Kreuzbrunnen
.386
Seltzer
.289
Wiesbaden
.600
Bippoldsau
1.090
Shap Wells ..
.100
Kesselbrunnen
traces
Ludwigsquelle
.500
Kraenchenbrunnen
.413
Ragozi
2.25
Bath ,. ,.
.410
Franzensquelle
Ferdinandsbrunnen
.367
Vichy
.3696
.679
Pyrmont
.3727
Adelheidsquelle
.1922
Digitized by GOO^jIC
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
63 Jd
Fachingen
On Mineral Waters,
'. '• ■. * ■ -: ■;•■z.'Si >«* >r^..v
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.3896
traces
: ,2$9
.420
.HO
- ,386
Carlsbad. i ,^.,^ yr . ir< .,^.
FerdliiitidsbrutVneii
Franzensquelle
Obersakebrunnen
Adelheidsquelle
« *
*679
.367
.2433
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UNIVE
by Dr. Madden.
633
By the help of these tables, a homoeopathist will be enabled
to give a tolerably sound opinion as to the comparative suita¬
bility of any Spa for a given case of disease. If, for example,
he wishes to prescribe a course of waters containing Iodine ,
while at the same tirde he desires to produce a large increase of
osmotic action, as a means of depuration, he would try the
effects of Woodhall in Lincolnshire, or the Old Well at Leam¬
ington. If on the other hand, a defective action of the kidneys
in his patient points to that organ as the one through which
depuration should be carried on, he would prescribe either
Vichy Water, or that of the Adelheidsquelle at Heilbron; or
if he desires to try the effects of Iodine as existing in a natural
spring, but uncombined with any saline ingredients in sufficient
quantity to induce osmotic or chemical action, he might test
the powers of the Weinbrunnen of Schwalbach, with some
hopes of success: and thus with any other specific to which
the condition of the patient may point, as most homoeopathic
to the existing disease. Before closing these remarks, let me
again remind my readers, that I have only thrown out a few
suggestions which they may or may not reduce to practice as
opportunity or inclination may prompt. I would not presume
to dogmatize or dictate, as the whole subject is far too complex
to admit of any such course, until extended experience has
established or modified the conclusions to which the above
reasonings have pointed. All I have desired to excogitate has
been the probable modus operandi of certain agents which
large experience has proved to be truly curative, and having
shown what appears to me to be the probable rationale of their
success, I trust that those who feel inclined to put the sugges¬
tion to the test, will kindly note the results, and communicate
them for the*benefit of their brethren.
Digitized by
Go^ 'gle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
034
Sepia,
SEPIA.
By Dr. V. Meyer.
(From the Homotopatkuche Vierteljakrtchrift, 4th Jahrgang, 2 Htft.)
We have great pleasure in introducing to the notice of our
readers the following essay on the action of Sepia, by Dr. V.
Meyer, of Leipzig. It is one of a series of several essays, on
individual articles of our Materia Medica, by Dr. Meyer, and is
recommended not only by its intrinsic practical value, but also
as an encouragement and example of the kind of labour that is
most wanted at this stage of the progress of homoeopathy. Of
elementary treatises, popular and scientific, pamphlets, tracts,
and all kinds of machinery for diffusing the knowledge of
homoeopathy in its present state, we have now enough and to spare.
But there is a sad dearth of labourers in the field of the real prac¬
tical internal development of homoeopathy itself; and yet one sin¬
gle real gain in the practical application of homoeopathy, as a
healing art, does more to increase its influence than a whole
bushel of pamphlets and elementary treatises. So we trust
many may be found in this country disposed to follow the
example of Dr. Meyer, and devote themselves to the perfecting
of the Materia Medica, by taking up single medicines, and pre¬
senting us with elaborate and exhaustive treatises on their
action. The Hahnemann Materia Medica, as most of out
readers are aware, has been established for the express purpose
of affording the opportunity of publishing such elaborate
treatises in a collected and standard form; but as yet the
number that have been offered is not enough to complete one
volume.— [Eds.]
On the history and description of Sepia, Hahnemann has
made the following remarks :—“ The brownish black fluid,
which, previous to me, was only used in drawing, is contained in
a sack within the abdomen of the large ink-fish. Sepia octopoda.
This fluid is squirted out at times by the animal, to darken the
water, probably for the purpose either of securing its prey, or of
concealment from any enemy. The cuttle fish is most frequently
Digitized by
Go^ 'gle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
by Dr. V. Meyer.
635
found in the Mediterranean, and the dried sack is readily pro¬
cured at Home hy artists and others.
“ The contents of the sack when dried are very soluble in water
in every proportion, but in its raw condition is insoluble in
spirits of wine. Sepia, like other dried crude medicinal substances
is prepared by trituration for homoeopathic use.” Literature:
Hahnemann chron. Krankh. Yol. 5 § 169, Gross, Archiv fiir
Horn. Heilkunde, Bd. 19 Hft. 3 § 187.
Character and sphere of action. It is very rarely that a
remedy embracing such a number and variety of physiological
symptoms, is found to possess so marked and limited a sphere
of action, as is the case with sepia. This remedy operates
especially on the portal system , by retarding the circulation,
and causing an overloading of the vascular system with
venous blood, or with blood more or less resembling venous.
A plethora venosa as it is called, gives rise to most of the
various symptoms. The pathological process is also marked
by a state of depression. A want of tone, and weakness of the vital
forces is plainly indicated by the feebleness of the mental
powers, and of the muscular system, the debility often termina¬
ting in complete exhaustion. There is never an excessive
development of symptoms, nor considerable excitement and
increase of the vital force; in those rare cases in which an
increase is observed, rt is not owing to a state of reaction, but
is the result of a new symptom of the primary Sepia disease.
How far my views of the character and sphere of action of
Sepia, which as far as I know have never before been expressed
by any one, may admit of actual proof, will be more readily
comprehended by the consideration and estimation of the
physiological symptoms of the medicine as left us by Hahnemann.
We must however especially keep in view—
1st. That Sepia, by primarily affecting the splanchnic
nervous system, induces an overloaded condition of the portal
system.
2nd. That all further morbid conditions are but secondary,
and are natural results of the further development of the
primary disease.
Action of Sepia on the portal system. When the blood
Digitized by
Go^ 'gle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
636
Sepia,
corpuscles lose the power of separation and of beooming reddened
by oxygen, the quantity of the blood becomes increased and its
quality deteriorated by the useless and defunct corpuscules which
remain behind. The whole of the blood assumes a dark,
blackish red colour, similar to venous blood, which has been
called by Schultz melanotic blood. At first this abnormal
blood is collected in the portal system, and subsequently gives
a melanotic appearance to the entire mass. Various chronic
diseases gradually appear. From all the symptons caused in a
healthy person by the proving of Sepia, it is evident that a
similar action is at first produced in the portal system, and sub¬
sequently a corresponding plethora venosa.
We will therefore consider, first those symptoms which denote
an overloading of the portal system, without previously passing
in review those conditions resulting therefrom.
1. Plethora Venosa.
All disorders of the portal system must first affect the
neighbouring organ—the liver. This influence is clearly shewn
by the following symptoms:
Feeling of fulness in the region of the liver. Simple pain in the
liver when driving over an uneven road, under the last rib, taking
away the breath. Pain in the gall bladder; flatulency, stretching,
much yawning, weight in the limbs. Pressive pain in the region of
the liver. Habitual pressure in the liver when walking. A draw*
ing pain in the region of the liver in the evening. A dull stitch in
the region of the liver. Shooting pain in the liver and kidneys, with
paleness of the face. Painful shooting in the gall bladder. Violent
shooting in the region of the liver, in the evening, for several minutes,
painful when touched, and constipation. Soreness in the region of
the liver. Throbbing in the region of the liver. Twitches in the
liver. Frequent attacks of crampy pain in the livef.
[We shall find again in the following symptoms, features which in
general must be attributed to this form of disease.] Paleness of the
face. Sickly, pale countenance early in the morning, with muddy
red eyes, yellowness of the face and conjunctiva, a whole day.
Yellow spots on the face, and a yellow saddle across the nose and
cheeks. Yellowness around the mouth.
Digitized by
Gck igle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
by Dr. V. Meyer.
637
Inclined to have cold feet. Icy cold feet in the afternoon and
evening when sitting. Icy cold feet especially in the evening , not
becoming warm after having been a long time in bed. Very cold feet
in the evening , more especially in bed, when they become warm fol¬
lowed by very cold hands. Cold knees at night. Sweating of the
legs so violent during the day, that it goes through double clothing.
Sweating of the feet. Severe sweating of the feet, yet without odour
or soreness. Sweating of the feet, especially of the toes, for a fort¬
night. Great sweating of the feet, with an insupportable odour, and
soreness of the toes.
Ebullition of blood in the whole body for three consecutive days.
Ebullition of blood with determination of blood to head and chest.
She feels the pulse beat in the body, especially in the left breast.
She feels the pulse beat in her head and limbs, day and night, but
more at night. Every part of the body on which she’sits or lies
aches, pain in every limb, especially in the hips. Weakness of all
the limbs with chilliness. The legs ache as if beaten, she longs to
sit down, and when seated, she feels as if she must again stand up.
He was so exhausted by half an hour’s walk that he became ill and
could not breathe; the bronchi seemed to be closed down to the
epigastrium. So weak that she thinks she shall faint. Fits of ver¬
tigo, with fainting for two hours with very short breath. Faintness
early in the morning to swooning, with loss of thought, slight
shivering, goose-skin and yawning for an hour; tongue very pale,
pulse weak and slow. An attack early in the morning while walking:
a blackness came before his eyes, and he became hot from one to six
o’clock, with tearing in all his limbs, with constant nausea; weakness
in the evening even to fainting, with dejection of spirits; everything
affected his nerves, he was very timid. In the night there was an
abundant discharge of foul smelling wind.
Slow pulse, from 56 to 58 beats. Shuddering several times in
the day, with chilliness. Constant febrile shuddering after resting
at noon. Constant chill with shivering. Internal chilliness in a
warm room, the whole day, for several days. Chilliness for several
nights in bed. Chilly shuddering even on the head, with icy cold
hands, yawning, and great weakness. Chilliness, with thirst towards
evening, and sweat at night. Great chilliness for an hour succeeded
by thirst. Evening and morning he must lie a-bed. Coldness of
the whole body. A bad headache with dulness and heaviness in the
forehead, preceded with scintillations before the eyes, as from a
Digitized by
Gck igle
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
638
Sepia,
thousand suns, with heat and pressure, with febrile heat, mingled
with chilly shuddering8,attended with much nausea, great oppression of
the chest as if it were laced tight, but without shortness of breathing,
from morning till evening. Fever with pressing at first in the
temples, with intermissions of a few minutes, and short breath, as if
from internal heat, throughout the night, followed by weakness of
the legs in the morning, thirst, loss of appetite, drowsiness, feverish
shuddering throughout the day, pains in the neck with swollen sub-
maxillary glands. Flushes of heat as if hot water were poured over
one, with redness of the face, sweat over the whole body, and anxiety,
without thirst, yet with dryness of the throat. Attack of heat every
afternoon from one to six o’clock, for several days. Great heat
until after midnight. Profuse sweat in walking. Profuse general
night sweat , from evening till morning. Cold night sweat on the
breast , back and thighs. Morning sweat over the whole body. Sour
night sweat for five mornings. Repulsive odour of the sweat almost
like juniper flowers. Complete absence of thirst for 11 days.
Intermitting fever, frequently through the day at uncertain periods :
at first attended with general heat, perspiration of the face, violent
thirst, and bitterness of the mouth, then with chilliness and general
coldness likewise in the face, with inclination to vomit, pressure in
the forehead to the temples; during the heat she had vertigo as if
she should fall. Violent chills for an hour followed by great heat,
with inability to collect one’s senses; profuse sweat in the evening ;
urine brown, with an acrid smell. Chilliness in the morning, and
throughout the day some heat of the face and hands, with paleness of
the face, without either thirst or sweat, accompanied with oppressive
pain in the stomach, and headache when stooping.
Much yawning and stretching. Drowsiness during the day. She
falls asleep as soon as she sits down. Inclination to sleep even in the
forenoon, she must sleep an hour. Falls asleep late in the evening ,
from sprightliness. She cannot sleep from uneasiness. Wide
awake at night on account of a flow of ideas. Awakes frequently
at night, many nights together. Loud speaking in sleep. He raises
himself up at midnight and begins to laugh, sits quite firm with
extended arms and hands, teeth clenched, talking nonsense. Endless
dreams the whole night. Uneasy dream in the night as if he were
haunted and was obliged to run backwards; when awake he thinks
that something has come from above and contracted his chest, followed
by creeping and stitches in the chest. Frightful dreams with loud
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shrieks. Awaking at night with fright and shrieks. Shrieking at
night during sleep. At midnight while perspiring profusely, a sort
of fainting fit, lasting a quarter of an hour, with consciousness, but
unable to speak or stir a finger. While fainting he had a dream in
which he was fighting with a ghost. He had scarcely recovered from
the fainting when he fell into another fit in which he dreamt he was
lost in a wood. Frequent frights when falling asleep. Twitchings
of the legs, when falling asleep. Frightful oppressive ebullitions of
the blood when going to sleep. Great ebullition of the blood in the
whole body during the night , and consequent uneasiness. Heat
during the night and consequent uneasiness. Frightful startings
during the siesta. Awakening up at night after a short sleep, with
great uneasiness of the body, she cannot be still without much
. difficulty.
Great internal uneasiness for many days, with a hasty disposition.
He wishes to have his work finished as soon as it is commenced..
Peevish sensitiveness. Peevishness, especially early in the morning.
Great inclination to be vexed. Vexatious events of former times
occur to him involuntarily, at which he revolts so much as to become
quite beside himself, and could not be composed, with anxiety.
Palpitation of the heart, and whole surface of the body covered with
perspiration. So extremely excited by vexation that she was fearful
of an apoplectic stroke, accompanied with a blackness before the
eyes. Very irritable in the whole body. The nerves very sensitive
to the least noise. Dejected, sad. Sad, especially in the evening.
Sad and troubled, particularly when walking in the open air.
Melancholy, especially early in the morning. Gloomy ideas of the
disease and of the future. Her complaint appears to her in such a
bad light, that she trembles. Great sadness, and fits of crying
which she can scarcely suppress. She has such depression of spirits
that she could cry at everything without cause. Gloominess, she
feels unhappy without occasion. Misanthropy. She wishes to be
alone, and to be with her eyes closed. Complete despondency.
Great wearineas of life ; it seemed to him as if he could not support
such a miserable existence any longer, that he should pine away, if
he did not make away with himself. Ill humour, especially early
in the morning. Discontentment. Very easily offended. Great
indifference to every thing, no right feeling. Very indifferent to
every thing , without sympathy, and apathetic. Mental indolence, and
dejection of spirits. No inclination to labour, inattentive, indolent.
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Sepia,
He was absent in mind, spoke incorrectly, and confounded his words.
Feeble memory. Inconsiderate and thoughtless with a desire to
work. A feeble flow of ideas. He thinks of things which he does not
wish, makes use of expressions which he knows well he should not
do, proposes to do things contrary to his views, and thus finds him¬
self in contradiction with himself, which throws him into a very
unpleasant and uncomfortable temper. Attacks of anxiety. Anxious¬
ness. Timidity at many times. Careful and anxious, with
fretfulness. Timid trembling with cold perspiration on the fore¬
head. Very frightened and fearful. At one time lively at
another sad. Involuntary laughing and crying, alternately, with¬
out the corresponding frame of mind.
In reviewing these Sepia symptoms, we shall find a clear de¬
lineation of plethora venosa. By overloading the portal vein,
the liver is first placed in a hypereemic condition; hence the
sensation of fulness, pressure, beating and throbbing, in this
important organ.
In proportion as the blood collects in the internal organs
owing to a retarded circulation, in the same degree does the skin
usually become bloodless; hence the paleness, and the yellow
colour of the face, and conjunctiva, are easily explained. To
the same cause may be attributed the yellow spots on the cheeks
and nose. An equally constant sign of congestion of blood in
the internal organs, is the continued coldness of the extremities,
which do not become warm in bed without much difficulty. The
general ebullitions of blood with various local pulsations are in
like manner a natural consequence of such congestion; and,
notwithstanding their violence, their action is more that of de¬
pression than of excitement; hence the debility, weariness and
depression of all the limbs, loss of thought, fainting.
The Sepia fever—which scarcely deserves the name—is of
the same nature. It is marked by slowness of the pulse, slight
shivering, drowsiness, and absence of thirst;—all indications of
an impeded flow of blood. In those cases in which there is
febrile heat, the chilliness is not absent: the attending pressure
and weight in the head and chest, are true indications of a stasis
of the blood. The condition resembling an intermittent fever,
is anything rather than a true intermitting, for there is no
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decided type nor form ; in fact, this state is more a gastric—or
rather, in the language of the old school, a depurating fever.
The sleep is distressingly uneasy ; often broken, with intervals
of heavy sleep. The horrible, frightful dreams—nightmares—
are very prominent. The mental conditions attendant upon
most abdominal disorders are well marked. Sadness, melancholy,
despair, misanthropy, indolence' and timidity, clearly indicate the
hypochondriacal mental depression, which is at times only tem¬
porarily replaced by a degree of excitement, hurried uneasiness,
irritability, fretfulness, and sensitiveness usual in those suffering
from plethora venosa. There is no feature wanting in the sketch
of this disorder which is of such frequent occurrence, and which
is so faithfully represented by Sepia.
