LECTURE lY. 



Delivered January 20, 1875. 

 A STUDY OF THE NATURE AND MECHANISM OP FEVER. 



By Horatio C. Wood, M.D. 



I HAVE settled upon a Study of Fever as the subject of this 

 evening's discourse, partly because ni}^ attention has long been 

 attracted to the phenomena of fever, and partly because the 

 saibject is of such general character that every medical man 

 must share the interest in it. In approac^iing a physiologi- 

 cal or pathological process for the purpose of studying its 

 mechanism and nature, its essence should, if possible, be first 

 determined. Fever has been defined to be "an acute de- 

 rangement of all the functions ;" this it certainly is. Yet the 

 definition gives to the mind no idea of the phenomena of fever. 

 When these are analyzed, it will be found that the most 

 important of them are capable of being grouped in three sets : 

 acceleration of the heart's beat, and disturbance of the circu- 

 lation ; nervous disturbance ; elevation of bodily temperature. 

 The first step in my study of fever to-day shall be to demon- 

 strate that of these groups, the first two are merely second- 

 ary to and dependent upon the third, i. e. that the essential 

 part of fever is elevation of temperature. 



A misunderstanding as to my meaning may possibly arise 

 from the unfortunate double value or meaning that attaches to 

 the word fever. It is hardly necessarj- to state that I am 

 using the term in its abstract sense only. In a fever the pulse- 

 rate and the nervous disturbance, for instance, are dependent 



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