re was increased lividity of countenance, and little or no action of
heart. He had at no time expectorated carbon, even during many severe
paroxysms of cough. Upon inquiry, I found that this man had been a
companion in labour to R. R. (whose case No. 2, is fully reported,) at
Preston-Hall colliery, and from the morbid appearances found in R.'s
chest, and from the character of the coal-work in which both were
engaged, I was induced to believe Duncan's to be a similar case. In
ascertaining his early history, I found him to be a robust powerful man,
though troubled with a cough and hurried breathing from his first
becoming a collier, circumstances very usual with those who engage in
difficult mining operations, and which they erroneously attribute to
want of air, nothing more.

_Post-mortem examination, twenty-four hours after death._--The body was
much swollen from effusion. On removing the anterior part of the chest,
both lungs were much compressed from an immense effusion of a light
brown fluid into the cavities of the chest to the extent of a gallon.
The lungs were of a deep black colour, and irregularly spotted with dark
brown patches of exudation. There were considerable adhesions of the
pleurae, and marks of very general chronic inflammation and false
membrane over the greater part of the pleura costalis. There were
adhesions of the left lung to the pericardium, which was much thickened,
and contained about 14 ounces of a turbid fluid. On removing the left
lung, it seemed large, and felt partially consolidated, and on dividing
it throughout both lobes, it contained a mass of semi-fluid carbon, of a
bright black colour, similar to paint. In this lung, the air-cells were
almost entirely disorganized, unfitting it for the function of
respiration. The upper lobe was divided into a variety of cysts, filled
with carbonaceous matter in a fluid state, into which many of the
smaller bronchi opened, and through which various blood-vessels passed
uninjured. The inferior lobe, when emptied of its contents, was so much
excavated that the parenchymatous substance felt light and flaccid. On
dividing the right lung[16] it exhibited a pure black mass, but not so
fully disorganized as the left. Portions of each lobe were permeable to
air, while other parts formed cysts, containing fluid and solid carbon,
the inferior lobe showed an almost solid mass. The mucous membrane of
the respiratory passages was inflamed and spongy throughout th