306 Historical 



pressure, and second, at a more or less pronounced decompression. 

 Therefore I again put off till a better time the realization of my wishes. 

 (Vol. I, p. 181.) 



These wishes I had the good fortune to realize, thanks to the 

 generous assistance of my learned colleague. And we shall see 

 that I succeeded in proving how closely his anticipations agreed 

 with the truth. But for this demonstration, I refer the reader to 

 the second part of my book. 



In the third part he will find the detailed history of the latest 

 aeronautic ascensions to great heights, and particularly of the one 

 which had so fatal an end. We shall then specify definitely the 

 causes of this disaster and draw from it the lessons it contains. 

 Limiting ourselves to the subject of the present chapter, we shall 

 say that the interpretations, given by the different scientific jour- 

 nals and others, of the causes of the death of Sivel and Croce- 

 Spinelli are merely those whose discussion fills the preceding 

 pages. There is nothing new in them which deserves to be noted 

 here, and all these ideas had already been given by authorities of 

 greater weight. 



We shall except only the short discussion which arose on this 

 subject within the Academy of Medicine. We see that, in the 

 opinion of MM. Woillez, Mialhe, and Colin, the diminution of the 

 weight sustained by the body again plays the principal part; in 

 spite of the elementary principles of physics of which M. Giraud- 

 Teulon, M. Gavarret and many others have already reminded 

 them, they still harp on the theory of the Universal cupping-glass. 

 But M. Colin adds to that a hypothesis which alone would deserve 

 the honor of repetition, for it had been only very briefly suggested 

 by a few former authors, and M. Maissiat did not go so far as to 

 give it such importance. In his opinion, the escape of gases into 

 the intestine and the expansion of these gases by the decrease in 

 pressure played the chief part in the fatal ending. Here is the 

 passage in full: 



M. Larrey: The ingenious experiments of M. Woillez and the new 

 researches he has made on the spiroscope would no doubt lead him 

 to the physiological study of respiratory phenomena at different alti- 

 tudes, and then to the hygienic prophylaxis of the violent disturbances 

 of this important function, under other influences. We should also 

 decide upon therapeutic measures, when asphyxia, for example, is 

 imminent and causes complex symptoms which rapidly become fatal, 

 through sudden rarefaction of the air or through the progressive 

 diminution of the air pressure. Finally, it would be desirable to 

 determine and check the measures by which artificial respiration could 



