Application of this Fluid and Eleclricity to Medicine. 321 



poflefTcd of great vitality, which I never obferved to be the 

 cafe in frogs when tormented by ftrong ele6lric fparks. All 

 thefe fa(^\s, to which many more of a finiilar kind might be 

 added, confirm the great atlivity of Galsanifm in compa- 

 rifon of eleilricitv. Hence it refults, that the fluid of the 

 Voltaic pile may be very iifeful in cafes in which common 

 eleftricity would not have fufficient atlivity. You are ac- 

 quainted with fome of the experiments which I made in con- 

 jundlion with my colleagues Giulio and Roffi : we made 

 others, Itillmore interelting, which have determined phyfio- 

 Jogical fa6tj, before doubtful for want of being verified. We 

 then tried an application of it in feveral difeafes with the 

 greated fuccefs. Three of the cafes are as follow : 



" A lady about thirty years of age, after fevere pains in the 

 head, Io(t the fight of the right eye. C. Roffi being con- 

 lulted in regard to this malady, after a elofe examination of 

 the eye, which appeared to be as found and to look as well 

 as the left, concluded that it muit arife from a palfy of the 

 optic nerve, or what is called a gutla ferena, which fuftered 

 the patient to fee only, as it were, through a thick mift ; 

 which increafed her misfortune, fiuce it deranged the fight 

 of the other eye, fo that (he was always afraid of falling, not 

 being able to diftinguiili well with the riiiht eye the objefts 

 which flie handled. Roffi being fick, fent her to me, that I 

 might make an application of Galvanifm. I formed a pile 

 of thirty pairs of plates like thofe already mentioned, and 

 employing gold wire as conduftors, I cauied the Galvanic 

 current to enter near the exterior angle of the eye, and to 

 iflTue fometimcs at the eyebrow, fomelimes by the ophthal- 

 mic ramus which palles through the orbital foramen, and 

 fometimcs near the interior angle of the fame eye. The ope- 

 ration was very painful ; it caufcd abundance of tears to flow; 

 but, after fucceflive Galvanic fliocks fur haU an hour, the eye 

 began to fee a little belter. That I might not fatigue my 

 patient too much, and that nature miglit have time l() a6t, 

 the operation was fufpended till the evening, when it was 

 repeated for half an hour. The next day the eye btgan to 

 diitinguifh the fia;ure of bodies. Having repeated the ope- 

 ration for tiiree davs following, the lady was not only al;'e to 

 diflinguifli the figure of bodies, and people's features, but alfo 

 the pupils of their eyes. Before this operation, in confe- 

 quence of a confultation with Dr. .John Baplilt Aiiforini, lird 

 phyfician of the Hoi'pital de la Charild, I ha<l Galvanized a 

 young woman, twentv-feven vears of age, of a melancholy 

 temperament, who, after fome (light attacks, had a hemi- 

 plegia of the right fide, which affected in particular the arm, 



Vol. XV. ^^o. 60. V tiie 



