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The Cafe of a Perfon who lived fourteen Years without any Dif charge from his Alimentary Canal.

A

MAN aged fifty years, who lived in Richland county, South-Carolina, fourteen years before he died, had nothing to pass through his alimentary canal. I got acquainted with him two years before he died; he informed me, that twelve years before, he was taken with a violent pain in the region of the stomach, a constipation of intestines, and a puking of every thing he eat. The pain continued about fifteen days, and went off by degrees; but the conftipation and puking continued. At the time I first got acquainted with him, he informed me, that he could keep down whatever he eat, more than about three hours, and not longer; that flight fickness came on and increased, until the whole of what he eat was thrown off. He died about eighteen months ago, very much emaciated; fo much fo, that he could not walk, or even turn himself in his bed. He died without pain or fever-with pure debility.

Query.-Where was the stoppage? was it at the lower part of the duodenum ?* R. HENDRICK.

DR. BENJAMIN Rush.

* 1 knew a boy at school, whofe intestines were seldom excited to an evacu ation, more frequently than once in a week, and then only in a small degree. He mostly in a few hours after his meals, discharged the excrementitious parts of his food by vomiting; which he could excite at pleasure. He swallowed his food with little maftication, and used afterwards to fit at his defk, and ruminate at pleasure. Editor.

Abstract of a Cafe of Vaccine, of uncommon Magnitude, (With a plate.) By the EDITOR.

'ROM a desire to present a view of the outline of an enor

FROM

mous vaccine pock, which occurred in the courfe of my practice, I am induced to extract the following history of the cafe, from a communication printed in the 7th volume of the New-York Medical Repository.

Molly Allen, a mulatto of twenty-five years of age, was vaccinated on the 9th May 1803, with infection of a year old. This attempt, as might be expected, failed. On the 18th, it was repeated with infection of the tenth day, then two days old, by two punctures of the right arm. One only took effect, On the eighth day, there was great lo cal itching, with commencing tumefaction of the axillary glands, and febrile irritation. The pock was not much larger than ufu- › al at this stage. On the ninth day, the tumefaction of the skin indicated the presence of an areola, which was fufficiently evi dent the next day. I re-vaccinated her on the ninth, from the primary pock, to ascertain the conftitutionality of the disease, as recommended by Mr. Bryce. Though fo late in the disease, it took effect, and advanced fo rapidly, that an areola commenced on the third day. Its fcab came off the twelfth day, whilst that of the primary pock adhered till the twenty-fourth, Several little fiery-looking pimples appeared around the original pock on the tenth day, fome within, and fome without the areola, which difappeared in a few days. The patient was ve ry inattentive, by ufing her arm in washing, &c. in the freeft: The pain, and enlargement of the axillary glands increased; and the pock was now nearly half an inch in diameter, very perfect, and turgid with a limpid fluid. From her irregularity, I did not fee her again till the fourteenth day. On R-r

manner.

VOL. I.

the thirteenth, she struck the pock against a lock, which broke it; and the fluid oozed out in great abundance, as might be expected, for it was now, confiderably upwards of an inch in diameter. The fecond pock also, was fully one-fourth of an inch, though it was barely the termination of the fifth day. A fcab had commenced in the centre of the primary pock, and was about one-third of an inch over. Its edges were plump, well defined, and elevated at least a quarter of an inch, with a hard tumid bafe, of between three and four inches diameter. Much itching, and confiderable fever, continued feveral days, though less than might have been expected, from the size, and repeated irritation of the disease, from blows, &c. It continued its courfe favourably; and by the feventeenth, the fcab was more than half an inch over; the circumference had greatly augmented, and an irregular deficcation had commenced, owing, I prefume, to the continual rupture of the edges from injuries. Hence the uneven appearance of the outline of the pock at this period: (See Fig. 5.) The fcab, in a few days, was perfectly formed, and fell off in separate pieces, from the constant moisture (from lead water) which had allowed the cuticle to contract irregu-. larly. The fecond pock was larger than the dark circle E in the centre of the outline-reprefenting the extent of the scab on the seventeenth day, when the outline was taken.

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This cafe was attended with no very unpleasant circumftances, although fuch frequent injuries were fuftained. For further particulars, the reader is referred to the Medical Repofitory.

The outline in the engraving, was taken on the feventeenth day, when it measured an inch and four-tenths in diameter, at its broadeft part, from A to B,-and from C to D, one inch and two and one-half tenths. The dotted circle represents the re gular pock before it had been injured, fo as to dry up irregu larly.

One circumstance, worthy of notice, relating to this extraor dinary pock, is, that on the fame day, and with the fame infection which produced it in the above cafe, I vaccinated a black

infant of two months old; I had previously failed in exciting the disease in it, with a scab of four months old, and infection of thirty days preferved on glass. The child from this third attempt, had a regularly progreffing pock, of the ufual fize. A cutaneous eruption of small watery blifters over its head and body, with which it had been plagued from its birth, and for which a variety of remedies had been employed, difappeared during the progress of the vaccine, to which, I believe, the cure was owing. No unufual occurrence took place from the vaccine. A number of small pimples appeared on the ninth day within the sphere of the areola, but fubfided in two or three days.

Defcription of the curved Biftoury, as improved by DR. PHYSICK, for the Operation of Fiftula in Ano. (With a plate.) By R. B. BISHOP, Surgeon's Inftrument-maker, in a letter to the EDITOR.

Philadelphia, January 1st, 1805.

SIR,

THIS

HIS bistoury has a filver guard, to prevent the edge from cutting any part of the finus in its introduction. The advantages it poffeffes over the one recommended by Mr. Whately, are, the fimplicity of its conftruction, and the facility of relieving the blade from the guard; as it does not, like the one alluded to, require an affiftant to manage the instrument, which must be fomewhat embarraffing to the operator. This inftrument has been feveral times ufed in Philadelphia with great approbation.

Fig. 1. The inftrument in the handle, half open.

Fig. 2. The filver guard.

aa. A fmall button on each fide of the guard, to relieve it from the blade.

b. A flott which flides upon the screw c. Fig. 1. to secure it upon the blade.

The blade is relieved by preffing forward either of the buttons moft convenient to the operator. The guard is left in

the finus till the operation is completed.

Fig. 3 and 4. The extremities of the blade and of the guard, to fhew the manner of their connection.

It is evident, that this inftrument comprifes in itself, the advantages of both the blunt, and the sharp-pointed bistoury.

I am, Sir,

Your most obedient fervant,

R. B. BISHOP.

Some Account of the Agave Americana, which flowered at the Woodlands, in the Summer of 1804. Extracted from a Letter of WILLIAM HAMILTON, ESQ. to the EDITOR, dated January 13th, 1805. (With a plate.)

"I

RAISED the plant from a fucker of that, which flourished at Springetsberry, in the year 1778; of course there can be no difficulty in determining its age. During the last fummer, its height was between four and five feet, above the cafe in which it grew.

"From the increased fize of its base, on the 25th of May laft, I first observed its inclination to flower. In a day or two afterwards, the fprout appeared, in the form of an overgrown fhoot of afparagus. That habit continued, until the stalk was better than eight feet high, when the racemes began to appear. "On the 4th of June, the stem had grown two feet fix inches. By the enclosed ftatement, you will learn the height to

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