S,g6 Account of Mr. Stn'itFs Air-pump Vapsur-hath. 



the immediate uneafinefs and early death of the enclofed 

 animal. 



What proportion of thefe confequences is to be attributed 

 to retarding the impetus of the blood returning to the heart, 

 and confequently producing an earlier collapfe'of that organ, 

 1 leave to anatomills and phyfiologiils to determine. 



Jt was once the faihion among phyficians to explain the 

 fun6iionsof the human body by mechanical principles alone j 

 to confider it as an hydraulic machine, and its fluids as af- 

 cending and defcending bv the ordinary powers of fuch en- 

 gines. From having applied the laws of dead matter to the 

 ruutStions of the living body too extenfively, they bev\ildered 

 themfelvcs, and conlradiMed each other. Ncveuhelefs, in 

 this age of perfe6led anatomy and improved phyfiologv, we 

 find Dr. Darwin, who is faid to have done as much for the 

 latter fcience as fir Ifliac Newton did for natural philofophy, 

 propofing " to Hill the aftion of the heart and arteries by 

 mechanical means." This, he fuppofes, may be effc6ted by 

 fufpending a bed fo as to whirl the patient round, with his 

 head neareft the centre of motion. For this purpofe, a per- 

 pendicular fliaft might have one end pafs into the floor, and 

 the other into a beam in the ceiling, with a horizontal arm, 

 to which a fmall bed might be attached. 'I'hc efleds of 

 whirling a patient in this fituation, fo as by the centrifugal 

 force to propel the blood from the liiperior into the inferTor 

 parts of the body, would certainly be confuierable, and, he 

 obfcrves, might probably add to the means of curing fevers. 

 Be this as it may, the relief which many perfons have ex- 

 perienced from the ufe of the Air-pump Vapour-bath, autho- 

 rizes me to affirm, that it is capable of producing, with eafe 



and fafety to the patient, all the good eflf<fts which Dr. Dar- 

 win could poflibly expert from his centrifugal machine. 

 It would neither be compatible with mv attainments, nor 



your plan, to defcribe the medical ufes of the Air-pump Fa^ 

 psur-batb, I fliall therefore barely mention, that it has been 



tound extremely beneficial in a variety of difeafes fpccified in 



a treatife lately publiflied, intitled, '< F&S^f, and Obfervations 



refpefting the Ufe of Smith's Air-pump Vapour-bath in 



Gout, Rheumatirm,Pa!fy, &c. &c." 



Laltly, It ohly remains that I ofTer vou fome explanation 



of the niechanical principles of the Apparatus, according to 



the references on the annexed plate. 



J^xplanqt'ion of the Plate. 



Fig. 1. (Plate VII.) a view of that end of the machine to 

 which the cxhauflerj Sec. are affixed. A, the body of the 



nnichine. 



