Setds of the Crotun Tiglium. 71 



of a full dose of the croton solution were very apparent on 

 one occasion, and equally so on a subsequent attack from the 

 same cause. In another case, where similar symptoms existed, 

 but not from the same cause, in a gentleman from the West 

 Indies, and most probably the precursor of mania, it was 

 equally beneficial. In this case, though a person of a very 

 highly cultivated mind, there were present all the symptoms 

 which have been described as arising from the belief and super- 

 stitious dread impressed on the minds of negroes in West 

 India plantations from the spells and incantations of Obi, or 

 African witchcraft. In all cases in which there is a super- 

 fluity of the secretion of bile regurgitating into the sto- 

 mach, it is of service unless the medicine itself is rejected 

 by vomiting ; and in the removal of jaundice from obstruction 

 or spasms in the bowels, (perhaps equally in those of the 

 biliary passages,) it proved most beneficial and agreeable in its 

 eiFects, as reported to me by the gentleman who furnished me with 

 the seeds. In acaseofa child, about two years of age, with almost 

 total want of appetite, and labouring under what appeared to be an 

 incurable state of tympanites intestinalis, it was prescribed in doses 

 to cause two or three stools daily. In four days the child, belong- 

 ing to poor parents, was brought back to me, with an appearance 

 so much improved, in so short a period of time, as scarcely to be 

 credible ; the return of appetite, and a liveliness of countenance, 

 and such a reduction in the tympanitic symptoms, that I formed 

 the most sanguine hopes of ultimate recovery. Though the 

 mother made many promises to return again, she neglected 

 them, and though no determinate conclusion can be drawn 

 from the early symptoms of amendment in this case, which 

 was truly hopeless at first view, I am induced to think, that, 

 in the cure of this most stubborn complaint, much benefit may 

 be expected from the cautious, but steady, use of the croton 

 oil. In a case of excessive corpulence, with the most alarm- 

 ing symptoms of determination to the head, amounting at 

 times almost to apoplexy, a few doses of the solution produced 

 the most signal benefit; and, without having had occasion 

 to let blood, every symptom was removed which could have 



