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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



he had prepared." From the time of Noah 

 to that of Long, Morton, Wells, and War- 

 ren, the history of anaesthesia is concisely 

 summarized in the first chapter of the pres- 

 ent work ; a history terminating in the final 

 success of the search, which man has been 

 making from the remotest antiquity, for the 

 means of arresting or annihilating physical 

 pain. " The venerable Nestor came to the 

 relief of the wounded Machaon with a medi- 

 cated poultice composed of cheese, onions, 

 and meal, mixed with the wine of Pramnos. 

 . . . Some preparation of opium or of In- 

 dian-hemp it may have been with which, 

 after the ten years' siege was ended, beauti- 

 ful Helen drove away sad memories from 

 the minds of her husband and his friends, 

 making them drink of wine into which she 

 cast a drug presented to her by the Egyptian 

 princess Polydamna. Most potent this same 

 nepenthe must have been, for we are told 

 (Odyssey, iv, 220) that it delivered men 

 from grief and wrath, and caused oblivion 

 of every ill." Some of the ancient sopor- 

 ifics are well-known to us, as opium, Indian- 

 hemp, mandragora ; and probably they em- 

 ployed carbonic-acid gas also. Mandragora 

 was the favorite among the Greeks ; infused 

 in wine, it was known as morion. " Apu- 

 leius states that half an ounce of this would 

 render a person insensible even to the pain 

 of an amputation. Dioscorides taught that 

 the sleep thus produced might continue 

 four hours or more ; hence, no doubt, vari- 

 ous legends which were by Shakespeare in- 

 terwoven into the story of Juliet. The wine 

 mingled with myrrh which was offered, ac- 

 cording to the custom of the kind-hearted 

 Jewish women of the day, to Jesus on the 

 cross, was unquestionably this same man- 

 dragora-winc." During the time of Dante 

 the following soporific, Hugo di Lucca's 

 prescription, was used for patients about to 

 undergo operations : they were caused " to 

 breathe the vapors given off from a sponge 

 moistened with warm water, after it had 

 been thoroughly steeped in a decoction of 

 opium, deadly nightshade, hyoseyamus, man- 

 dragora, hemlock, ivy, and lettuce. Sponges 

 thus medicated were to be dried in the sun- 

 shine, and stored for use as occasion might 

 require. 



During the eighteenth century trials were 

 made for anaesthetic purposes of hypnotism, 



freezing mixtures, intoxication, and pressure 

 upon the trunks of the principal nerves. All 

 these methods were, of course, unsatisfac- 

 tory ; chemical science, indeed, was not yet 

 sufficiently advanced for the more recent 

 discoveries. In 1799 Sir Humphry Davy dis- 

 covered the intoxicating effects of nitrous 

 oxide gas. Sulphuric ether was employed 

 by Dr. Pearson, of Birmingham, in 1*785, as 

 a means of relief for spasmodic asthma ; 

 and in 1805 by Dr. Warren, of Boston, in 

 the later stages of consumption. It was 

 first used to produce insensibility to pain 

 during a surgical operation by Dr. W. C. 

 Long, of Jefferson, Georgia, in 1842. This 

 great event, says Professor Lyman, " was 

 thus simply recorded by Dr. Long in his 

 ledger: ' James Venablc, 1S-12. Ether and 

 excising tumor, $2.00.' In the same year, 

 William T. G. Morton employed sulphuric 

 ether in tooth-pulling. Then came nitrous 

 oxide or laughing-gas, used in tooth-pulling 

 in 1844, by Horace Wells. In October, 

 1840, Morton made the surgical use of ether 

 known to the world. " From that date the 

 success of anaesthesia in surgery was placed 

 beyond all doubt." In 1847 the eminent 

 physiologist, Flourens, discovered the anaes- 

 thetic properties of chloroform, and it came 

 rapidly into use. These are the facts over 

 which the endless controversies of the rival 

 claimants have been raised controversies 

 which this is not the place to follow. 



From the history of anaesthesia Professor 

 Lyman passes to its physiology and its phe- 

 nomena ; discussing the various procedures 

 by which it is produced, whether generally 

 or locally, the statistics and the treatment 

 of the accidents resulting from it, the medi- 

 co-legal relations of the subject, and the 

 various classes of cases in which the anaes- 

 thetic substances may be employed. The 

 larger part of his book is taken up by a 

 detailed examination of the numerous sub- 

 stances classifiable under his title, no less 

 than forty-seven being enumerated and de- 

 scribed, besides which other methods than 

 the posological, as anaesthesia by electricity, 

 by rapid respiration, and by cold, arc stud- 

 ied. A feature of the work is the citation 

 of remarkable illustrative cases. The ex- 

 perience of Dr. J. Marion Sims (p. 58), in a 

 case of apparent death from chloroform, is 

 one of those dramatic recitals which give 