It will become still more evident that my proposition—that
the action of Sepia is more especially directed to the portal
system—is true, by considering the conditions resulting from
the long continued existence of plethora, and by comparing them
with those symptoms educed by tbe physiological proving of
Sepia. It is self-evident that where an impeded flow of blood
has existed for a long time, it cannot be restricted to the organs
already affected, but that it must he continually extending.
Hence the patient’s attention is first drawn to his disease by the
gradual inorease of his ailments. Various troublesome con¬
gestions appear, as well as different disorders of the digestive
organs ; among which, flatulency and irregularity of the evacu¬
ations become more prominent, and leave no doubt as to the
disorder.
Hemorrhoidal sufferings are rarely absent. At this point,
the malady assumes a more general character:—the heart en¬
larges ; the lungs suffer from the continual effort they have to
make, causing disordered respiration, and even asthma; the brain
and spinal marrow subsequently become affected, giving rise to
convulsions and paralysis. If the formation of the blood is
arrested, or as Schultz observes, the moulting is very incom¬
plete, the so called blood crasis is developed, whence arise gouty
and rheumatic complaints, and finally dropsy. This is the
course of plethora venosa.
Let us now observe how far Sepia will correspond with our
description of the morbid process.
VOL. XIII, NO. LIV.—OCTOBER 1855. 2t
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042 Sepia,
2 . —Morbid states resulting from Plethora VeNoba.
1. Congestions.
(a). Of the Head.
Determination of blood to the head. Violent heat rushing to the
head every five minutes. Heat in the head in the evening. Heat in
the head as if it were burning out of the ears ; then dulness of hear¬
ing, and gloomy countenance. Great heat of the head early in the
evening, with a feeling as if the nose would bleed. Painful heat in
the head; often with flushes of heat over the whole body. Head¬
ache, pain in forehead and vertex, followed by anxiety in the epigas¬
trium, with trembling; afterwards profuse bleeding of the nose.
With violent headache, external warmth was intolerable, yet accom¬
panied with chilliness. Headache as if the head would burst; like¬
wise when coughing. Headache as if the eyes would fall out.
Headache every minute seems as if it came from the spine ; a shoot¬
ing in the head at every step. Concussion of the brain on stumbling.
Motion in the brain when shaking the head. Vertigo, early in bed,
when sitting up, as if everything in the room was in motion. Vertigo
when walking, as if everything moved. Vertigo, so that he stumbles
when walking, and looking up to a height. Vertigo only when
w alkin g in the open air, so that she was obliged to be led. Vertigo
on moving the arms. Vertigo when looking at a large flat surface.
Attacks of vertigo, when walking in the open air, of two or three
minutes duration. It seemed as if something rumbled about in the
head, with staggering, followed by headache in the evening, and
humming in the ears. Vertigo, so that he falls down every morning
on rising. Vertigo after dinner, so that he is obliged to cling to
something. Vertigo daily from three to five o’clock—everything
goes round, whether walking, sitting, or lying. Vertigo, with cold¬
ness of hands and feet. Two fits of vertigo while stooping, as if the
senses would be lost, after supper. Vertigo—the head can scarcely
be held up. Vertigo and giddiness daily, from four to six o’clock,
when sitting or walking. Swimming and reeling whilst taking simple
drinks when sitting, for some minutes, as if he had received some
blows, followed by flushes of heat. Compression of the head,
with constriction of the chest, and debility of the whole body.
Attacks of dulness of the head, with shuddering, and momentary
suppression of the breathing, followed by a deep inspiration. At
times very giddy, with aversion to any employment. Confusion of
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the back part of the head, on the left side. Confusion of the fore
part of the head. Confusion of the head as with a severe cold, with
giddiness. Confusion of the head, with pressure in the eyes, in¬
creased by walking in the air. Confusion and wavering of the head,
with tension of the muscles of the throat and neck. Heaviness of
the head every morning when rising, which gets better after some
hours. Heaviness in the occiput, especially early in the morning.
Heaviness of the head, that it can scarcely be held up. Heaviness
of the head in the evening; and after lying down, one-sided headache.
Pressing heaviness in the head, temples and forehead, as if the head
were swollen with blood, as with a severe cold. Pressive headache
in the hot forehead, from seven to eight o’clock in the evening.
Pressive headache in the back of the head, from evening to midnight.
One-sided and deep pressive headache in the back of the head, with
a pressive pain in the posterior molars. Violent pressure in the head
the whole day, with vertigo, weeping mood, and severe cold. Pres¬
sure mostly in the forehead and eyes, with abundant spitting of saliva.
Pressure and tension in the forehead and eyes, with burning. Pres¬
sure, twitching and throbbing, with heat in the head, as if all would
come out of the forehead and eyes. Compression in the upper part
of head the whole day, with tightness of the chest. A severe throb¬
bing pain in the temples. Throbbing headache in the evening.
A beating very severe pain in the vertex, early in the morning, soon
after rising. A beating in the side of the head on which he lies.
Very painful beating in the upper part of head on the slightest mover
ment: on tinning the eyes, or moving either head or body, the beat¬
ing moves upwards and outwards; even when very quiet, an in¬
distinct beating. A boring, digging pain in the forehead, on the
slightest movement, commencing in the forenoon, and lasting the
whole day. Discharge of coagulated blood when blowing the nose
early in the morning. Bleeding, and discharge of blood when blow¬
ing the nose. Epistaxis for several hours, though only a few drops
at a time. Violent epistaxis.
( b ). Of the Eyes.
Congestion of the eyes. Heat in the left eye early in the morning,
with swelling of the internal canthus. Redness of the conjunctiva.
Redness of the conjunctiva early in the morning on waking, with
burning, smarting, and pressure. Inflammation and redness of the
conjunctiva, with shooting and pressure. Inflammation of the eyelid,
2tS!
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Sepia,
with hordeolum. Watering of the eyes, morning and evening.
Watering of the eyes in the open air. Swimming appearance of the
eyes, early in the morning, on waking, with smarting in the canthi.
Frequent pain in the eye, with headache, and heat in the eyes.
Pressure, heat, and scintillation in the eyes. Pressing pain in the
eye on turning to the right side. Pressure, heat, and scintillation in
the eyes like a thousand suns. Pressure over the eyes when walking
in a bright, clear light. Pressure on the under portion of the right
pupil. Painful pressure on the upper portions of both pupils ; more
frequently in the right. Pressure in the right eye, as if a grain of
sand had fallen in, aggravated by rubbing, and most apparent when
closing the eyes. A kind of itching and smarting of the internal
canthus of the left eye, with lachrymation, and slightly reddened con¬
junctiva. Tearing pressure in the orbits, especially of the left side.
Shooting in the left side. Cutting pain in. both eyes. Burning of
the eyes early in the evening, with weakness. Daylight blinds the
eyes, and causes headache. Lighted tapers cause a contractive sen¬
sation in the eyes when reading and writing. Scintillations before
the eyes when looking into bright daylight: a kind of zig-zag wreath
of colours is seen. White scintillations before the eyes. Sparks of
fire before the eyes, with great weakness of the body. A fiery zig¬
zag before the eyes, impeding sight. Many black spots before the
eyes. A green appearance around the lighted taper. The eyes are
hurt by writing and reading, and ache as if sore in the internal
canthi. By fatigue of the eyes a feeling of nausea and anxiety.
Vanishing of sight. Dimness of the sight when writing, so that
scarcely anything more can be clearly distinguished. One half of
objects may be clearly seen; the other half is obscure.
(e). Of the Ears.
Frequent ringing in the ears. Singing before the ear. Loud
sounding and humming in the ears. Deep sounding pulsative howl¬
ing in the ear when lying on it, for two nights. Humming before the
ear in the evening, while writing, with intervening whistling. Roar¬
ing in the ear ; after which, she hears nothing. Roaring, and pulse¬
like mewing in the right ear, at night. Crepitation before the ears,
as if from paper. Gurgling in the ear when rising from stooping.
Pain in the ears in the evening, as if compressed. Severe shooting
in the left ear and cheek. Single severe stitches in the interior of
the left ear. A pressing outwards in the ear in straining at stool.
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Creeping in the right ear. Aching in the left ear as if it were torn
out. Soreness in,the left ear. Pain as if ulcerated in the meatus.
- Very sensitive to noise. Sudden short deafness, as if from a plug.
(d). Of the Teeth and Gums.
Violent bleeding of the teeth early in the morning. Bleeding of
the gums almost without any cause. Painful swelling of the gums.
Great pain of the swollen gums around the carious teeth, with swollen
cheeks. Swelling and soreness of the gum, which separates from
the teeth, and bleeds on the slightest touch. Vesicles on the gums,
with a burning pain when touched. All the teeth become loose and
painful, and the gums bleed readily when spitting. Looseness of the
inferior incisors. Great dulness of the teeth. Toothache on biting,
and being pressed upon by the tongue. Nocturnal toothache, pre¬
venting her from sleeping ; and in the morning, when it ceased, she
was so irritated, that notwithstanding her great debility, she could not
sleep at all. ' Aching of all the teeth, especially of a posterior molar,
which aches as if it were too long, and driven up ; with swelling of
the gum and cheek when the pain ceased. Dull pain in all the roots
of the teeth; anything cold causes a thrill of pain through them.
Shooting toothache, that she could weep. Shooting in the tooth and
jaw, extending to the ear; no sleep could be obtained at night, and
in the day a ’kerchief was bound over it. Shooting in the gum.
Beating toothache, changing to shooting on the third day, the tooth
quickly becoming hollow. A shooting beating in various roots of the
teeth, with burning in the gum, occurring when entering a room after
walking in the cold; also after eating and biting, especially when
coming in contact with warm things, for eight days, when the tooth
begins to become black and hollow. Frequent waking at night from
beating in the posterior molars, over the cheeks to the occiput.
Painful heaviness in the upper teeth. A draught of air to the
teeth cannot be borne. Digging in the upper teeth. Rumbling in
the upper cutting teeth. Grumbling in the fore teeth.
(e). Of the. Heart.
Palpitation of the heart, a quarter of an hour long. Palpitation,
with shooting in the left side of the chest. Palpitation, with a feeling
of anxiety obliging a deep inspiration to be drawn, without any in¬
fluence upon the disposition, lasting several days. Intermitting pal¬
pitation of the heart, with greater anxiety, and trembling of the
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Sepia ,
fingers and legs. Palpitation in the epigastrium in the morning;
then ebullition in the chest, like palpitation, with burning face and
heat of the body, without any external heat and redness perceptible,
or thirst, but with perspiration. Intermittent action of the heart, with
anxiety. Intermittent action of the heart, mostly after eating.
(f). Of the Lungs.
Ebullition and congestion of the chest, as if hemoptysis would take
place. Feeling of weight in the chest, necessitating a deep inspiration.
Severe pressure in the chest in the evening, when in bed. Oppression
of the chest morning and evening. Great oppression of the chest in
the evening, causing great difficulty of breathing, which is most
aggravated by lying down: she was obliged to sit up in bed, when
she had scintillations before the eyes. Oppression and constriction of
the chest, with shooting on taking a deep inspiration. He awoke up
at night with oppression and great constriction : he was obliged for
an hour to breathe deeply and heavily, and still felt some constriction
on awaking in the morning. Dyspnoea in the night: he lay with his
head bent forward, felt constriction of the chest, was obliged for an
hour to breathe deeply, in order to inspire air, followed by cough with
adhesive expectoration. Loss of breath by the least movement, how¬
ever slight. Impeded breathing when standing still. A deep in¬
spiration cannot be taken, owing to constriction around the lower
portion of the chest. Great oppression of the breathing in the even¬
ing, with pressure in the epigastrium. Oppression of the breathing
in the evening from pain under the short ribs of the right side, pre¬
venting her from making the least motion. Shooting pain in the right
breast on expiring. Shooting in the left breast when coughing.
Violent shooting in the breast on each inspiration, hut little air could
be inhaled: this affected his head.
(g). Of the Male Genital Organs.
Heat in the testicle. Burning in the penis during an embrace.
Stitches in the penis. Cutting in the testicle. Powerful and rather
painful erection after the siesta, while sitting. Violent and obstinate
nocturnal erections. Desire for an embrace, with quick emission of
semen, with slight pleasurable sensation; afterwards tension in the
hypogastrium extending to the spermatic oord. Anxious and uneasy
the whole day after an embrace. Erection after an embrace, followed
by weakness of thought, vertigo, despondency, lassitude, and fearful-
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ness. Nocturnal emission of semen, with a lascivious dream. Fre¬
quently on the point of having an emission, which is each time sup¬
pressed by awaking. Pollutions feeble and watery. Burning in the
anterior portion of the urethra after pollutions. Inactive after pol¬
lutions, languid, is sensitive to damp air, with turbid urine, vertigo,
and constipation.
(A). Of the Female Sexual Organs.
Discharge of blood from the vagina after an embrace. Discharge
of blood from the vagina only in walking. Discharge of some drops
of blood from the vagina fifteen days before the menstrual period.
Menses too early (from two, seven, eight, and fourteen days). Menses,
previously very regular, appear seven days too early. Re-appearance
of the menses in an elderly person, after they had been suppressed
for several months. Re-appearance of the menses in an old person
in forty-eight days, after a suppression of two months, with drawing
from the teeth to the cheek, which was rather swollen. Violent
cholic preceding the menses, with faintness. A few days before the
menses, a pressure in the abdomen : after this has subsided, a sore¬
ness in the perineum, and swelling of the pudendum previous to the
appearance of blood. Two days before the appearance of the menses
a shuddering all over the body the whole day. Before the menses, a
sensation as if the pudendum were enlarged. Before the menses, a
burning in the pudendum. Before the menses, acrid leucorrhoea,
with soreness of the pudendum. During the menses, toothache, and
throbbing in the gums. During the menses, a tearing in the tibia.
During the whole of the menstrual period she could not obtain any
sleep from tearing in the back, shivering, and heat, with thirst, and
painful contraction in the breast. During the menstrual period she
was obliged to lie in bed two days from uneasiness in the body, a
drawing pain in the legs and abdomen, with rumbling; palpitation of
the heart for several hours the second day in the forenoon, with
dyspnoea. During the menses she has a darkness and mistiness
before the eyes in the evening, with great weakness, passing off in
the evening. Very melancholy during the menses, especially early
in the morning. A pressure downwards in the vagina, as if every¬
thing would be forced out, with lancinating pains in the abdomen,
causing oppressed breathing. In order to prevent the prolapse of the
vagina, she was forced to cross the thighs ; still nothing passed but
a gelatinous discharge.
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Sepia,
The large proportion of venous blood in the system is the
proximate cause of the • above-mentioned congestive conditions.
Various obstructions in different important organs, result from a
retarded and impeded circulation in the vena porta. The
indications of passive congestions, even if unrecognized by
modern pathologists, may be here assigned their proper place.
Notwithstanding the congestion of blood, and turgescence of
the vascular system, there is no increased vital action; no turgor
vitalis; no excitement terminating in inflammation. This pas¬
sive character, or hypereemia, of the venous portion of the
capillary system, clearly resembles the congestive states induced
by Sepia. Although in these congestive conditions various
symptoms arise, as shivering, chilliness, icy coldness of the ex¬
tremities, slow pulse, as must be the case in every species of
congestion, with varying heat, redness, &c., yet these symptoms
are not present in a high degree, and are mostly of short duration,
soon disappearing. In comparing the congestive conditions
induced by Aconite, with those already mentioned, the difference
will at once be apparent. In the first, there is a well defined
character of increased energy; in the last, one of depression :
in the former, an increased functional activity; in the latter, a
depressed action. • The congested condition of the head is in¬
dicated especially by dull pressure, heaviness, tension, and a
pressing outwards (as if about to have a cold in the head), the
senorium is consequently affected, there is confusion in the head,
want of thought, aversion to employment. The attacks of ver¬
tigo occur after moving, when walking, shortly after a meal, or
when awaking out of sleep: a very characteristic indication of
venous hyperaemia. A tendency to epistaxis is not wanting.
The congestion of the eyes, which most frequently gives rise to
pressing and itching pains, operates very prejudicially on the
faculty of vision, causing various abnormal conditions of a more
chronic nature. Scintillations, sparks of fire, black spots, a
greenish circle around a lighted taper, weakness of the eyes,
nausea, or trying the eyes, dimness, hemiopia, are, without any
additional symptom, suggestive of the precursors of amaurosis,
which, as is well known, frequently originates in abdominal
obstructions. Twice have I succeeded in removing alterations
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of the faculty of vision dependent on the above-named causes,
in a very short time, by the use of Sepia alone. The humming,
roaring, ringing, and pressing outwards in the ears, are in a like
manner caused by hypersemia of the brain.
The symptoms of the teeth, which have already been noticed,
likewise hear the impression of the venous congestion. The
gums bleed readily; swelling of the gums; aggravation of the
pains by warmth, and at night; groaning and grumbling of the
teeth. As a plethoric state of the liver and vena porta often
arises from hypertrophy, and enlargement of the right auriculo-
ventricular cavities, so does the reverse condition also occur.
All the symptoms induced by Sepia in the heart, resemble
those attendant upon the usual organic diseases of that organ.
Violent palpitation in the evening; sometimes with stitches and
anxiety, rendering a deep inspiration necessary (characteristic of
congestion); convulsive action of the heart; intermitting action,
especially after eating, are signs of the heart being distended
with venous blood, by which the right side becomes hyper-
trophical and enlarged.
