~ BxpP.} . 454 
cough or screatus, when excited by the stimulus 
of mucus so to do: or an effort to restrain either 
action under pressure of the same stimulus, will 
prove it instantly. It is supposed that when the 
voluntary effort is made and is found impractica- 
ble to any efficient extent, the difficulty is owing 
to a state of extreme debility of the muscles neces- 
sary to the act—and to patients exhausted by tuber- 
_ eulous cough or ulcerated vomicas, which tireby 
perpetual efforts to expectorate, great distress is 
often produced by this inability to rid the ]ungs of 
the still oppressive load. It is in such cases a sti- 
mulant like ammonia is supposed by Dr. Paris, 
to act mechanically, in promoting a rejection of the 
accumulated mucus. Irefer the effect here to an 
evanescent tone communicated to the general sys- 
tem by the diffusible stimulant, and not to any 
mechanical action on the respiratory muscles. The 
latter mode of accounting for an evident fact, is, f 
think, quite unphilosophical. The word mechani- 
cal, ifin any other than a figurative way used, 
is inappropriate and calculated to mislead. Shall 
ihe powerful, diffusible, volatile stimulant, marked 
by the intensity of its action, and its known power 
io pervade in a few moments the whole system—be 
called an expectorant, simply because increascd, 
though transitory tone, is communicated to the mus- 
cles concerned in expectoration, (now worn down 
with effort and fatigue,) in the sweep of its general 
stimulating sway? Here then, is no expectorant, 
hut by an impulse common to the parts of the 
whole, by which excitability is renewed. 
Section } of this class leads us to the starting 
point of this canvass of Dr. Paris’ classification— 
emetics. They are, truly, expectorants ; they cause. 
coughing and screatus, by which the present con- 
tained fluids of the lungs and trachea are viggii 
sie erig, “ee _— - * 
lently ejected or expectorated. ‘The concussion 0 
