DEATH BY SUFFOCATION. 113 



but oftener a pleasurable feeling, as in the case 

 of the respiration of nitrous oxide. And in the 

 suffocation produced by the gradual abstrac- 

 tion of air in a close room where charcoal is 

 burning, we have the record of the son of a 

 celebrated chymist, that the sensation which 

 precedes the deep sleep that ends in death is 

 agreeable. There is far more pain in recover- 

 ing from the insensibility produced by the 

 abstraction of air than in undergoing it, as I 

 can answer from my own feelings ; and it is, 

 I believe, quite true, what has been asserted, 

 that the pain of being born, which is acquiring 

 the power of respiration, is greater than that 

 of dying, which is losing the power. 



Orn. — I have heard, that persons, who 

 have been recovered from the insensibility 

 produced by hanging, have never any recol- 

 lection of the sufferings which preceded it ; 

 and as the blood is immediately determined 

 to the head in this operation, probably apo- 

 plectic insensibility is almost instantaneous. 



There is on record a very remarkable trial 

 respecting the death of an Italian, who was 

 for many years in the habit of being hanged 

 I 