The congestion of the lungs gives likewise as clear an in¬
dication of the venous hypersemia. A feeling of weight, oppres¬
sion of breathing, and want of breath, are mostly complained of,
and which, by long continuance, or frequent recurrence, will
occasion emphysema, so often incurable. The symptoms, in
fact, point to this condition :—The dyspnoea increased by lying
down; the painful effects attending inspiration are suggestive of
those difficulties with which those suffering from emphysema
have to contend. These symptoms—“nocturnal attack of
dyspnoea : he lay with his head bent forward, felt constriction of
the chest, was obliged for an hour to breathe deeply, in order to
inspire air, followed by cough with adhesive expectoration”—
depict in a few, but suitable words, a nocturnal attach of asthma.*
Finally, the congestive state of the genitals in both sexes is
clearly indicative of the same fact. It is not by any means sur¬
prising that these irritable organs, abundantly supplied by blood,
* Sepia is especially indicated in these cases of asthma occasioned by
venous congestion. In pure spasmodic, or nervous asthma, I have never seen
it useful.
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Sepia,
should suffer from the general venous state of the blood. In
man, Sepia, in the first place, excites sensations of heat, burn¬
ing, shooting, and cutting in the testicles and penis. The
erections are indeed powerful; but the act of coition is quickly
terminated, and without great pleasurable sensation. Hence,
after coition, various disorders ensue; such as weakness of
thought, vertigo, lassitude, uneasiness, anxiety, dejection of
spirits, fearfulness. The pollutions are imperfect and watery.
Notwithstanding the apparent state of excitement, the depression
which characterises Sepia is predominant. In women, the
menses recur too early, in consequence of hyperemia of the
uterus. Even in those persons who have entered the climacteric
age, Sepia is capable of inducing a single recurrence of the men¬
strual period. This anomaly occasions various disorders before
and during the period, all of which are of a congestive nature;
such as abdominal pain, toothache, drawing in the limbs, un¬
easiness, palpitation of the heart, sleeplessness, fainting. The
state of hypereemia of the uterus frequently attains such a
degree, that a prolapse of the organ is dreaded, as clearly indi¬
cated in one of the symptoms.
2.—Disorders of Digestive Organs.
White tongue. Coated tongue. Tongue covered with mucus,
hours after eating (one, two). Foul tasted mucus on the tongue.
Foetid smell from the mouth. A sweet taste in the mouth like sugar.
A sour taste in the mouth, with constipation. Sour taste in the mouth
on waking early in the morning. A disgusting bitter taste in the
mouth early in the morning. A bitter taste in the mouth only when
hawking. A strong bitter taste in the mouth when eating. A nasty
taste early in the morning, and the mouth dry and shiny. A foulish
taste after drinking beer. No appetite; everything was without
taste. Little appetite, but great thirst. Little appetite, but yet can
taste the food. Diminished appetite; everything tastes too salt.
Feeling of satiety, with disgust and lassitude. Tolerable appetite,
but not at all for meat, which was entirely refused for many days.
Eructations of food, as if surfeited. Very frequent eructations.
Eructations in the evening, continuing some time, and violent, pre¬
ceded by great abdominal distension. Eructations of air alone, after
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eating. A deal of eructation after eating and drinking. Eructation
with retching. Bitter eructation after breakfast. Bitter eructation
early in the morning, with bitter taste in the mouth and throat: food
has its proper taste, and removes the bitterness. Some eructations
after supper. Eructations like rotten eggs. During the eructations
early in the morning, there was a pinching in the stomach as if some¬
thing would tear away. During the eructation, shooting in the epi¬
gastrium, in the left side, and between the shoulder blades. Burning
in the stomach after the eructation. Burning in the stomach, and
scrobicuhis cordis. Burning from the stomach upwards. Heartburn
in the fore and afternoon for several hours, from the epigastrium to
the throat, with a soreness and roughness. Hiccough for a quarter
of an hour after eating. Hiccough when smoking tobacco as usual,
with contraction in the oesophagus, with the sensation as if it contained
a piece of wool, which excited nausea, followed by a flow of water to
the mouth. The mouth filled with a quantity of water in the night,
as in pyrosis, and which ceased on eating. Fulness of the stomach
at noon. Aversion to all food, especially meat. Nausea early in the
morning, fasting, for several days. Nausea early on awaking, towards
evening and night. Nausea early in the evening, as if turned round
in his inside. Nausea and weakness. Nausea, followed immediately
by drawing in all his limbs. Nausea, with bitterness in the throat,
without vomiting. Nausea the whole day, likewise after eating, with
a discharge of watery saliva, a constant sour bitter taste in the mouth,
without appetite, yet without a depraved taste of food. Retching on
rinsing the mouth in the morning. Spasmodic pain in the stomach
and abdomen. Contraction in the gastric region. Pressure in the
stomach for three nights together. Pressure in the stomach, as if
sore. Pressure in the stomach in the evening, followed by headache.
Pressure in the stomach like a stone. A hard pressure like a stone
while fasting; more severe after eating bread. A tearing pressure
around the epigastrium. A drawing pain in the stomach, extending
to the back, after eating, with great lassitude and debility. Pressure
and sensibility in the stomach. The slightest pressure in the gastric
region causes great pain. Two attacks of one hour of contractions
in the hypochondriac regions, with nausea daily, with shootings to the
back, accompanied with shootings in the breast, and yawning, with
vomiting of bile and food. Shooting pain in the stomach, and in the
distended abdomen, in the afternoon. Stitches in the epigastrium.
Intermitting action of the heart after dinner. Febrile flushes imme-
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Sepia,
diately after eating. Digestion excites heat, and palpitation of the
heart. Profuse and general perspiration, with feeling of heat after
dinner. Confusion of the head after eating. Dry cough after eating.
Dull tearing in the forehead immediately after eating. Immediately
after eating at noon and evening, a tearing in the whole of the thigh,
especially in the knees. Immediately after eating a soreness in the
throat, and in the inside of the cervical column. A very distended
abdomen after dinner. A frequent distension of the abdomen, with
hardness, attended with butting in the intestines. A hard and dis¬
tended abdomen, especially in the evening; the vessels of the ab¬
dominal coverings are likewise distended, with shooting pain in the
abdomen. Distended abdomen, with diarrhoea and griping. Pain in
the abdomen in the afternoon, as if the intestines would be torn out.
Belly-ache early in bed. Pressure in the abdomen removed by going
to stool. Pressure in the abdomen for several days, increased after
eating, with confusion of the head, with relaxation of the scalp.
Violent pressure on the left side below the ribs, disappearing on lying -
down. Shooting and intermitting pinching in the bowels, occurring
in attacks of ten minutes duration. Griping pains, with frequent
nausea. Griping in the abdomen at night, with strangury. Griping
in the abdomen almost every morning, for an hour, with nausea,
squeamishness, and salivation. Constant tenesmus, with but slight
evacuations. Evacuation not at all hard, though passed with great
effort. Great weakness in the abdomen, with entire loss of appetite
after two hard stools. Gripings before a natural stool. Nausea
before each fluid stool. Headache after a papescent stool. Stomach¬
ache after a thin stool. A soreness in the*belly, with a foetid, sour
stool. Soft papescent stool, with a very offensive sour smell, suddenly
and at once expelled. Stool of a whitish colour. Many mucus
stools with gripings. Diarrhoea. Diarrhoea after taking milk.
Exhausting diarrhoea the first few days. Slimy diarrhoea, with dis¬
tended abdomen. A stiffness and hardness in the back after a stool;
a feeling as if strained in the scrobiculus cordis, with oppression of
breathing. Expulsion of ascarides. Abundant serous urine. Pale
yellow urine, without deposit. Offensive urine , with an abundant
white sediment. Urine becoming turbid on standing, offensive smell¬
ing, with white sediment. Urine often becoming thick and turbid
directly after voiding, as if mixed with mucus. Turbid chalky urine
with a reddish deposit on the urinal. Turbid urine, with a red sandy
sediment.
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This gastrio affection is attended with much flatulent disorder,
as it will appear from the following symptoms :—
Pressure in the scrobiculus cordis, passing off with a motion like
fermentation, downwards. Rumbling in the stomach. After eating,
a pressure, as if from flatulence, on the right side, deep in the hypo-
gastrium, and subsequently in the side, only perceptible on moving
the part, and bending forwards. Abdominal distension after dinner
diminished by eructations, lasting until evening, when it subsided,
without any discharge of flatulency. At first, great abdominal dis¬
tension, then great rumbling and motion in the abdomen. Frequent
attacks of a contractive pain in the right side of the abdomen ; worse
in the morning, followed by a bad constrictive pain in the stomach,
which then passed into the chest; removed by eructations. Great
pressure and tension in the hypogastrium, at times alleviated by in¬
ternal fermentation ; at the same time, pressure and shooting in the
umbilical region. A stitch round the lowest rib of the right side ex¬
tends to the scrobiculus cordis, lasting for a minute, passing off with
empty eructation. A tensive, shooting pain around the hypochondria,
preventing any motion ; worse in walking. Violent squeezing in the
region of the liver, lessened by eructation, and discharge of flatulency.
Violent gripings, extending to the chest, with revolving flatus, which
can find no outlet. Violent cutting across the body, as if from flatu¬
lency, passing off on moving, with cutting at the same time in the
left testicle. Daily pinching in the abdomen, without diarrhoea, at
the same time as flatus arose, alleviated by eructation. Digging and
contraction in the abdomen, with discharge of much flatus. Rumbling
in the abdomen. Rumbling and movement of flatus in abdomen, as
in diarrhoea. Collection of flatus in abdomen on going out in the
open air. Abdominal distension when walking, with discharge of
flatus. Before stool, a commencement of flatulent cholic, with sigh¬
ing and groaning. After an unusual evacuation in the forenoon, the
feeces light coloured, in thin streaks, looking almost like groats.
There was a severe drawing pain in the right side, directly over the
hips, extending to the ribs, and upwards more to the forehead, passing
off with discharge of flatus.
{To be continued.)
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REVIEWS.
I?Art Medical, Journal de Midecine Generate el de Midecine Pratique.
J. Chararay, 53, Rue de Seine Saint-Germain. Paris, 1855.
The Medical Art: a Journal of General and Practical Medicine.
Hitherto, it was to us a subject of regret and disappointment, that
the periodicals which have appeared in France, however excellent in
themselves, and useful in introducing homoeopathy to the notice of
the public, were nevertheless deficient in originality, and not cal¬
culated to advance the cause of homoeopathy, in the degree that might
be expected from a country generally in the foremost rank in the
advance of science. We have now much pleasure in introducing to
our readers a journal which promises to place homoeopathy in the
position which it ought to hold in medical literature. Among the
editors of this journal, at the head of whom is M. Tessier, we find
the names of men to whose high character and ability favourable
testimony is borne by the leading medical journals of the day. Most
of these, while they express dissent from its doctrines, make honour¬
able mention of it, and seem to look upon its appearance as an event
of no small importance : one which shows that homoeopathy has suc¬
ceeded in its struggle against ignorance and calumny, and has taken
its place in the field of science. Even those who affect to treat the
subject with disdain, betray by their anxiety the fear which they
would gladly persuade themselves is groundless.
The journal before us is not exclusively devoted to homoeopathy ;
but while giving the homoeopathic doctrine its proper place in thera¬
peutics, it treats also of the various subjects relating to the medical
art. Thus we find articles on the Scientific Constitution of Surgery ;
on Pathological Anatomy ; on Etiology; on Semeiology ; on Che¬
mistry ; and other subjects. Some of these we hope soon to present
to our readers.
The articles which M. Tessier has contributed as yet, are to us of
little interest, being in great part devoted to the discussion of the
peculiar views which he holds concerning the reform that is demanded
in medical instruction. These he has already brought before the
notice of the public in some letters published in the Univers.
Rejecting as unsound “ the materialism of the school of Paris, the
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655
Pantheism of Germany, the Vitalism of the school of Montpellier, and
Hippocratic Manicheism,” he declares that a firm foundation for
medical science is to be found only in its union with Christianity;
that this Christianity is in fact Romanism appears very plainly, when
he further remarks, “ What, shall the church decide on the most im¬
portant question, and shall we reject as physicians what is true for us
as men ?” And again he says—“ The Catholic church has not only
defined the moral law; it has also defined all that is indispensable for
man to know concerning himself, concerning his nature.” In his
view, therefore, a direct opposition exists between rationalism, “ which
submits divine truths to human reason,” and Christianity, “ which
submits opinions purely human to divine truths, interpreted by the
infallible authority of the head of the church.” We, however, have
learned to disbelieve in infallibility altogether ; and for us, therefore,
the controversy on this subject was virtually set at rest three centuries
ago. Nor can we agree in M. Tessier’s view that the materialist ten¬
dency of the present day forms an obstacle to the progress of homoeo¬
pathy, which he considers necessarily united with spiritualism. In
this country, at least, this union and this opposition do not exist; and
yet homoeopathy is probably not received with more favour here than
in France.
Respecting the general tone of this new journal, we are happy to
find, that while the homoeopathic principle is adopted and defended
in an uncompromising manner, there is no tendency to sectarianism
in medicine. On the contrary, far from showing any desire of en¬
couraging any party spirit, or favouring any peculiar views, this
journal exhibits the greatest liberality of sentiment; and while giving
due importance to the remarks of Hahnemann, of whose writings a
portion has been translated in each of the numbers before us, like
him, it does not disdain to seek for truth in the writings of former
days, professing the principle which no one will disavow, “ salus
segrotantis suprema lex esto.” It would.be well if it met with similar
liberality ; but as usual, “ the faculty” seem determined to show that
they will do nothing to encourage the advance of knowledge or
enquiry ; nor even, so far as is in their power, allow others to do so.
The Art Medical was rejected in an insulting manner at the Imperial
Academy of Medicine: thus a supposed error on one point, renders
a book, however otherwise excellent, unworthy of the immaculate
purity of the Academy. We would strongly recommend to thfe
Academy the publication of an index expurgatorius. It would be
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Reviews.
interesting to know what books would escape their censure, if all are
to be treated with equal rigour.
Notwithstanding the disapprobation of this dignified Academy, we
augur most favourably for the advance of medical knowledge from
the appearance of this journal, which we strongly recommend to the
notice of our readers. It appears in monthly parts, each containing
80 pages. The terms of subscription are 20 francs per annum for
this country.
Address by W. E. Payne, M.D., and Poem by Henry C. Preston,
M.D. Delivered before the Massachusetts Homoeopathic Medical
Society, on the Centennial Birthday of Samuel Hahnemann,
April 10, 1855. Boston, Otis Clapp.
We have just received this Address and this Poem. In the
Address occurs the following passage, which claims for Hahnemann
not only the first instance of homoeopathic treatment, but also the
origination of the moral treatment of the insane.
“ Almost the first of Hahnemann’s practice after his discovery (of
the homoeopathic law), was at the Insane Asylum at Georgenthal,
founded by Duke Ernest of Gotha. The recovery, in this asylum,
and under his treatment, of Klockenbring, privy secretary of the
chancery—a man of extensive scientific and literary attainments, who
had been for a long time a raving maniac, and who had been un¬
successfully treated, for a period of six months, by the most cele¬
brated physicians of the age, gave to Hahnemann and his treatment
great notoriety. In this asylum originated with Hahnemann the
present moral treatment of the insane ; the superiority of which over
the old mode of chains and corporeal punishments was so evident,
that Pinel was induced to adopt it with the maniacs under his care in
the hospitals of Paris.”
If it was through Hahnemann’s instrumentality that the moral
treatment of the insane was introduced, it is the greenest and most
charming leaf in his immortal chaplet of renown. We doubt how¬
ever if Pinel and others did derive the practice from our founder.
The author shows the absence of any law in the heterogeneous
practice of the allopaths, and the possession of a definite law, of
general applicability, in the more homogeneous practice of the ho-
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657
mceopathists. He says—“ We learn from a recent letter from France,
that, by order of the Emperor, a homoeopathic physician was sent to
a district in the south of France, to attend upon the poor villagers,
who were rapidly dying off with sweating sickness and cholera.
The mortality under his treatment is reported at 7 per cent.; while
the mortality under the old treatment ran-up to the fearful amount of
90 per cent.”
One of our contributors, several years ago, called our attention to
the analogy between the Asiatic cholera of this century, and the
“ sweating sickness ” of a past age.
Dr. Payne’s address is a very good summary of what can be said
for homoeopathy, in a brief popular address. We do not like the
word homceopathta , instead of homoeopathy, which itself is too
ancient, in any of its forms, for modern use; but as it has been in¬
troduced, and become universally used, we must abide by it. Nor
do we like such expressions as the “ sun of the new dispensation
it smacks of irreverence, which we are sure Dr. Payne is guiltless
of; nor do we know what he means by it.
We come now to Dr. Preston’s poem. The importance of his
theme has induced him to use the six foot verse, instead of the usual
English heroic verse. We do not find that he has caught the rap¬
ture of Pindar, nor the harmony of Dryden.
“ A hundred years ago this very day, was bom
The gifted mind that came to bless a race forlorn;
That first to Nature’s broad foundation went,
And grasped it’s one great healing-law omnipotent.”
This is a sad specimen of a so-called poem. What and where is
Nature’s broad foundation ? And where, in Hahnemann’s writings,
does Dr. Preston find that he calls the law of healing by drugs the
only possible law of healing ? and where does he call it omnipotent ?
Our founder speaks of his law as the only one for healing by drugs.
We quote one other passage, which will, we think, be quantum
sujficit for our readers.
“ What he foresaw on Fact’s materialistic shore,
We hasten now to gain through Psyche’s open door;
And mounting up her cloud-capped hill ^ethereal,
We breathe the pneuma of the visionary Stahl.
There soul alone combats death’s devastating damps,
And yields or conquers by its atony or cramps.
Soon e’en the soul is lost in excitation ,
And the pneuma is cpndensed to irritation :
VOL, XIII., NO. LIV.—OCTOBER, 1855. 2 U
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Miscellaneous.
