inftances of this fort have been properly noted in the Society's Reports. 111y. Should feverish symptoms enfue, accompanied with a sense of heaviness, or dull pain in the head or cheft (as frequently happens in confequence of the fevere discipline fo lately undergone), moderate bleeding, together with mild laxatives and cool regimen, will generally afford the defired relief. SECT. SECT. XLIX. OF ASPHYXIA FROM UNRESPIRABLE AIRS. When an animal is immerfed in water, his pulse becomes weak and frequent; he feels an anxiety about his breast, and struggles to relieve it; in thefe ftruggles, he rifes towards the furface of the water, and throws out a quantity of air from the lungs. After this, his anxiety increases, his pulse becomes weaker; the struggles are renewed with more violence; he rifes towards the furface again; throws out more air from his lungs, and makes feveral efforts to infpire; and in fome of these efforts, a quantity of water commonly paffes into his mouth; his skin then becomes blue, particularly about the face and lips; his pulse gradually ceafes; the sphincters are relaxed, and he falls down without fenfation, and without motion. This description of drowning applies, as far as the circumftances admit of comparifon, to the effects occafioned by unrefpirable airs. I have had occafion, fays Dr. BEDDOES, to remark them in a number of perfons, who were curious to try how long they could breathe HYVOL. III. 4 I DROGEN inftances of this fort have been properly noted in the Society's Reports. 11ly. Should feverish fymptoms enfue, accompa nied with a sense of heavinefs, or dull pain in the head or cheft (as frequently happens in confequence of the severe discipline so lately undergone), moderate bleeding, together with mild laxatives and cool regimen, will generally afford the defired relief. SECT. SECT. XLIX. OF ASPHYXIA FROM UNRESPIRABLE AIRS. When an animal is immerfed in water, his pulfe becomes weak and frequent; he feels an anxiety about his breast, and struggles to relieve it; in these ftruggles, he rifes towards the furface of the water, and throws out a quantity of air from the lungs. After this, his anxiety increases, his pulse becomes weaker; the struggles are renewed with more violence; he rifes towards the furface again; throws out more air from his lungs, and makes several efforts to inspire; and in some of these efforts, a quantity of water commonly passes into his mouth; his kin then becomes blue, particularly about the face and lips; his pulse gradually ceases; the sphincters are relaxed, and he falls down without fenfation, and without motion. This description of drowning applies, as far as the circumstances admit of comparison, to the effects occafioned by unrefpirable airs. I have had occafion, fays Dr. BEDDOES, to remark them in a number of perfons, who were curious to try how long they could breathe HY VOL. III. 4 I DROGEN DROGEN GAS. The frequency and debility of the pulse; the blueness of the lips and coloured parts of the fkin, were very obfervable in a minute, or a minute and an half. Befides, dizziness was felt, and the eyes have grown dim; in animals, the transparent cornea has appeared funk and fhrivelled, the skin has become flaccid, and the body was as it were collapsed. Several individuals agree in defcribing the incipient infenfibility produced by the hydrogen air as highly agreeable. During this procefs, I have felt the pulse nearly obliterated. Afterwards, as the perfons have recovered, it becomes fenfibly fuller and ftronger than before the inspiration, This fact, continues Dr. BEDDOES, belongs to a general principle now beginning to be understood; WHEN THE ORDINARY POWERS HAVE BEEN, FOR A SHORT TIME, WITHHELD FROM THE BODY, THEY ACT WITH GREATER EFFECT, as holding the fingers to the fire after handling now occafions fevere aching. In a late publication*, fays that ingenious phyfician, we find many experiments, which confirm the opinion. here advanced, that the unrefpirable airs deftroy by difarming the fyftem of its moving principle, yet do they at the fame time tend to refute the idea of thofe, who • Confiderations on the Medicinal Use of Factitious Air, &c. |
