ADDISON^ ON BLOOD-CORPUSCLES. 173 



sauguinisj implies that the person, before symptoms of" fever 

 appear, is ah'eady the subject of disease. In the former 

 examples the conditions are independent of, in the latter they 

 are a part of the person ; and as all contagious fevers observe 

 certain times and stages, indicative of cellular action, so it 

 is to be expected that these periods would be more marked 

 and regular in fevers of the first class — which arise from 

 things without, and where the patient has only the fever and 

 its concomitants to overcome — than in fevers of the second 

 class, which arise from things within the person, and where 

 he has a previous disease and the fever, with its effects, to 

 battle with. Smallpox, scarlet-fever, and typhus are more 

 regular in their phenomena than hectic, puerperal, traumatic, 

 and typhoid fevers ; a consequence, it would seem, of the 

 conditions upon Avhich a proposed classification of fevers is 

 founded. 



If the proposition, that the red corpuscles of blood are 

 special elements of fever be established, it would seem to 

 follow that fever, from whatever source, may generate a 

 contagious virus, — that is to say : fever from the circulation 

 of blood through places of unhealthy local disease in one 

 person, may originate fever in a healthy person by inoculation, 

 or infection through the air ; in other words, a fever of the 

 second class may generate a fever of the first class. This is 

 in correspondence with the facts, that fever (a typhoid fever) 

 supervening on chronic diarrhoea, dysentery, or scurvy, 

 occasions typhus in the healthy attendants on the sick ; that 

 traumatic or erysipelatous fever may give rise to puerperal 

 fever, and that puerperal fever may be propagated amongst 

 puerperal women. 



Let us give some illustrations. In overcrowded habitations 

 when distress or famine prevails, chronic diarrhoea, dysentery, 

 scurvy, and other diseases from impoverished and un- 

 wholesome living, abound. The anatomical lesion of chronic 

 diarrhoea and dysentery is ulceration in the mucous membrane 

 of the bowel. 



Under such circumstances, it is very usual for forms of 

 fever to make their appearance amongst the sick ; and if no 

 epidemic atmosphere be present the first case of fever must 

 be referred to the circulation of blood through the degene- 

 rating local lesions; that is to say, the avenue of fever is 

 within the person ; it is fever of the second class, and the 

 stages or periods will probably be ill-marked and uncertain. 



But if subsequently, and as a consequent of the first case of 

 fever, fever makes its appearance among the healthy at- 

 tendants upon the sick — then this second case of fever differs 



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