Then into view spring np those wondrous things, the nerves,
Which, like the forked lightnings, make fantastic curves.
Mapping all nature with their streams of varied course,
Bearing the vital spirits to their central source.
In the dim distance seen, two rival domes arise,
And lift their towering heads in grandeur to the skies !
The one—great Cullen’s classic storehouse, wide and free,
The other—Brown’s convivial fare of stimuli :
Where with sthenic whisky he asthenia plied.
And the vis medicatrix natures denied.”
Ye gods and goddesses, and little fish! Surely this must have
come from the inspiration of spirit-rapping. We are sorry we cannot
be complimentary to this unfortunate muse.
MISCELLANEOUS.
Report of the Proceedings of the Congress of Homoeopathic
Practitioners.
The Congress for 1855 was held on the 4th of July last, at
82, Sackville Street, London.
The following gentlemen were present: — Drs. Bell, Drury,
Dudgeon, Epps, Gwillim, Hamilton, Hartmann, Henriques, Kidd,
W. Laurie, Leadam, Madden, Petrosky, Pope, Quin, Rogers, Roth,
Russell, Siiss-Hahnemann, Tuckey, Wielobycki, Wilkinson, Wyld ;
and Messrs. Allshorn, Engall, Epps, Frith, Gillow, Hering, Hinxman,
Mackern, de Michele, Morgan, Pearce, Reynolds.
Dr. Quin, who had officiated as chairman at the last Congress,
stated, that as was usual, he, along with the secretary of the previous
year, would now vacate their offices, on the appointment by the Con¬
gress of another chairman, and another secretary.
Dr. Madden and Dr. Wyld were respectively elected by the meet¬
ing to hold the offices vacated by the retirement of Drs. Quin and
Russell.
Dr. Madden, on taking the chair, said, that the first business of
the Congress would be to determine whether they should have two
days of meeting, or only one; and to make arrangements for a dinner
or a supper, according as they adopted one or other of these plans.
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Dr. Hartmann moved, and Dr. Bell seconded the motion, that
there should be but one day of meeting.
This motion was carried unanimously; and Dr. Roth and Mr. Mackem
were appointed a committee to make arrangements for the supper.
The Chairman then said, the next point to be determined was the
place and time of meeting of next Congress.
Dr. Wyld proposed that the next Congress should be held next
July, in London.
Dr. Russell proposed, as an amendment, that it would be.a better
plan to empower their secretary to ascertain the feelings of the
country practitioners relative to the place of meeting of next Congress.
This motion was seconded by Dr. Kidd.
The amendment being put to the vote, was lost. The original
motion, that the Congress should be held next year in London, was
carried by a majority.
It was also resolved that the meeting should take place m the first
week of July.
Dr. Wilkinson then delivered the annual address (vide p. 529).
He was followed by Mr. Gillow, who read a paper on the proper
objects of Congresses.
Dr. Kidd then read a paper on Bright’s Disease of the Kidney,
(vide p. 560).
Dr. Hartmann observed, that he had found argentum metallicum
of much use in allaying the obstinate vomiting occurring in Bright’s
Disease.
Dr. Henriques stated that argentum had also been found of great
service in subduing the vomiting incident to the yellow fever of the
West Indies. He would like to know if Dr. Kidd had had any ex¬
perience of the treatment of diabetes.
Mr. Gillow said that cases of Bright’s Disease sometimes got
rapidly well; and that shortly after their apparent cure, the patient
would die suddenly. He mentioned the case of a very distinguished
inhabitant of Bath, who was treated for this disease, and rapidly
cured by two homoeopathic practitioners. He went off to Paris,
caught cold during the journey, and died in a very few days. He
would like to know from Dr. Kidd if he could suggest any probable
explanation of such sudden deaths.
Dr. Kidd thought, that in such cases the patients died in con¬
sequence of no vent being provided for carrying off the secretion
which had been suppressed. It was necessary, in order to effect a
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Miscellaneous.
permanent and safe cure, to induce a very powerful action of the skin
and lungs, by vapour baths, and exercise, otherwise the patient would
run considerable risk. He had not had any success in the treatment
of diabetes mellitus: he believed that was a disease depending on
some morbid action in a certain part of the brain and until we dis¬
covered some remedy that acted specifically on the corpora quadri-
gemina, he did not think we should cure diabetes. If we could find
a remedy capable of carrying the fermentation a step beyond the
saccharine state, we might cure the disease.
Dr. Tuckey read a paper on a case of tumour of the face, which
had been condemned as incurable by the allopaths, but which he had
cured completely by means of arsenicum and a ligature.
Dr. Kidd mentioned the case of a woman affected with cauliflower
excrescence of the womb, under the care of Mr. Joce, of Barnstaple,
who was long treated by him and Dr. Black with internal remedies,
without effect. She was persuaded to go again under allopathic
treatment: she, however, derived no good from the change. She
had one night a curious dream, which induced her to recal Mr. Joce.
This time he applied arsen. to the tumour, which soon cured it. He
thought that in Mr. Tuckey’s case it was the ligature, and not the
arsenicum that cured the disease.
Dr. Epps, reverting to the subject of Dr. Kidd’s paper, stated, that
in cases of albuminuria, cantharis generally effected a cure ; but when
it failed, tinctura acris succeeded. He thought that the higher
dilutions acted better than the lower; and he wished to know the
reason why Dr. Kidd gave drop doses of pure turpentine in the cases
he had detailed. He himself had seen excellent effects from the
30th dilution of terebinthina.
Dr. Kidd replied, that he had previously tried the higher dilutions
without any result j and believing terebinthina to be the remedy in¬
dicated, he gave it in the pure form, with perfect success. He con¬
sidered that larger doses were necessary where there was any organic
obstruction to be overcome. He considered Hahnemann to have
been the greatest medical philosopher of any age, and the dis¬
coverer of' a truth of the greatest importance to humanity; but he
could not accept the statements, even of such a great man, without
examination. Now he had observed while he was house surgeon in
the Hanover Square Homoeopathic Hospital, that the practice of
Dr. Curie, who was in the habit of prescribing high dilutions at long
intervals, was six times less successful than that of Dr. Epps’ brother,
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661
Mr. G. N. Epps, who gave lower dilutions, more frequently repeated.
The test of the value of any practice was the number of cases cured;
and it was entirely owing to the greater results obtained from using
stronger doses, that he had been led to adopt them in his practice as
a rule.
Dr. Epps believed his experience was more extensive than
Dr. Kidd’s. Now he had often found the most desperate cases
recover on the administration of a higher dilution, when the lower ones
proved quite unavailing. He thought we should not put ourselves
above Hahnemann; and Hahnemann had, in his Materia Medica,
distinctly stated the most appropriate doses of each remedy; and
those doses he (Dr. Epps) considered were the best.
After a little further discussion on this point between Dr. Kidd
and Dr. Epps, the subject dropped; and
Mr. Morgan read a paper on Neuralgia (vide p. 574), which ter¬
minated the proceedings of the Congress.
A number of the members of Congress afterwards supped together
at Hatchett’s hotel.
Observations on the Deform of the Central Homoeopathic
Association. By Dr. Thinks, of Dresden.
Abridged from the “ Zeitschrift fur Homoeop. Klinik,” of July 1st, 1855.
When, in the year 1830, the Central Association of Homoeopathic
Physicians was founded, a keenly felt, and often expressed neces¬
sity for a closer connection, and a combined effort of all such
associates, received its fulfilment. The resolution of the meeting,
held at that time, that there should be such an annual con¬
gress required the appointment of a director, secretary, and other
officials; and the Central Association was formed on a plan quite
suitable to those times.
But the times and our relations have greatly changed in the course
of these years. The internal and external development of homoeo¬
pathy as a science and art, has made rapid progress: the position it
holds in public estimation is much more favourable; while its aspect
towards allopathy is of a more sharply hostile character than it was
then. The allopathic school, from the extensive diffusion of numerous
exoteric denominations, has got into the position of an ecclesia pressa,
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Miscellaneous.
which must be prepared every moment to defend itself against attacks;
so that it only occupies its present place by tolerance, on account of
its services, and the favour of the public.
On the other side, we must admit, that among the adherents
of homoeopathy, certain tendencies have gradually developed them¬
selves, which, if allowed to extend, would not only hinder the progress
of the science, but vitally imperil its very existence. When we
closely examine what these dangers are, we shall see how much may
he done to arrest them by a reformed Central Association.
Hitherto, all that the Central Association did, was to hold a meet¬
ing of its members, and of other friends and adherents, at the place
determined by the majority of votes. The president of the meeting felt
himself called upon to give a concise review of the external history
of homoeopathy ; of its development in a scientific and practical point
of view; of its literary efforts; and also to conduct the general
business of the meeting. A resumt of the whole proceedings was
prepared, and published in the journals. After the dispersion of this
annual assembly, the members were scattered like sheep in a wilder¬
ness, where they continued to live in absolute anarchy, exactly as
those who were not members, till the recurrence of the period when
the yearly meeting took place, or, as has frequently happened since
1848, could not take place.
If we carefully observe what is required for the scientific and
practical development of homoeopathy in regard to its recognition by
the state, so that it shall be properly represented in educational in¬
stitutions and medical literature, we come to the conclusion that the
loose constitution of the Central Association does not suffice to give
expression to our present interests; but a re-construction is required,
by which these objects may be pursued with greater energy and
continuance.
It was, therefore, with great pleasure that those who assembled on
the 11th of April, at Meissen, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of
the birthday of Hahnemann, were informed of a resolution of the
Vienna Homoeopathic Association, communicated to them by the re¬
presentative of that body, Dr. Streinz, to the following effect:—
“ The Vienna Association of Homoeopathic Physicians had resolved,
along with the petition for a permission to hold their assembly there
on the 10th of August, to combine a request for the establishment of
a Central Association, which should be recognized by the state as a
corporate body, with all the privileges of such.” If the Austrian
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663
government, which was the first to favour the development of homoeo¬
pathy, comply with the request, not only would the Austrian homoeo¬
pathic physicians acquire a firmer position, but the adherents of the
Bystem through all Germany would thereby obtain a recognized
judicial position; and thus a general Central Association would arise
of the greatest importance for the internal and external development
of homoeopathy as a scienoe and art; for at present, wandering about
from land to land, without a permanent seat, it is merely an ephemeral
appearance, without any power of enforcing its resolutions. At the
same time, we must acknowledge, that in this association lay the
germs of a larger development; and that it was of the greatest ad¬
vantage, by enabling distant homoeopathic physicians to become
acquainted.
A continued established action on the part of government, would
have many salutary results for the common weal. It is not to be ex¬
pected that governments—at best, little inclined to do anything
for medicine—shall pour their favours upon a medical novelty
which has only existed for fifty years, and is opposed by so much in¬
fluence, we do not expect that they will make over professorial chairs
and hospitals to us. All that we have a right to look for is, that we
shall not be hindered in our future development. Governments may
then require that we shall establish, by statistical documents, our
superiority over other systems; and we have no doubt, that if this
opportunity were given, we should be in a position to attain all we
want in the shortest way.
In the next place, the Central Association would direct its attention
to the state of the enemy’s camp. It exhibits to us the spectacle of
spontaneous dissolution, by the secession of the most intelligent, and
best informed, who perceive scepticism to be an important part of the
medical character, but that it does nothing. It yields no healing
medicines; it cures no sick; and its triumph would be the total
prostitution of our art. They perceive, moreover, that the only pos¬
sible science of medicine must consist in an accurate and extensive
knowledge of the powers of remedial agents ; and they will at length
arrive at the way which Hahnemann pursued for the attainment of
this essential object; and it will be less difficult for them to do so on'
account of the numerous thefts which the old school are not ashamed
to make from homoeopathy, and to bring into currency as the result
of their own observation and experience.
The question is, how are we to get useful results from such an
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association ? The refutation of attacks—of course only those made
in a scientific spirit—should be one of its objects. But the most im¬
portant ought to be, the elevation and development of homoeopathy
itself. All homoeopathic physicians who consider the truth as being
something higher than a cloud out of which dreamers and mystics
may proclaim their own wonderful cures, will readily admit that there
is yet many a hiatus in our materia medica which will never be filled
by any effort of speculation: they all know too well that there are
many cases of disease for which we have as yet no specific remedy.
Idle expectation will do nothing : the future will not fill up these gaps
in our knowledge and efficiency ; but the only way in which this can
be done, is by determined use of, and labour in the discovery made
by Hahnemann, which he worked with such astonishing results, as
long as his bodily and mental vigour permitted.
It is the duly of every homoeopathic physician to strive to advance
the internal development of our system by adding to the number of
our medicines; for only by so doing, can we with confidence en¬
counter our opponent, allopathy, in the struggle. If we now ask the
question, whether this duty has been discharged, we are compelled to
acknowledge with shame, that only a very small number, in com¬
parison with our number—a mere nothing—have complied with the
urgent requisitions of Hahnemann; that this “ augmentum scientise ”
must be admitted to be very insignificant since the death of our
master; and that in this, as in many other respects, a more lively
and energetic activity requires not only to be stimulated, but ex¬
pressly developed. If all the homoeopathic physicians in Germany
would unite for the attainment of this great object, we might have
every year some really important addition ; especially if the necessary
funds were supplied.
Provings of medicines could be best made in university towns.
Hahnemann would not have done so much, and so perfectly, had he
not been assisted by the small circle of his pupils in Leipsic, and
Jorg’s proving society afforded results so astonishing to himself, and
in such direct opposition to the dogmas of his school, that he did not
dare to prosecute them.
This important object—the proving of medicines—should not be
left to individual effort, but should be striven after with earnestness
and zeal, in every possible way; for they are, and must ever be, the life-
fountain of our art, from which alone it can derive ever fresh vital vigour.
In this, such an association can do-much : for individuals, it is only
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possible to furnish fragments, 'which require completion before they
can be turned to practical use. For the last ten years little has been
done to proceed with the continuation of the provings of Hahnemann,
which appeared in the early numbers of the Archives, from a notion
that we now had a sufficient stock of medicines; but this is a great
mistake; and it is a matter of surprise and regret that Hirschel’s
attempt to found a proving society should have come to nothing.
It might, indeed, have been expected that in other countries a de¬
termined effort should have been made to prove the medicines upon
persons in health ; but it is only in England that the homoeopathic
physicians have in this, as in so many other respects, contributed to
the advancement of our science ; while from our colleagues on the
other side of the Rhine, we have got nothing but empty froth. Nor
can we say much of the provings made by Hering, ushered into the
world with such imposing pomp. And yet here, surely, there is
work for all of us. In the first place, all the provings in Hahnemann’s
Chronic Diseases, must be made over again, without any exception, for
there is not one of them which was proved throughout upon persons
in health ; but most of their effects were observed by Hahnemann as
so called Nebenwirkungen (accessory symptoms), upon patients who
had taken the medicines. Hence the great uncertainty and untrust¬
worthiness of their effects on disease: hence the great difficulty of
making the proper selection in practice: hence the absence of a
sharply defined diagnostic character of their peculiar action. What
we know about them we have all had first to learn ab usu in morbis;
and that is admitted to be a turbid and uncertain source, so long as
we have not the positive foundation which the proving of those in
health alone supplies.
It will not do to work this great field of exhaustless treasure in a
careless style ; it will not do to leave it to accident: it demands our
unceasing toil. All our hunting after causes and appearances of
disease will never give us one specific medicine: this can only be
done by proving them on the healthy, as Hahnemann has shewn in
his Materia Medica, with conscientious carefulness. We cannot stamp
them out of the earth with our feet; but must dig them up, as the
miner does the golden ore. How small is our knowledge in relation
to the immeasurable treasures which the great Creator has spread over
the whole earth for the use and benefit of his creatures. How great,
on the other hand, the range of diseases for which we have no specific
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remedy ; but as the great poet, himself a diligent investigator, has
said, “ Nature opens herself to the earnest will and labour of the
honest searchers.”
Another object should be the defence of the fundamental principles
of homoeopathy, as set forth by Hahnemann in his Organon. It is
not to be denied that the fantastic notions of numerous homoeopathic
physicians have done much injury to the cause in the eyes of the
scientific part of the public. In this category we reckon the theory
of potentization propounded by the horse breaker of Mecklenburg,
which was accepted as the acme of homoeopathy by so many
enthusiasts.
Lastly, the defence of homoeopathy against attacks and aspersions
of all kinds, whether appearing in scientific journals, or other pub¬
lications. Somewhat like the following should be the plan of the
organization of the Central Association, according to my notion.
A director or president should be chosen for the year, or longer, whose
dnty should be,—
1st,—On the day of assembly he would give a condensed review
of all occurrences affecting the internal development of homoeopathy
as science and art, as well as its external relations to its opponents
and the state, which would include a notice of its literature, contro¬
versial and general. With such an address the assembly would be
opened, and then—
2nd,—He would be expected to select the medicines which were
to be proved, and bring them before the meeting, which should decide
upon them by a majority of votes.
3rd,—It would be of great consequence if he could collect the
results of all the homoeopathic institutions.
4th,—He would point out what had occurred in the internal con¬
stitution of homoeopathy towards the development of its fundamental
principles; or what, on the other hand, might give occasion to a de¬
parture from them.
5th,—It would be his duty to take care that all attacks upon
homoeopathy, from whatever quarter, should be specifically repelled ;
its advantages placed in the best light; and its dignity as science
and art assisted in the most fitting manner.
6th, and lastly,—He should propose the place of its next meet¬
ing, and bring it to a vote.
Besides this president, a secretary should be chosen to conduct the
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correspondence; and in any emergency should have the power of
taking legal advice; and further, a treasurer should he appointed to
attend to all money matters.
