o incline the superior
part of the body forward, for the purpose of facilitating respiration,
increased so much, that he frequently slept with his head reposed on
his knees. The cough became occasionally very violent, and was always
attended with an expectoration of a brown coloured mucus, sometimes
tinged with blood. The abdominal viscera lost their activity. The face
was sometimes turgid and high coloured, at other times pallid and
contracted. A gradual abolition of the powers of the mind ensued, with
a low delirium, and two short fits of phrenzy. The state of the
circulation was very variable; the pulse at the wrists principally
hard and vibrating, rarely soft and compressible; the less pulsations
becoming more indistinct, and at length scarcely perceptible. No
perfectly distinct beat of the heart was felt, but a quick undulating
motion, not corresponding with the pulse at the wrist. Three days
before death the arteries assumed this undulatory motion, corresponded
with the motion of the heart, and, for forty-eight hours, lost the
irregularity of pulsation[3].

[Footnote 3: The celebrated Morgagni has recorded some cases
of organic disease of the heart discovered by dissection, the
symptoms of which do not exactly accord with those observed
in this and the succeeding cases. It should be remembered,
however, that many of the subjects of those cases were not
examined by him, while living, and others but a very short
time before death. But it appears, that, in the last stage of
this disorder, some of the most important symptoms may be
materially changed, especially the state of the pulse,
dyspnoea and palpitations. Thus in the case related above,
and in some others, the pulse became regular, the
palpitations subsided, and the dyspnoea was less observable.
The cases of that accurate anatomist, therefore, are not so
contradictory of those related here, as might at first be
imagined.]

Once or twice the expiring faculties brightened. On the 30th of
November he awoke, as if from death, conversed very pleasantly for two
or three hours, and humorously described scenes, which he had
witnessed in his youth.

On the 4th of December came on the second attack of furious delirium.
Insensibility, and great prostration of strength, ensued. The
respiration became very slow, and obstructed by the accumulation of
mucus in the lungs; the pulse very intermittent, then regular