he gave up the idea of death. About the
ninth day the wound presented a healthy, rosy appearance, and as the
patient was cheerful he was allowed to leave his bed. After a few hours
the nurse heard the noise of labored breathing, and on investigation
found the patient apparently in a dying condition. He was given
stimulants and regained consciousness, but again relapsed, and died in
a few moments. At the necropsy the heart was found healthy, but there
were two or three spots of extravasated blood in the brain, and
evidences of cerebral congestion. Vos remarks that he remembers a case
he had when dressing for Mr. Holden at St. Bartholomew's Hospital: "A
man who had been intemperate was rolling a sod of grass, and got some
grit into his left palm. It inflamed; he put on hot cow-dung poultices
by the advice of some country friends. He was admitted with a
dreadfully swollen hand. It was opened, but the phlegmonous process
spread up to the shoulder, and it was opened in many places, and at
last, under chloroform, the limb was amputated below the joint. The
stump sloughed, and pus pointing at the back of the neck, an opening
was again made. He became in such a weak state that chloroform could
not be administered, and one morning he had such a dread of more
incisions that, saying to us all standing round his bed, 'I can bear it
no more, I must now die,' he actually did die in a few minutes in our
presence. His was the last arm that Mr. Holden ever amputated at St.
Bartholomew's."

CHAPTER XVIII.

HISTORIC EPIDEMICS.

A short history of the principal epidemics, including as it does the
description of anomalous diseases, many of which are now extinct, and
the valuable knowledge which finally led to their extinction, the
extraordinary mortalities which these epidemics caused, and many other
associate points of interest would seem fitting to close the
observations gathered in this volume. As the illustrious Hecker says,
in the history of every epidemic, from the earliest times, the spirit
of inquiry was always aroused to learn the machinery of such stupendous
engines of destruction; and even in the earliest times there was
neither deficiency in courage nor in zeal for investigation. "When the
glandular plague first made its appearance as a universal epidemic,
whilst the more pusillanimous, haunted by visionary fears, shut
themselves up in their closets, some physicians at Constantinople,
astonished at the phenomena opened