Hitherto, the time of the meetings, which should have been devoted
to these questions of internal policy, has been taken up by practical
communications, and thus these important matters have been dis¬
patched with insufficient care. This should no longer be done; and
only after the primary object has been completed, should the president
bring before the congress such scientific papers as he may deem
proper; for the journals afford an obvious and suitable medium for
communicating such matters to the medical public.
But we must also procure the means : we must have money. We
must have money for prizes ; for new provings; money to pay the
secretary and treasury ; money to pay for the insertion of notices in
homoeopathic and political journals; and also for good popular
treatises.
The vast majority of homoeopathic physicians are not in a position,
from the demands upon their time, and many other causes, to take a
direct part in the theoretical or practical development of our science;
but, feeling as we all do, the importance of combined effort, it will be
a satisfaction to know that each can make a contribution to this desired
end by a subscription.
[We have given thus fully an abridgment of this paper, because the name
of Dr. Trinks—second to that of no living homceopathist—commands attention
from all Germany for anything which comes from his pen; and also because
there are many of his suggestions which are applicable to the condition of
homoeopathy among ourselves. We may naturally hesitate to attribute so
much importance as he does to the effort to obtain recognition by the state;
for living as we do in the reign of the Times —a popular despotism tempered
by Punch —we may be satisfied, that while on the one hand we have nothing
to hope from the powers that be, in the way of encouragement and support,
on the other hand, beyond the negative injustice of ignoring us, and all our
doings, we have nothing to fear. As individuals, with few exceptions, any
attempt at persecution is in this country impossible. Each may work in his
own sphere, for the promotion of his own and the common good, without
anxiety, for the efforts of our opponents to pass measures of a restrictive
nature, have been hitherto, and will be in the future, attended with failure
mortifying to them. No Medical Reform Bill will ever pass which directly or
indirectly limits our freedom of action; and it is this very immunity from all
personal hardships of a political character, which makes it so difficult to or¬
ganize permanent and effective associations among us. If we felt ourselves a
persecuted sect, the very instinct of self-preservation would bind us together
as one man. But without this girding force, our only reliance for securing
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harmony, unity, and consentaneous effort, rests upon individual zeal, and a
sense of the grandeur of the great truth committed to our keeping. How in¬
effectual such a bond is, the teaching of every page of history testifies; and to
expect from us the devotion of martyrs, without the terrors of the stake, is
to believe in the return of a greater miracle than any on record. Shall we
then altogether despair of the value of all organization, and attempts at com¬
bination for the development of our cause ? By no means. We may be dis¬
appointed that the fruits of our societies and congresses have as yet been so
insignificant; but something has already been achieved: we are better
acquainted with one another, and have more esprit de corps than if we had had
no associations; and much more is possible, and may be attained without re¬
quiring miracles. Every year adds to our numbers; and among our new con¬
verts we shall naturally find more of the zeal and self-devotion of a first love,
not yet perverted by personal success into channels of private aggrandizement.
Could we but divert this, by any form of association, to the great object for
which Dr. Trinks pleads so earnestly—the proving of medicines—how great
would be our gain, and how much higher our common position and mutual
respect! Suppose a prize, offered to all graduates of a certain year, for the
best experimental essay upon any new medicine! How certainly would it
stimulate the interest of students and noviciates in homoeopathy, and augment
the treasures of our art! This might be done, and could only be done properly
by an association; and there is no reason that some of the existing ones
might not at once take it up. Again, as Dr. Trinks observes, the value of
collected statistics is enormous; and this, too, is a proper work for a society.
That it can be done by a voluntary association, even better than by the efforts
of government in this country, is shewn by the success of the Highland
Society in collecting agricultural facts of the highest national importance.
We believe most of our readers will agree with our author, that we cannot
expect so much from any form of association in the production of practical
essays. Periodical literature has now-a-days almost entirely superseded the
learned societies in this function; and no person who reads an essay before
any of these bodies, of any value, thinks of confining it to them: it is always
published, either in their own organ, or some other journal. With these few
observations, we commend the recommendations of Dr. Trinks to the earnest
attention of our readers.— Eds.]
Homoeopathy in Iceland .
To the Editor of the British Journal of Homoeopathy .
Sir,—During a recent visit in Copenhagen, I learnt the following
particulars concerning the introduction of homoeopathy into Iceland.
By inserting them in your Journal, you may perhaps help the cause
in a district hallowed by long associations, and which, to the scholar
and antiquarian will always be classic ground: a land also which is
peculiarly in want of the resources of the NeW Medicine, to arrest
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Homoeopathy in Iceland.
669
the epidemics which periodically devastate it: and thus to increase
its hardly-reared population. On some future occasion I may per¬
haps have the honour of drawing your attention to the remarkable
sanitary condition of this Northern island. In the meantime, I
would prepare your readers for some ^interest in it, by stating the
following facts respecting the lay-homceopaths of Iceland,
And remain, your obedient servant,
J. J. GARTH WILKINSON.
It is only within the last few years that homoeopathy has begun
to spread in Iceland, and principally, or, as far as I know, exclu¬
sively, in the Northern division of the country. The first person
who, by chance, became acquainted with this system, and who
was also the first to apply it in practice, was Sira Magnus Jonsson,
then pastor in Garth, in Keldu Hverfi, in Axarfiordth. Sub¬
sequently he was appointed to another living in the Eastern
division, As i Fellum, where, however, on account of his successful
cures, he soon came into such serious collision with the district
doctor of the Eastern division, Gisli Hjalmarsson, that he was
induced last summer to return to the North, where he is now acting
as curate to his father, Sira Jon Jonsson, in Grenjadarstad. Sira
Magnus is undoubtedly not only the first in date among the homoeo¬
pathic practitioners in Iceland, but also the first in ability. His
father, who is now upwards of eighty years of age, was also at one
time a very skilful physician, though he was but self-taught, and
the medical art seems thus to be innate in the family.
Gisli Hjalmarsson, the district doctor mentioned above, is con¬
sidered one of the ablest and most enlightened medical practitioners
in Iceland, and as long as Sira Magnus remained in the North
country, and consequently within the district of another doctor,
Gisli Hjalmarsson is said to have consulted him in dangerous cases,
although he knew that he was only self-taught; but when Sira
Magnus moved down to the East country, and people applied, to
him for medical help instead of to the district doctor, open enmity
ensued.
Before Sira Magnus left the North country, he gave another
clergyman some insight into the homoeopathic method, and the
latter continued his practice in those parts. The name of this
clergyman is Sira Thorsteinn Palsson, of H&ls in Fujokadal. A
third practitioner has arisen very recently: a man of low estate.
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Miscellaneous.
by name August Jonsson, at Hrisey, in Eyjafjordth; but of the two
latter I know no more than that they are said to have been very
successful in then' cures, and that in consequence a considerable
falling off in the sale of allopathic medicines has been experienced
in the Apothek or drug-store at Akreyri. The homoeopaths pro¬
bably get their medicines from Copenhagen with much trouble, and
it would no doubt be very beneficial if a connexion, as regards this
matter, could be established between England and Reykjavik, a
connexion which would probably lead to the spread of homoeopathy
in the South country also, where, as yet, it seems to be quite un¬
known, although this is the part of Iceland that is most accessible to
strangers.
Electicism among Homoeopat lasts.
[In an article entitled “ Du Mouvement des Homceopathes vers
l’Eclectisme Medical,” in the number of the Jour, de la Soc. Gallicane
for July 1855, by Dr. Gabalda, we find the following extract from an
editorial article by Dr. Nunez in the annals of the Hahnemannian
Society of Madrid, published January 1855. The rest of the article
of Dr. Gabalda, is chiefly composed of verbatim extracts from the
German Vierteljahrschrift and Dr. Perry’s letter, which our readers
are already acquainted with, accompanied by comments in the same
sense by the author.]— Eds.
Hitherto the columns of our journal have been exclusively conse¬
crated to the defence and the propagation of the principles on which
the immortal Hahnemann has constructed the edifice of homoeopathy;
hitherto we have not been satisfied with merely retaining and
maintaining those principles in all their purity, but we have also
explained all the facts of our practice in subor dina tin g them to the
theories of our illustrious master; hitherto in a word we have
confined ourselves to the circle of pure Hahnemannic ideas.
If we have acted in this manner, it is not because we hold that
the Organon is to be considered as the ultimatum of medical
progress; nor is it that we think that homoeopathy, such as we Have
received it from the hand of Hahnemann, is the absolute truth in
medicine ; but because we are convinced that when it is our task to
promulgate a truth our first duty is to maintain it on the same basis
on which the revealing genius of the founder has placed it; the
second is to assemble the facts in great number, so as to demonstrate
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Eclecticism among Homceojpathists. 671
the fundamental principle which flows from them ; the third, finally,
to carry the war into the camp of the enemy, and show the defects
of their scientific and practical objections. Such has been our
conduct for eight years.
But now that our school, after innumerable vicissitudes and
vexations, after so many struggles and discussions, after overcoming
so many prejudices, reckons such a host of illustrious adepts ; and
that the principle on which it stands so firmly is acknowledged and
proclaimed by our adversaries themselves, now begins our task; a
task not less difficult than important. This consists—
1st. In analysing all that is doubtful or controvertible.
2nd. In recording without conditions or reserve , all that is irrevoc¬
able, indefeasible, or really acquired by said doctrine.
3rd. In stating with the greatest candour, the desiderata which
remain to be realized.
4th, In appropriating whatever other scientific schools possess of
evident certainty, and make it serve our own.
To the foregoing testimonies, borrowed from not the least imposing
authorities among the distinguished defenders and propagators of
Homoeopathy, we will add that of Dr. Perry. This gentleman in his
recent letter to Dr. Nunez, on Cholera, has treated this question in a
manner too remarkable for us to forego the wish to lay before our
readers the preface to his pamphlet.
“ If some of the opinions advanced in this letter appear to deviate
from the rules hitherto considered fundamental in homoeopathy, their
true bearing would nevertheless be mistaken if it were supposed that
they involve an abandonment of our sound doctrines.
“ As to the use of massive doses, I will not dwell on the considera¬
tions that might here be indulged on the nature of disease, its rapid
progress, or the too frequent impotence of attenuated doses, but
taking only a general view of the question, I will remind you that the
massive dose was Hahnemann’s starting point for the demonstration
of the law of similars, for his first applications of that law, and for a
great part of the experiments on which his Materia Medica Pura is
constructed. The admirable discovery of the dynamisation of
medicines is certainly a vast gain to therapeutics, but it does not
necessarily exclude for ever medicines in their crude state. That
would be to ignore the services they have rendered to homoeopathy,
and needlessly reject those they can and ought to render still.
“ To be seduced by the marvellous effects of infinitesimal doses, so
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Miscellaneous.
ridiculously disputed, and to give all our attention and use all our
efforts in the direction of this discovery, and to seek in it the full
development of therapeutics, was the natural bent of the human
mind. But, having reached the farthest limits of attenuation, and
having nothing to gain, apparently, in that direction, let us return
towards our starting point, and examine without prejudice the
claims of non-dynamised-medicines. Already the practice of a large
school of homoeopaths offers us useful information on this point, and
if we will candidly consider how often we fail with dynamised medi¬
cines, we must acknowledge to more than blindness in keeping on
systematically within the circle of our dynamisation, and in repudiating
as unworthy of the title of homoeopaths, those who do not always use
them.
“A more serious question is that of the simultaneous employment of
several medicines. In order to form a correct opinion of it we should
reduce it to its most simple terms, and enquire: 1st, whether the
action of attenuated medicines is necessarily compromised by the
simultaneous operation of every internal or external modifying agent;
2nd, whether on the contrary this action may not be aided or com¬
pleted by one of these agents fulfilling indications for which the
attenuated medicine is not suited.
“ As regards homoeopathic attenuations, Hahnemann and his
disciples have persuaded themselves that the least influence was
capable of annihilating the effects ‘of such infinitely small doses.
Under this idea we, mistrusting everything that was suspected of
possessing medicinal qualities, have forbidden our patients the usual
vegetables and meats; the orange on account of its acidity, and the
smallest flower for its perfume. We ought a fortiori to forbid every
drink that could do more than quench thirst, every fomentation,
every enema if only of water, because the homoeopathic medicine
should suffice for every need, and ought to be left to act alone, under
penalty of hazarding everything. It is true that growing bold by
degrees we have softened this rigour by concessions which at first
might have seemed imcompatible with homoeopathic treatment.
“ Some persons, and among them our best minds, have doubted the
utility of all these dietetic precautions, and have quoted numerous
facts tending to prove that they had obtained all the desirable effects
from their medicines, not only when patients had not observed the
homoeopathic dietary during treatment, but when they had taken
substances of undoubted medicinal properties.
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Eclecticism among Homoeopathists.
673
“ Is it not sufficient for us to consider, without other testimony, that
in multitudes of cases our patients are exposed to absorb medicinal
emanations and odours, which, by our hypothesis, ought to make
homoeopathic treatment impossible ?
“ And how often are we not called to attend patients saturated with
musk, opium, camphor, iodine, or mercury, &c.: and nevertheless our
medicines, given Sometimes only by olfaction, have acted immedi¬
ately, and worked the marvellous cures which are the glory and
triumph of homoeopathy!
' “ In many of these cases it is- remarkable that the same substance
has been used in the crude and also in the dynamized state; the
massive dose having in no wise interfered with the infinitesimal, but
each having preserved its sphere of action. To this kind of facts
belong the cases of smokers and drinkers of coffee, to whom we
successfully give tobacco and coffee dynamized. Moreover we can
employ the higher dynamizations of such medicines as Sulphur, Bark,
or Mercury, to obviate the bad effects produced by large doses of the
crude drugs themselves. Here the attenuations, far from being
neutralized, do actually neutralize to a certain degree the effects of
massive doses.
“ What then is the ground of those fears which have caused every
modifying agent to be considered as necessarily neutralizing the
homoeopathic remedies, and have prescribed the so-called Homoeo¬
pathic Regimen—a purely negative regimen, conceived in reference
to medicines rather than to patients, and which excludes most of the
materials of hygiene, instead of utilising them for the treatment of
patients.
“ But it must not be concealed that Hahnemann himself departed
from his principle by admitting as auxiliaries to dynamic medicines
the electric and magnetic forces, hydrotherapy, topical applications of
Arnica, Thuja, and Soap; and especially by having recourse to the
association of several homoeopathic medicines, given indeed alternately
or intercurrently, but which notwithstanding this subtle distinction,
have really a simultaneous action on the organism.
“Far from us, then, be those prejudices which fetter our practice,
and can only be got rid of by expedients unworthy of science and of
truth: let us tread openly the path in which our master unwittingly
perhaps, has directed' our first steps; it promises to be fertile, if
explored with prudence and discernment, but would be fatal to
homoeopathy were we to plunge into it without rule or criterion.
VOL. XIII, NO. L1V.—OCTOBER, 1855. 2 X
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Miscellaneous.
The fear of this has long withheld the free expression of my thoughts
on this subject, and has on several occasions caused me to raise my
voice against the more liberal tendencies of some of my brethren.
Homoeopathy had scarcely advanced beyond the phase of self asser¬
tion, self-isolation, and exclusion. Its adherents could not forego its
exclusiveness and accept other methods without compromising
homoeopathy by appearing to doubt its value, and weakening the
practice of young adherents, by shaking their faith in the certainty of
its principles. But in a very few years things have changed, and
homoeopathy has rapidly entered into a transition state, or rather has
overflowed and invaded physicians of every school, embracing a
number of new elements which were more or less assimilated to it.
Then were heard appeals to tolerance , to tradition ; and then it was
understood that it was not, as had been thought, a question of the
overthrow but of the regeneration of old medicine by Homoeopathy.
“ The considerations which would have arrested us formerly exist
no more, and in the grand progress of mind towards medical reform,
we are free to contribute our share of effort to develope the. grand
truths bequeathed to us by Hahnemann, and unite them to the tem¬
poral inheritance of medicine.”
Parliamentary Return of the Homoeopathic Treatment of Cholera.
Return to an Address of the Honourable The House of Commons, dated
17th May, 1865for,
“ COPIES of any Letters which have been addressed to the General
Board of Health, complaining of the omission of any Notice of certain
Returns in relation to the treatment of Cholera, which returns were
sent to the General Board of Health, in pursuance of a Circular dated
September last, and issued by the Board j and of any Correspondence
which has passed between the President of the Board and the Medical
Council; together with Copies of the Returns which have been
rejected by the Medical Council.”
London Homoeopathic Hospital, Golden Square,
Sir, 20 April 1856.
The Committee of Management of the London Homoeopathic Hos¬
pital who were actively engaged in the reception of the poor suffering
from the cholera epidemic of last year, have observed with much pain and
surprise, that in the Report furnished by you to Her Majesty’s Secretary
of State, and recently presented to Parliament, on the results of the
different methods of treatment pursued in epidemic cholera, the Returns
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Parliamentary Return on Cholera. 675
prepared and delivered to your Board in the month of November last by
them, are not included in the Analysis prepared under your sanction.
In the Report issued from the Board of Health it is stated that the
whole of the returns made to that Board have been carefully analysed; but
as this statement is completely at variance with the fact that the returns
from this hospital were delivered at your office and yet remained unnoticed,
the Committee of Management conceive that they have just cause of
complaint that their labours in the cause of the indigent sick in that
district of the Metropolis which was the most severely affected by the
epidemic, have been thus entirely ignored.
Again, in the execution of the duty assigned to those charged by
yourself with the preparation of the above-mentioned Report, it could not
be forgotten that the object contemplated by yourself and declared, was
the commencement of a system by which national medical statistics could
be procured, a system not intended to produce opinions, but facts and
materials on which opinions and practical deductions might hereafter be
based; therefore the suppression of any duly authenticated returns which
afforded positive information to the public relating to the cholera was not
' to have been expected; and the omission of which the Committee of
Management complain, is one which they feel convinced you, as Presi¬
dent of the Board of Health, will admit requires explanation, inasmuch as
it not only affects the conduct of those officers of your Board to whose
care the returns were entrusted, but it is at the same time calculated to
throw doubt on the value of that Council which, under other circum¬
stances, could not but impart additional confidence to the recommenda¬
tions emanating from the Board of Health.
The Committee of Management, in addressing this complaint to you
solely cm public grounds, cannot at the same time refrain from bringing
under your notice the circumstances connected with their proceedings in
the crisis adverted to.
It may not be irrelevant to state, for your information, that the London
Homoeopathic Hospital numbers amongst its office bearers and supporters,
Members of both Houses of the Legislature, officers of the army and navy,
clergymen of the Established Church, and other ministers of religion,
lawyers and merchants, and many individuals distinguished for their
attainments in the different branches of science, literature, and art, whilst
its medical-staff is composed of graduates of universities, and members of
recognized licensing schools of surgery and medicine, as you will perceive
by the following list of the staff of the hospital:—
Patroness .—Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Cambridge.
Vice-Patron .—His Grace the Duke of Beaufort.
President .—Right Hon. the Earl of Wilton.
Vice-Presidents .—His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin; Right Hon.
the Earl of Essex; Right Hon. the Earl of Albemarle; Right Hon. the
Viscount Sydney ; the Viscount Maldon; Lord Francis Gordon ; Captain
2x2
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
670
Miscellaneous.
Digitized by
Lord C. Paget, R. N., M.P.; Captain Lord M. Paget, M.P.; Colonel
Lord G. Paget, M.P.; Right Hon. the Lord Robert Grosvenor, M.P.;
Right Hon. the Lord Gray; Sir Charles Isham, Bart.; Charles Powel
Leslie, Esq. M.P.; Colonel Wyndham; F. Foster Quin, Esq. M.D. ;
Marmaduke B. Sampson, Esq.
Chairman. —Right Hon. the Lord Robert Grosvenor, M.P.
Board of Management. —Nathaniel Barton, Esq.; Captain Branford,
R.N. ; John Broadhurst, Esq.; Ralph Buchan, Esq.; Captain William
Caldwell; J. B. Crampern, Esq.; W. C. Dutton, Esq.; Edward
Esdaile, Esq.; George Hallett, Esq.; Philip Hughes, Esq.; J. P. Knight,
Esq., R.A.; William Pritchard, Esq. ; R. T. Reep, Esq.; H. C. Robin¬
son, Esq.; H. Rosher, Esq.; Sir John Smith, Bart.; Charles Snewin,
Esq.; J. W. Tottie, Esq.; Thomas Uwins, Esq. R.A.; William Wat¬
kins, Esq.
Trustees. —George Hallett, Esq.; Philip Hughes, Esq. ; William
Watkins, Esq.; D. W. Witton, Esq.
Treasurer .—Sir John Dean Paul, Bart., 217 Strand.
Medical Council. —Frederick Foster Quin, M.D., President of the
British Homoeopathic Society; Edward Hamilton, M.D., Treasurer to
the British Homoeopathic Society ; T. R. Leadam, M.R.C.S., Honorary
Secretary to the British Homoeopathic Society ; S. T. Partridge, M.D. ;
Hugh Cameron, M.R.C.S.; Victor Massol, M.D.; J. Rutherfurd
Russsll, M.D.; George Newman, M.R.C.S.; George Hilbers, M.D. ;
D. Wielobycki, M.D.; F. W. Irvine, M.D.; George Dunn, M.D.;
J. Ozanne, M.D.; J. B. Metcalfe, M.R.C.S.; Joseph Kidd, M.D.
M.R.C.S.; W. Mayne, M.D.; R. D. Hale, M.D.; G. C. Holland,
M.D.; John Moore, M.R.C.S.; Stephen Yeldham, M.R.C.S.; Henry
Reynolds, M.R.C.S.; W. Watson, M.R.C.S. ; T. Mackern, M.R.C.S.;
W. Roche, M.D.; J. G. Young, M.R.C.S.; R. T. Massy, M.D.; J. L.
Vardy, L.A.C.; Professor Macdonald, M.D.; S. Wielobycki, M.D. ;
J. Hutton Hill, L.R.C.P., M.R.C.S.; A. C. Edwards, M.R.C.S. ; G.
Wyld, M.D.; R. Baikie, M.D., M.R.C S.; D. Smith, M.R.C.S.; W.
Morgan, M.R.C.S.
Medical Officers. —Dr. Quin, Consulting Physician; Dr. Hamilton ;
Dr. Partridge, Physician Accoucheur; Dr. J. Rutherfurd Russell; Dr.
Wielobycki; Dr. Hill; Dr. Wyld; Dr. Baikie, Assistant Physician;
Mr. Yeldham; Mr. Leadam, Surgeon Accoucheur; Mr. Mackern ; Mr.
Cameron; Mr. D. Smith; Mr. Edwards, Mr. Morgan, Assistant
Surgeons.
During the five years of its existence, the London Homoeopathic Hos¬
pital has received as in and out patients fully 14,000 of the poor, afflicted
with nearly every variety of acute and chronic disease.
In the early part of last September, the Committee of Management of
the London Homoeopathic Hospital, from a desire to contribute, to the
best of their ability, to the measures adopted by the parochial authorities of
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Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Parliamentary Return on Cholera.
677
St. James’s, Westminster, for the purpose of checking the ravages of the
cholera in the Golden Square and neighbouring districts, gave directions
for appropriating the wards of the hospital to the sole use of the poor
attacked by the epidemic, the usual letters of recommendation being dis¬
pensed with. A visiting staff of medical officers was also organized for
service amongst those who could not be received as in-patients, and sup¬
plies of medicines, preventive as well as remedial, were gratuitously
dispensed at all hours of the day and night to the poor who applied.
To give as much publicity as was practicable to the proceedings of the
Committee of Management, handbills containing directions to be followed
for the prevention or arrest of the disorder in its earlier stages were
extensively circulated, and notices were from time to time inserted in the
daily journals, announcing that the hospital was ready to receive patients
labouring under cholera.
The Committee of Management also forwarded an official intimation of
their arrangements to the Board of Guardians of the parish, to whom
application was likewise made for the use of any litter or means of
conveyance the authorities might have provided in pursuance of the
directions issued by yourself; but the application for assistance to remove
cases of cholera to or from the hospital was refused, on the ground that
they had no means of complying with the request.
Although the medical inspector appointed by the Board of Health for
the Golden Square district could not be ignorant that many of the poor of
the neighbourhood were received and treated in this hospital, the only
medical institution in the district exclusively devoted to the reception of
cholera patients, he never once visited the hospital, to examine into the
nature of the cases received here, nor sought to enter the wards where
their treatment was carried on. But the medical officers of the London
Homoeopathic Hospital, desirous that the severity and character of the
cases received by them, as well as the treatment pursued, should be wit¬
nessed and recorded by a medical inspector appointed by the Board of
Health, invited Dr. Macloughlin (who has always been strongly opposed
to homoeopathic treatment), the medical inspector of the districts of Step¬
ney, Poplar, St. Andrew’s, St. Giles’ and St. George’s Bloomsbury,
to inspect the wards; and to him the Committee of Management can
refer for corroborative evidence in support of the value of the results
obtained and witnessed by him in his visits to this hospital.
A copy of a letter addressed by Dr. Macloughlin to one of the officers
of the medical staff of this hospital is, by permission, enclosed herewith,
and your attention is particularly directed to that passage in which it is
stated by him, u That there may therefore be no misapprehension about
the cases I saw in your hospital, I will add, that all I saw were true
cases of cholera, in the various stages of the disease, and that I saw
several cases which did well under your treatment, which I have no
hesitation in saying would have .sunk under any other.”
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
678
Miscellaneous.
The care of the Committee of Management was not confined to the
merely medical treatment of the poor who sought relief in the hospital.
Through the liberality of some of the supporters of the institution, and of
others anxious to assist in this charitable work, a fund was raised and
placed at the disposal of the visiting staff, who humanely engaged lodg¬
ings at Hampstead and other places, to which several of the poor were
removed during the period of their convalescence, and by this means, as
well as by gifts of money and clothing distributed to those who were
reduced to extreme poverty by their own illness, or death by cholera of
their parents, the parish was relieved of any charge on their account.
The operations of this hospital, directed exclusively to cholera patients,
were continued during the whole period of the epidemic in the district,
and the results obtained in 61 cases of pure cholera, and in 331 cases of
choleraic and simple diarrhoea, were recorded in the forms issued by the
General Board of Health, and, as already stated, delivered by an officer
of the institution at your office in the month of November following.
The utmost care was taken in adding the names, occupations, and ad¬
dresses of the cases, the symptoms observed at the different stages of the
attacks, and the remedies employed in accordance with the prominent
symptoms detailed, as well as the names and degrees of the respective
medical officers of the institution responsible for the accuracy of the
returns.
The following is a summary of the returns thus furnished :—
CASES OF CHOLERA TREATED.
Admit¬
ted
Collapse.
Conse¬
cutive
Fever.
Recov¬
ery.
Death.
Discon¬
tinued,
As In-patients
33
23
5
25
7
i
By the Visiting Staff -
18
13
3
13
3
2
Amongst the Out-patients
10
—
—
10
—
—
Total
61
36
8
48
10
3
CASES OF DIARRHCBA TREATED.
No. of
Cases.
Passed
into
Cholera.
Discon¬
tinued
Recov¬
ery.
Death.
f
Un¬
known.
■
As In-patients (Choleraic)
6
—
—
[ 5
—
—
By the Visiting Staff (Choleraic)
5
—
—
6
—
As Out-patients { stapuT-
116
206
4
1
, 2
.
107
201
1
2
3
Total -
831
6
2
318
i
6
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Parliamentary Return on Cholera .
679
From the circumstance that of these 61 cases of dearly ascertained
cholera, including the three cases removed from the hospital by the friends
of the patients before any result could be obtained, the cases of collapse
equal 69 per cent., it will be observed that a very large proportion of the
cases recorded presented features of the most severe and serious
character.
And in further proof of the violence of the cases treated, it may be
mentioned that one of the ten whose deaths are recorded expired whilst
being removed from the conveyance in which he was brought to the hos ¬
pital, and before any treatment could be commenced ; whilst, in another
case, the treatment was begun by the visiting staff of this hospital after the
parish surgeons had pronounced recovery to be hopeless.
It forms no part of the immediate object of this letter to institute a
comparison between the results obtained at this hospital and those recorded
in your] Report, but as the returns of this hospital prove that in an
institution ill adapted from its want of space and the arrangements of its
yvards for the purposes of a cholera hospital the deaths do not exceed
16‘4 per cent, in an epidemic in which, as the Report issued by you
shows, the deaths in severe cases under the most successful treatment
pursued in other metropolitan hospitals, were at the rate of 36*2 per cent.,
the Committee of Management must lament that the public, for whose
benefit the Board of Health was instituted, is left, by the Report of that
Board, in total ignorance of the results obtained by the treatment pursued
in the London Homoeopathic Hospital, and of the medicinal means by
which these results were obtained ; and they deem it their duty respect¬
fully to request an investigation into the truth of the above statement, and
into the cause of the suppression of their returns in the Report made by
the Board over which you preside.
By order of the Committee of Management of the London Homoeopathic
Hospital, Golden Square.
I have, &c.
The Right Honorable (signed) Ralph Buchan ,
Sir Benjamin Hall, Bart., M.P., Hon. Sec.
&c. &c. &c.
The President of the General Board of Health.
Extract from a Letter dated 22nd February, 1855, from Dr. Macloughlin,
one of the Medical Inspectors of the Board of Health, to Hugh
Cameron, Esq., M.R.C.S., and one of the Surgeons to the London
Homoeopathic Hospital.
You are right. I did tell you that I would report to the General Board
of Health the opinion I had formed of the manner the poor cholera
patients were cared for in your hospital, and the success of your treat¬
ment ; but finding that I .could not enter into details relative to your
hospital without entering also into details relative to the Allopathic Hos-
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
680
Miscellaneous.
pitals, which would lead me into considerations foreign to the sanitary
question before me, I therefore merely give the result arrived at in yours,
along with the result arrived at in other establishments, reserving
to myself the liberty to say more in detail wbat is the impression on my
mind as to your treatment of cholera cases, when I publish a monograph
on cholera.
You are aware that I went to your hospital prepossessed against
the homoeopathic system ; that you had in me, in your camp, an enemy
rather than a friend, and that I must therefore have seen 'some cogent
reason there, the first day I went, to come away so favourably disposed
as to advise a friend to send a subscription to your charitable fund, and I
need not tell you that I have taken some pains to make myself acquainted
with the rise, progress, and medical treatment of cholera, and that I
claim for myself some right to be able to recognise the disease, and to
know something of what the medical treatment ought to be ; and,
That there may be therefore no misapprehension about the cases I saw
in your hospital, I will add, that all I saw were true cases of cholera,,
in the various stages of the disease; and that I saw several cases which
did well under your treatment, which I have no hesitation in saying
would have sunk under any other.
In conclusion, I must repeat to you, what I have already told you, and
what I have told every one with whom I have conversed, that although
an allopath by principle, education, and practice, yet was it the will of
Providence to afHict me with cholera, and to deprive me of the power of
prescribing for myself, I would rather be in the hands of a homoeopathic
than an allopathic adviser.
I cannot suppose that anything I have said above can be of value to
the homoeopathic system, but such as it is, you are at full liberty to make
what use you please of this letter.
P. S. —I- forgot to tell you that the Imperial Institute of France will
decide in July what is the best work published on cholera, and which has
most contributed to the advance of our knowledge of the pathology and
cure of the disease, and the award is 100,000 francs, or £ 4,000.
As I am the first in any country who has pointed out, by researches at
the bedside, that cholera is invariably preceded by a diarrhoea for some
hours, some days, or some weeks, and that the disease taken in this
diarrhoea! stage is easily cured, I have been desired to send in my claims,
and in so doing I have mentioned that all the cases admitted in your hos¬
pital in 1854 have been preceded by a premonitory diarrhoea, so that your
hospital is placed for accurate observation in the disease by the side of St.
Thomas’s, St. Bartholomew’s, St. Mary’s, the Westminster and the
University College Hospitals.
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
681
Parliamentary Return on Cholera.
The General Board of Health, Whitehall,
Sir, 26 April 1866.
I am directed by the President of the General Board of Health to
acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 20th instant.
I am to forward copies of the correspondence which has passed between
this office and the Committee of the Medical Council, to whom the
preparation of the report on the treatment of cholera has been entrusted.
I am, &c.
(Signed) J. F. Campbell,
C. Buchan, Esq., Assistant Secretary.
Homoeopathic Hospital.
Enclosure, No. 1.
The General Board of Health, Whitehall,
Sir, 11 [< qu . 21 ?] April 1866.
I am directed by the President of the General Board of Health to
inform you that inquiries have been made with regard to the course pur¬
sued by the Treatment Committee of the Medical Council, in dealing with
the cholera returns sent in by homoeopathic practitioners. It appears that
the Medical Directory was followed in circulating the forms of return
from this office, and that this directory does not distinguish homoeopathic
from other practitioners.
As the president finds on inquiry, that forms of return were sent to
hemoeopathic practitioners, and as these forms appear in several cases to
have been filled up and returned to this office, and as a return was also
made from the Homoeopathic Hospital, I am to inquire why no notice has
been taken of these returns by the Treatment Committee, their report
containing no reference to them.
I have, &c.
(signed) J. F. Campbell,
John A. Paris, Esq., M.D., Secretary.
Chairman of the Treatment Committee of the
Medical Council, 27 Dover Street.
Enclosure, No. 2.
Sir, Dover Street, 21 April 1866.
For the information of Sir Benjamin Hall, I beg to enclose a resolution
unanimously passed by the Treatment Committee of the Medical Council
of the General Board of Health, which I trust will be a satisfactory
answer to the enquiry addressed to me regarding the reasons whicn
induced the Committee to pass over without notice the homoeopathic
returns of their treatment of cholera.
“ Resolved, That by introducing the returns of homoeopathic practi¬
tioners, they would not only compromise the value and utility of their
averages of cure, as deduced from the operation of known remedies, but
they would give an unjustifiable sanction to an empirical practice alike
opposed to the maintenance of truth, and to the progress of science.”
I have, &c.
(signed ) John Ayrton Paris,
T. Taylor, Esq., President.
Secretary to the Board of Health.
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
682
Miscellaneous.
Enclosure, No. 8.
The General Board of Health, Whitehall,
Sir, 24 April 1855.
I am directed by the General Board of Health to acknowledge the
receipt of your letter of the 21st instant, and of the resolution of the
Treatment Committee as to the returns of cholera cases treated in the
Homoeopathic Hospital.
1 am to state that your letter will be laid before the President for his
consideration.
I have, &c.
J. A. Paris, Esq., M.D. &c. &c. &c. (signed) J. F. Campbell,
Dover Street. Assistant Secretary.
From R. Buchan, Honorary Secretary, London Homoeopathic Hospital,
11 May 1855, to the Right Hon. Sir Benjamin Hall, Bart. M.P.
Sir,
The Committee of Management of this hospital have instructed me to
acknowledge the receipt of Mr. Campbell’s communication of the 26th
ult., in reply to their letter of the 21st April, requesting an explanation of
the omission in your Report of the Cholera Returns sent from this hospital
in November last, in pursuance of your instructions, and which were pre¬
pared in the tabular forms furnished by your department.
The Committee of Management are fully sensible of the promptitude
with which you have directed an inquiry to be made into the cause of the
omission complained of. They deem it their duty, however, to protest
against the injustice which has been done to a charitable institution over
which they preside, and to express their surprise that the reason assigned
for such omission is an abstract resolution of a body of gentlemen who,
in violation of the objects set forth in your circular, have, under the appa¬
rent sanction of your authority, arbitrarily and without any examination,
suppressed the returns of this hospital; not because they have been
proved to be untrue, but because they are at variance with the precon¬
ceived opinions of those to whom the preparation of the Report was
entrusted.
The Committee of Management feel confident that you, the appointed
guardian of the public health, will still give practical effect to the decla¬
rations contained in your circular, dated September 1854, and not permit
the benefits to the public therein anticipated by you, from the collection
and systematic record of the results of treatment of choleraic disease pursued
by all qualified practitioners, to be neutralized by any body of medical
gentlemen limiting the field of inquiry to those returns only which
communicate results obtained by what are termed “ known remedies.”
The Committee, therefore, again solicit your consideration of the state¬
ments contained in their letter of the 20th ultimo, and are desirous
of impressing upon you the importance to the public, for whose benefit
your Board was formed, of including in your forthcoming Report on the
Golden Square District the results embodied in the returns furnished by
the officers of this hospital in November last.
By order of the Committee of Management of the London Homoeopathic
hospital.
1 have, &c.
(signed) R. Buchan, Hon. Sec.
[Note. —The Parliamentary returns being too voluminous for our columns,
we have omitted the tables of the cases of diarrhoea, and also those relating
to Mr. Anderson’s cases of cholera, which have already appeared in our
Journal.— Eds.]
Digitized by
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Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
689
Harvey and Homoeopathy .
To the Editor of the “ Medical Times and Gazette.”
Sib,
The admirable leader in your journal of Saturday last, on
the “ Difficulties of Homoeopathy,” deserves the best thanks of the
profession and the public. As you truly observe, “ the genuine doc¬
trines of homoeopathy are utterly incompatible with the science of
medicine as taught, believed, and practised, in all civilized countries,
“ inconsistent with all human knowledge,” and “ irreconcileable with
all that science has done in the last sixty years.”
That a system so absurd, useless, and, indeed, so mischievous,
should be supported and admired by the credulous portion of the
British public, need create no astonishment when we remember the
flattering patronage bestowed upon St. John Long, Morison, Coffin,
Holloway, the worthy fraternity of bone-setters, et id genus omne—
“ For sure the pleasure is as great,
Of being cheated, as to cheat.”
But is it not painfully surprising to every enlightened and high-
minded lover of the noble art of healing, to find that this pernicious
and delusive form of quackery is countenanced and encouraged by
those from whose position and influence, as practitioners of the true
science of medicine, the profession and the public might expect bet¬
ter things ? At this, the second town in the kingdom, we hear of
physicians meeting homceopathists in consultation for the purpose, it
is said, of diagnosis only. Pube surgeons are reported to be at all
times ready to lend their aid to the globulists in cases where chirur-
gical interference is needed, to overcome difficulties which even the
two-hundredth dilution could not solve. Let us charitably hope that
evil-tongued rumour, with her accustomed disregard of truth, has,
without foundation, maligned our brethren on the shores of the
Mersey. But I fear you will with me confess that appearances are
against them, when you learn that the “Liverpool Medical Institution”
—a society established with the avowed object of promoting the
science of medicine, enjoys the unenviable notoriety of being one
(I would fain believe the only one in England) of those institutions
which admit the followers of Hahnemann to the full privileges of
membership, placing them on an equality with regular practitioners,—
is regularly supplied with the periodical literature of the pseudo-
VOL. XIII, NO. Lrv.— OCTOBER 1855. 2 Y
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
690
Miscellaneous.
science; and has even gone the length— proh pudor !—“ heu prisca
Jides /”—of permitting papers to be read, and discussions held within
her walls upon homoeopathic subjects; thus, in the eyes of the public,
endorsing the principles of the system ; and, in the eyes of the pro¬
fession, exhibiting a pitiable specimen of pusillanimous inconsistency.
As an illustration of the feeling which pervades the institution as
a body, on the subject of globulism, I give the following extracts from
the minutes of an annual meeting of the members. It was proposed
and seconded— •
“ That for the future no homoeopathic works shall be admitted into
the Institution ; and if any such works now exist in the library, that
the librarian be instructed to remove them forthwith.”
An amendment was proposed, as follows, and carried: —
“ That the time is gone by for the burning of books by the hang¬
man ; for the heresy of Harvey is the fundamental doctrine of our
day ; and only by free scope to the medical mind can its narrowness
be overcome, and truth eventually reached.”
I have been assured by those who have opportunities of observation,
which enable them to form a tolerably correct prediction, that a similar
fate would probably attend any attempt to elicit from the Society a
declaration of opinion hurtful to the cause of homoeopathy.
It is, however, consolatory to be able to state, that better success
has at times attended other attempts to exclude the globulists and
their lucubrations; for a paper, on the “ Cure of Cancer by Infini¬
tesimal Doses,” was, after a warm debate, and by a compromise ,
withdrawn; and lately, a known homoeopathic practitioner, who
sought admission as a member, was, by a very narrow majority,
refused.
The case, therefore, is not hopeless. There are among the mem¬
bers men who yield to none in their desire to promote the best in¬
terests of the Institution, and of the science of medicine ; who, pos¬
sessing the influence, only need to be roused from their apathy by a
forcible appeal from a source more influential than any that such an
humble individual as your correspondent can command ; therefore it
is that I lay the case before you, remembering that—
“ Sera nunquam est ad bonos mores via,”
and hoping that a gentle chiding, and a little wholesome exhortation
from your editorial pen, may rouse their dormant energies ; and then
we may hope that our Institution will cast off the obloquy at present
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Harvey and Homoeopathy.
691
hanging over: it will no longer own connexion with globalism, or any
other'of the^many/orms of the “ Hydra-headed monster. Quackery
and wiirfor the future faithfully fulfil her noble mission.
I am, &c.,
“ A Member of the Council of the Liverpool
Medical Institution.”
Liverpool, August 14th, 1855.
We copy the above letter from a late number (18th August), of
the Medical Times , because while displaying the too common spirit
of a narrow-minded bigot, it makes the public acquainted with a fact
that redounds to the credit of the provincial society alluded to, and
is of interest in the history of homoeopathy.
It is true that a different colouring is attempted to be given to the
transaction by the secretary, in a subsequent letter ; but we under¬
stand the latter, who is recently appointed, is quite a junior in the
profession; and his letter, which is somewhat mean-spirited in its
tone, displays an evident desire to curry favour with his superiors in
age and bigotry.
This has led to a rejoinder from the anonymous bigot, insisting on
his correctness ; and again, to a reply from the secretary, giving in
to such an extent, that the editor closes the correspondence, on the
ground that he sees no difference between them ; in which we agree,
as the one simply abuses, while the other excuses, the majority in the
society for an act of liberality and common sense.
The facts alluded to in the above letter that are of interest to us,
are, as we have ascertained, simply, that a year or two ago, Dr. Hilbers
brought forward a paper on the homoeopathic treatment of a case of
disease of the tongue, that had been pronounced cancerous by the
late Mr. Bransby Cooper. It was not alleged that that was a proof
of the power of homoeopathic remedies to cure cancer, nor indeed was
any opportunity given to know what were the contents of the paper;
for a member of the society, immediately on its announcement, got
up and proposed in general terms, that homoeopathy was unworthy
of the notice of the society, and that therefore the paper should not
be read. To this motion the society distinctly refused to accede, as it
did not approve of limiting the freedom of its members in enter¬
taining or discussing any medical theory. But it was met by
another motion, which was carried; viz., to constitute a committee
for the selection of papers for the future ; and in the meantime, in
consequence of the party spirit displayed by some members, Dr.
Hilbers withdrew the paper.
ty Google
Original from
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
692
Miscellaneous .
On a subsequent occasion, an attempt was made to exclude all
books favourable to homoeopathy from the library, and this was met
by the above resolution, and rejected in the spirit of it, and in con¬
sequence of it, as we have been informed.
We cannot but regard this as a somewhat notable circumstance in
the history of homoeopathy ; and the conduct of the Liverpool Medical
Society presents a favourable contrast to that of the French Academy,
and to the Medical Soeiety of Edinburgh, who have both disgraced
the vaunted enlightenment of the age by their rejection of homoeo¬
pathic works, written by men in every way their equals as respects
education and position; and their superiors in knowledge of the
subject.
We trust that the more liberal party in this society will persevere
in this course, and steadily resist all attempts to exclude information
and stifle discussion ; and that their example will, ere long, be fol¬
lowed by all medical bodies; and they may be assured, that the
principle of giving fair play to every subject, will meet with approval
and sympathy from all right-minded men in and out of the profession.
It is, in fact, the only safe course, as well as the right one; for to
beg the question, and stifle discussion, when any alleged new truth is
first presented, must in the end lead to a breach of truth and common
honesty. And to this it has already come, we grieve to say, in res¬
pect to the great majority of those who refuse communion with ho¬
moeopathic members of the profession. The plea that is generally put
forward to justify their conduct, is the assertion, that homoeopathy is
nothing more than obedience to a cabalistic formula, that is complete
in itself, and therefore can have no connexion with general medicine,
and the collateral sciences. Now, though perhaps at first some few
might have been so ignorant as to have believed that, we know now
that all who have written against homoeopathy, evidence by the books
they quote, that they know better, and therefore their plea is wil¬
fully and knowingly false. Likewise, as regards the great body of
opponents to homoeopathy, we accuse them also of knowing and
wilful falsehood in the convenient plea put forward for rejecting the
claims of homoeopathic evidence to its proper place among medical
literature.
We shall confine ourselves to two examples, as one or two in¬
stances in detail are more convincing than a host of deductions. If
we take the lecturers as fair exponents of the state of medical opinion
of the day, let us hear how they represent that. Nothing is now
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN j
Harvey and Homoeopathy.
693
more common than to hear some second-rate provincial lecturer, after
the usual flourish about the enlightenment of our age, and amazement
at the blindness and ignorance of our forefathers, who rejected the
discoveries of Harvey and Jenner, &c., proceed to garnish his second-
rate lecture with jokes and facetious remarks about homoeopathy ; at
the same time, giving a distorted representation of its nature, and
winding up with the remark, that it is only on account of gross
ignorance of physiology and pathology, that believers in, and prac¬
titioners of such a method can be found. Now at the moment he
knows perfectly, and all his hearers know perfectly, that a professor
in one of the most renowned universities in the world, and a much
better pathologist and better lecturer than he is, both believes in, and
practises homoeopathy; therefore the plea of the incompatibility of
homoeopathy with knowledge of pathology, is palpably and wilfully
false and dishonest. Again—we are told over and over again by the
hireling writers in the weekly medical press, who pander to the pre¬
judices of their readers, that homoeopathic statistics of treatment are
all false ; and that, from ignorance or design, false names are given
to diseases, for the purpose of gaining credit by fictitious cures;
that this plan is well enough, and thrives in the secrecy of private
practice ; but that it would not stand the test of open day in hospital
practice ; nor are there men among us capable of taking charge of
an hospital, &c. And this at the very time when they are perfectly
aware that, not to go to the more inaccessible locality of Vienna,
there is a small hospital in London; and there is also in Paris, near
£o the most frequented thoroughfare, an hospital (Beaujon) in which
seventy beds are under the care of Dr. Tessier, where the patients
have been treated homoeopathically for years, and the results are
patent to any who will take the trouble to enquire into them. In
this instance, therefore, the plea is wilfully false and dishonest.
We trust, therefore, in conclusion, we shall ere long see an end of
the system of begging the question, and then endeavouring to stifle
discussion on false and dishonourable pleas. We wish no favour to
homoeopathy, nor do we require any. Let it be met with opposition,
or the strictest sifting, or by experiment, or the strongest arguments,
or even by ridicule, we care not; and are confident that in the end
truth will prevail. But let us have no more mean evasions, and
dishonourable pleas, which disgrace only those who employ such
weapons, and never can injure those against whom they are di¬
rected.—[E ds.]
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
094
Miscellaneous.
Homoeopathy in Denmark.
Although the introduction of homoeopathy into Denmark dates
from more than a quarter of a century ago, the number of homoeopa¬
thic practitioners bears no proportion to the period during which
homoeopathy has been known there. The only town in Denmark
that possesses homoeopathic practitioners is the capital, Copenhagen.
It boasts of three homoeopathic doctors, viz: Drs. Pabst, Lund
and Thomsen. Pabst is the oldest of them, and has practised in
Copenhagen for upwards of twenty-five years. Dr. Thomsen, if we
may judge from report, seems to enjoy a great reputation. Dr. Lund
is stated to be a talented practitioner. There is actually no homoeo¬
pathic literature in Denmark, not even a translation from the Ger¬
man. There is a good deal of amateur practice of homoeopathy in the
provinces, and as the German language is the proper language of
one half of the Danish kingdom, and is generally perfectly under¬
stood by educated people in the other half, the German domestic
works are used as guides by those favourable to our system. The
utter dearth of any proper Danish homoeopathic literature is the
more remarkable, seeing that the neighbouring country of Sweden,
which has no greater number of homoeopathic practitioners, pos¬
sesses, thanks to the zeal and assiduity of Dr. Liedbeck of Stock¬
holm, a respectable list of original and translated homoeopathic
works.
If homoeopathy has not made that progress in Denmark which we
might have expected from the great intelligence of the people,
hydropathy at least can boast a very large number of partisans.
Both in Denmark and Sweden there are numerous hydropathic
establishments, almost all in a very flourishing condition. We were
surprised to learn that Denmark has no institution for the practice of
Ling’s system of regulated gymnastics, though it is in such close
proximity to Sweden, where Ling’s system is most extensively ap¬
plied.
BOOKS RECEIVED.
Journal de la Socicte Gallicane.
The Fifth Annual Report of the London Homoeopathic Hospital.
Homoopathiens ntirvarande stallning i frammande lander , af Dr.
P. J. Liedbeck. Andra upplagan. Stockholm.
William Davy & Son, Printers, Gilbert Street, Oxford Street.
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
INDEX TO VOL. XIII.
Acids, Vegetable, in food, 378
Address at the Congress, by Dr. Wil¬
kinson, 529
Aggravations, Homoeopathic, 113; —,
True and False, 114
Albumen, Composition of, 367; —, Ve¬
getable, 373
Albuminuria, Treatment of, 567
Alcoholic Drinks, Properties of, 384;
—, Comparative Qualities of, 388
Allopathic Attacks on Homoeopathy,
435
Alternations of Remedies, Reasons for,
117
Alum in Bread, 360
Amaurosis, Case of, 412
America, Homoeopathy in, 511
American Homoeopathic Colleges, 125
Anderson, Mr., on the Cholera Epi¬
demic, 62
Anniversary of Hahnemann’s Birth,
Hundredth, 519
Araott, Dr., on Cold as a Local Anaes¬
thetic, 497
Arsenic in Cancer of the Face, 140
Art Medical, 1’, 654
Athenaeum, Remarkable Logic of the,
437
Atomistic Method, Dr. Mandt’s, 170
Attention, Morbific Influence of Ex¬
pectant, 291
Auxiliaries, on the Use of, 123
Balfour, Dr., Trials of Belladonna as a
Prophylactic, by, 282
Barbados, Dr. Chapman on Cholera in, 1
Bechet’s Treatment of Meningitis, 6
Begbie, Dr., on the Prophylactic Power
of Belladonna in Scarlatina, 257;
—, versus Hahnemann, 258; —,
Candour of, 259; —, versus Hen¬
derson and Black, 259; —, upon
Bayle,260; —, Misrepresentations
of, 263; —, Second Article of, 464
Bell, Dr., Trials of Belladonna as a
Prophylactic, by, 275
Belladonna as a Prophylactic of Scar¬
latina, Dr. Begbie on, 257; —, Dr.
Elb on, 414
Birds swallow Gravel, Reason why, 365
Black, Dr., on Glonoine in Headache,
139
Bladder, Case of Catarrh of the, 480;
—, Case of Inflammation of the, 591
Board of Health, Proposals for a Ho¬
moeopathic, 556
Body, the Materials of our, 364
Bonninghausen, Dr., on Vaccination,
172
Bowers, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 161
Brain, Case of Irritation of the, 479
Bread, Dr. Hassal on the Adulterations
of, 360
Bright’s Disease, Dr. Kidd on, 560; —,
Varieties of, 561; —, Symptoms of,
561; —, Remedies for, 565; —,
Cases of, 569
Bryonia's Head symptoms, Analysis
of, 129
Buchan, Mr., Letters of, 674, 682
Butyrine, Composition of, 378
Caladium in Itching of the Vulva, 509
Campbell, Mr., Letters of, 681, 682
Camphor in Cholera, 21
Cancer in the Face, Case of, 140
Cancrum oris, Inquest on a case of
death from, 334,439; —, Dr.West
on, 345
Cane Sugar, Composition of, 377
Cantharides in Bright’s Disease, 566
Carter on Hysteria, 286
Caseine, Composition of, 368
Caspar and Wurmb, Drs., on Intermit¬
tent Fever, 419
Cellulose, Composition of, 376
Digitized by
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696
INDEX.
Central Homoeopathic Association, Dr.
Trinks on the Reform of the, 661
Chapman, Dr., on Cholera in Barbados,
1; —, Cases of Cholera treated by,
22
Chemistry and Dietetics, 503
Chesman, Mr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 442
Chlorosis, Friction in, 506
Cholera, in Barbados, Dr. Chapman on,
1; —, Uncertainty of Allopathic
treatment of, 9, 196; —, Mr. An¬
derson on, 62; —, and Homoeopa¬
thy, by Dr. Gerstel, 328; —, l)r.
Perry on, 464; —, Returns of the
Board of Health, 457,543, 596; —,
Parliamentary returns of the Ho¬
moeopathic treatment of, 674
Chorea, Dr. Hamilton on a Case of, 254
Clark, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest of,
158
Gay, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest of,
442
Clinical Contributions, by Dr. Trinks,
317
Gose Corporations, all Professions are,
541
Cocoa, Consumption of, 394; —, Com¬
position of, 394; —, Homoeopathic,
395
Cod Liver Oil, Dietetic qualities of, 391
Coffee, Hahnemann’s antipathy to, 355;
—, as an article of diet, 392
Cold as a local Anaesthetic, Dr. Arnott
on, 497
Concours in France, and Homoeopathy,
The, 79; —, Rejected Candidates
at the, 82
Congress of Homoeopathic Practition¬
ers, Proceedings of, 658
Conjunctivitis, Cases of, 399
Contrexeville, Mineral Waters of, 526
Cooking of Food, Dr. Johnston on the,
371
Corbin, Dr., Cases of Cholera treated
by, 17
Coroner’s Inquest, at Brooklyn, 154;
—, at Darlington, 334, 439; —, at
Sheffield, 441
Crimea, Proposed Homoeopathic Hos¬
pital in the, 350, 449
Croserio, Dr., Death of, 474
Cystitis, Case of Chronic, 484
Czar, Who killed the. 349
Darwin, Mr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 442
Degenerated Homoeopathy, 170
Denmark, Homoeopathy in, 694
Dextrine, Composition of, 377
Diabetes, dependent on the state of the
Brain, 381; —, Artificial Produc¬
tion of, 381
Diet, Dr. Russell on, 353; —, Errone¬
ous notions of Allopaths respecting
Homoeopathic, 353; —, Hahne¬
mann’s views concerning, 355; —,
Sehleiden on varieties in, 356; —
Uselessness of experiments in, 356;
—, Rules in the Organon for, 357;
—, Hartmann on, 357 ; —, Hem-
pel’s golden rules for, 359; —, Is
it possible to have a non-medicinal,
359; —, Are there any peculiar
rules for Homoeopathic, 361; —,
Digestibility of different articles of,
376
Dietetics, What has Chemistry done
for, 503
Difficulties of Homoeopathy, The Me¬
dical Times on the, 447
Difficulty of selecting the Remedy, 134
Digitaline, Properties of, 525
Diuretic properties of Oats, 526
Doctors, Probable future diminution of,
540
Dropsy after Scarlatina, 318
Dudgeon, Dr., Cases Illustrative of the
difficulty of selecting the Remedy,
by, 134
Dudley, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 157
Dunham, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 162 ; —, Letter from, 351
Dynamization, Dr. Sharp on, 110
Eclecticism among Homceopathists, 670
Edinburgh Homoeopathic Dispensary,
Report of the, 504
Education of the Public, Medical, 534
Elain, Composition of, 378
Elb, Dr., on Belladonna as a Prophy¬
lactic of Scarlatina, 414
Empiric, Meaning of the term, 604
Epidydimis, Disease of the, 137
Erysipelas, Dr. Henriques on, 235; —,
Conflicting opinions respecting the
Pathology 4 of, 236; —, Cases of,
238
Digitized by
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INDEX.
697
Espionage exercised in the Old School,
532
Everest, Eev. Thomas, Death of, 477
Exposition de Paris, 594
Eye, Dr. Peters on Diseases of the, 473
Fat, in Bread stuffs, 382; —, in the
Body, Use of, 383
Fibrine, Composition of, 367
Flint Soup, Dr. Mackintosh’s, 167
Friction in Chlorosis, 506
Galloway, Dr., Coroner’s Inquest re¬
specting, 334; —, Evidence of, 339
Gastralgia, Case of, 483
Gerstel, Dr., on Cholera and Homoeo¬
pathy, 328
Gilman, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 156
Gleet, Case of, 590
- Globuline, Composition of, 368
Glonoine in Headache, Dr. Black on,
139
Glucose, Composition of, 377
Goding, Dr., Address on the Cholera,
by, 3
Gombeyr, Dr., on the Oil of Bitter
Oranges, 489
Grape-cure, Rationale of the, 391
Grape-sugar, Composition of, 377
Gray, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest of,
158
Grosvenor, Lord R., Motion for the
Homoeopathic returns of the treat¬
ment of Cholera by, 459;—, Pro¬
posal to eject him from Middlesex,
553
Hsematine, Composition of, 368
Haematuria, Case of, 484
Hahnemann, Pathological Views of, 96;
—, Dr. Sharp on, 98;—,Dogmatism
of, 105; —, Last Doses of, 106,
152 ; —, Correspondence of, 147 ;
—, Sketch of the Life of, 178; —,
and Hunter compared, 180; —,
Integrity of, 181; —, Philanthropy
of, 185; —, Physiology and Pa¬
thology of, 187; —, Antipathy to
Coffee of, 355; —, Birthday of, 525
Hahnemannists, Who are, 107
Hall, Dr., Evidence at Inquest of, 156
Hamilton, Dr., Case of Chorea by, 254
Hartmann, Dr., on Diet, 358
Harvey and Homoeopathy, 689
Hassall, Dr., on the Impurities of Water
359; —, on the Adulterations of
Bread, 360
Hastings, Dr., Cases of Gleet and In¬
flammation of Bladder and Kid¬
neys by, 590
Headaches, Cases of, by Dr. Black,
139; —, by Dr. Russell, 310; —,
by Dr. Pope, 478
Health, Dr. Wilkinson and a Ministry
of, 308
Heart disease, Dr. Helberger on, 315
Helberger, Dr., on Heart disease, 315
Hempel, Dr., Organon of Specific Ho¬
moeopathy by, 93 ;—, Golden rules
for Diet of, 359
Henriques, Dr., on Erysipelas, 235; —,
on Ophthalmia, 397
Henzell, Dr., Evidence before Coroner
of, 337
Hering, Dr., Dr. Hempel on, 103
High-dilutionists, Extravagances of
the, 108
Hirschel, Dr., New Work on Homoeo¬
pathy by, 127
Homoeopathic Health League, Plan of
a, 558
Homoeopathic treatment of Cholera, in
Barbadoes, 1; —, Parliamentary
returns relative to the, 459
Homoeopathists, Remarkable Agree¬
ment among, 93
Homoeopathy, and the Concours in
France, 79; —, in America, 511;
—, Progress towards, 526; —, in
Iceland, 668; — in Denmark, 694
Hospital in the Crimea, Proposed Ho¬
moeopathic, 350, 450
Hospitals in Paris, and Homoeopathy,
79; —, Mode of Election of Offi¬
cers in, 80
Hysteria, Mr. Carter on, 286; —, De¬
finition of, 287 ; —, Moral state in,
293; —, Exciting causes of, 291;
—, Treatment of, 296; —, Im¬
portance of exercise in, 298
Hysteric paroxysm, Different kinds of,
292
Iceland, Dr. Wilkinson on Homoeo¬
pathy in, 668
India, Mode of detecting a thief in, 379
Digitized by
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698
INDEX.
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Insane, Homoeopathic treatment of the,
by Dr. Wittfeld, 153
Intermittent Fever, Drs. Wurmb and
Caspar on, 419; —, Comparative
success of remedies in, 419; —,
Duration of, under treatment, 421;
—, Therapeutics of, 425; —,
Classes of, 428; —, Nux vomica
in, 431; —, Veratrum in, 432
Itching of vxdva, Caladium in 509
Jones, Dr. Bence, on Simple Prescrip¬
tions, 526
Jordan, Mr., Cases of Cholera treated
by, 17
Joslin, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest of,
163
Journals, Medical, of Paris, on Homoe¬
opathy, 86
Kidd, Dr., Case of Rheumatic Peri¬
carditis by, 198; —, on Bright’s
disease, 560
Kidney, Symptoms of enlarged, 561;
—, Symptoms of contracted, 562 ;
—, Case of Inflammation of, 590
*
Lachrymal sac, Inflammation of the,
135
Lactic acid, Composition of, 378
Lancet, The, on the Inquest at Dar¬
lington, 440; —, on the Inquest
at Sheffield, 446; —, on the Me¬
morial to Lord Panmure, 455, 545;
—, on the Homoeopathic Cholera
Returns, 463
Last desperate efforts of the Enemy,
435
Leadam, Dr., Introductory Lecture by,
177
Lecture, Introductory, by Dr. Leadam,
177
Legumin, Properties of, 374
Lechmann’s Trials of Belladonna as a
Prophylactic, 269
Linz , Homoeopathic Hospital of, 521
Liverpool Medical Institution and Ho¬
moeopathy, 689
London Homoeopathic Hospital, Re¬
port of, 512 ; —, Letters of Secre ¬
tary of, 674, 682 ; —, Staff of, 675;
—, Summary of Cases of Cholera
treated at, 678; —, Cases of Cho¬
lera treated at, 683
Long Prescriptions by Homoeopa-
thists, 117
Lutze, on the Inutility of Vaccination,
500
Mackintosh, Dr., Flint Soap manufac¬
tured by, 167
Macloughlin, Dr., Evidence respecting
Homoeopathic Treatment of Cho¬
lera by, 462; —, Letter of, 679
Madden, Dr., on Mineral Waters, 613
Mandt, Dr., Atomistic Method of, 170;
—, Treatment of the Czar Nicho¬
las by, 349
Marcy, Dr., Classification of Homoeo-
pathists by, 109; —, test for de¬
tecting heretics by, 122
Margarin, Composition of, 378
Matteucci’s Demonstration of Endos-
mose, 617
Medical Man, Every Human Being a,
530
Medical Times and Gazette, Difficul¬
ties of Homoeopathy, by the, 447
Meissen, Fete in honour of Hahnemann
at, 519
Memorial to Lord Panmure, 450, 544
Meningitis, Homoeopathic Treatment
of, 6
Mercurius corrosions in Bright’s Dis¬
ease, 566
Meyer, Dr., on Scirrhus of the Sto¬
mach, 321; —, on Sepia , 634
Milk, Composition of, 395; —, in dark
and fair Nurses, different compo¬
sition of, 396; —, Effects of Dis¬
ease on, 396
Mineral Substances taken in Food, 365
Mineral Waters, Dr. Madden on, 613;
—, is their action simple or com¬
plex, 614; —, general character
of, 616; —, peculiarities of their
purgation, 616; —, osmotic action
of, 617; —, their diuretic power,
whence derived, 619; —, homoeo¬
pathic action of, 621; —, can ho-
mceopathists prescribe, 621; —,
tables of, 626; —, guide to the
selection of, 633
Moli&re’s rule for the Faculty, 595
Morgan, Mr., on Tic douloureux, 574
Nature, Assisting, 190
Newbigging, Dr., Trials of Belladonna
as a Prophylactic, by, 276
Newton, Sir Isaac, Diet of, 375
Nitric add in Bright’s Disease, 567
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INDEX.
699
Nitrogenous constituents of Blood, 367
Nitrogenous constituents of Food,
whence derived, 367
Nusser, Dr., Death of, 146
Oats, Diuretic Properties of, 526
Obstetrics, Introduction to a course of
Lectures on, by Dr. Leadam, 177
Ophthalmia, Dr. Henriques on, 397 >
—, Purulent, cases of, 400; —,
Strumous, cases of, 403; —, Trau¬
matic, case of, 407; —, Rheumatic,
cases of, 410; Acute, case of, 481
Oranges, on the action of Oil of Bitter,
489
Orchitis, Case of, 482
Organon of Specific Homoeopathy, by
Dr. Hempel, 93
Panmure, Lord, Memorial to, 452, 544;
—, Reply of, 453
Paralysis, Nitrate of silver in, 370
Paris, Mr., Cases of Cholera treated by,
17
Paris, Dr., Letter of, 460, 599, 681
Paris, Exposition de, 594
Parker, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 156
Pathology, and Homoeopathy, 188; —,
Popularization of, 535
Payne, Dr., Address by, 656
Pectin, Composition of, 376
Pepsin, Properties of, 380
Percentage on Prescriptions, 175
Pericarditis, Case of Rheumatic, bv Dr.
Kidd, 198
Perry, Dr., on Cholera, 464; —, large
doses of, 466; —, Curious Cholera
remedies of, 467; —, Prophylactics
of Cholera proposed by, 468; —,
Extract from a Pamphlet by, 671
Peters, Dr., on Diseases of the Eye,
473 J
Petition of Rejected Homoeopathic Can¬
didates, 83
Piper, Mr., Evidence at an Inquest of,
335
Plethora venosa, induced by Sepia, 636
Pneumonia, Comparative treatment of,
193; —, cases of, 487
Pope, Dr., Cases by, 478
Portal System, Action of Sepia on the,
President of the College of Physicians,
Curious Freaks of the, 595; —,
Infinitesimal Logic of, 598 ; —,
Letter of, 460, 599; —, Elegant
English of, 599; —, Resolution
drawn up by, 460, 600
Preston, Dr., Poem on Homoeopathy
by, 657
Provings, New American, 100
Psora Doctrine, Essence of the, 121
Puff Indirect, the, 597
Quackery of the Old System, 539
Quacks, What to do with the, 538
Resolution of the Medical Council of
the Board of Health, 460, 600; —,
Suggested, 598
Rheumatism, Effects of rest on, 505;
—, tartar emetic in, 527
Rosman, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 163
Roth, Dr., on Swedish Gymnastics, 25,
203
Rummel, Dr., Death of, 145
Russell, Dr., Cases of Headache by,
310; —, on Diet, 353
Saliva, Uses of, 379
Salt, Danger of total Abstinence from,
365
Schron, Dr., Death of, 142
Scirrhus of Stomach, Dr. Meyer on, 321
Searle, Mr., Death of, 145
Secrecy incompatible with Homoeo¬
pathy, 533
Sepia, Dr. Meyer on, 634; —, Action
on Head, 640; —, on Eyes, 641;
—, on Ears, 642; —, on Teeth,
643; —, on Heart, 643; —, on
Lungs, 644; —, on Genitals, 644;
—, on Stomach, 643
Sharp, Dr., on Hahnemann, 98; —,
on Dynamization, 110; —, com¬
pares himself to Plutarch, 119
Shearman, Dr., Evidence at an In¬
quest of, 442
Silver, Nitrate of, in Paralysis, 510
Simpson, Dr., on the compound nature
of Opium, 116
Single Medicines, 116
Smith, Mr., Evidence at an Inquest of,
443
Digitized by
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700
INDEX.
Digitized by
Spermatic Chord, Disease of, 137
Starch, Composition of, 376
Stearine, Composition of, 378
Swedish Gymnastics, Dr. Roth on, 25,
203
Sycosis, Case of, by Mr. Wilson, 327
Symptoms, Definition of, 97 ; —, Pre¬
scribing from, 194
Tables of Cholera cases, 78, 683; —, of
Cholera medicines, 78; —, of
Mineral waters, 626
Tea, Consumption of, 393
Temperance, and Total Abstinence,
384; —, Society of the Landgrave
of Hesse, 390
Terebinthina in “ Bright’s disease,” 565
Tessier, Dr., New Journal of, 654; —,
Peculiar Views respecting Homoe¬
opathy of, 654
Thefts, Allopathic, 179, 463
Theological Tenets and Tendencies,
Allopathy applied to, 528
Tic douloureint, Mr. Morgan on, 574;
—, Earliest notions of, 577 ; —,
Various names of, 578; —, Mean¬
ing of, 578 ; —, Seat of, 579; —,
Advantages of Homoeopathic
treatment of, 581; —, Cases of,
582 ; —, Note on, 588
Tolerance in Medicine, Dr. Wilkinson
on, 306
Trinidad, Cholera in, 23
Trinks, Dr., Clinical Contributions by,
317; —, on the Reform of the |
Central Homoeopathic Association,
661
Turner, Mr., Cases of Cholera treated
by, 17
Vaccination, superseded by Bonnin^.
hausen, 172; —, Lutze’s denun¬
ciation of, 500; —, Influence of,
500 ’
Vienna Medical Society, Discussion on
Homoeopathy in the, 332
Vis medicatrix naturae, 190
Wakley, Mr., on Nullity of Treatment,
609; —, Medical Knowledge
limited by, 546
War, Cholera and the Ministry of
Health, by Dr. Wilkinson, 303
Water, Dr. Hassall on the Impurities
in, 359
Watson, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest
of, 162
Wells, Dr., Case for the Coroner of, 154;
—, Evidence at the Inquest of, 155
Wilkinson, Dr., on War, Cholera, and
the Ministry of Health, 303 ; —,
Address at the Congress by, 529;
—, on Homoeopathy in Iceland*
668
Wilson, Mr., Case of Sycosis by, 327
Wittfeld, Dr., Homoeopathic treatment
of the Insane by, 153
Wolff, Mr., Death of, 146
Womb, Inquest on a Case of
of the, 441
Wood, Dr., Evidence at an Inquest of.
157 *
Wood, Dr. A., Trials of belladonna as a
prophylactic by, 280
Wurmb and Caspar, Drs., on Intermit¬
tent Fever, 419
Yearwood, Dr., Cases of Cholera treated
by, 16
END OF VOL. XIII.
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UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
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