Notices respecting New Books. 387 



whose existence has neither been proved by experiment, nor 

 rendered probable by analogy. 



" 9. But there is another point of view in which the same 

 question may be advantageously regarded. The pathologist 

 will have to contemplate the living powers in various states of 

 languor and decay, when they will be found incapable of 

 wholly resisting the laws which govern inanimate matter; 

 and we shall learn, during the progress of the present work, 

 that in certain conditions of the human body, several of the 

 fluids will undergo the same chemical decompositions as 

 would take place in the laboratory. The same observation 

 will apply to the agency of mechanical causes. In a state of 

 perfect health, the fluids of the body will not descend to the 

 inferior parts, agreeably to the law of gravitation, because 

 the vital power opposes itself to this hydraulic phaenomenon, 

 and with an energy in direct proportion, as it would seem, to 

 the robust and vigorous state of the individual ; for if the per- 

 son be reduced by disease, this tendency will be only im- 

 perfectly resisted ; the feet in consequence will swell. The 

 ibllowing experiment of Richerand may be here related, to 

 show how greatly the power manifested in the living body of 

 resisting, with more or less success, the influence of physical 

 force, is enfeebled by disease. He applied bags filled with 

 very hot sand all along the leg and foot of a man who had 

 just undergone the operation for popliteal aneurism ; the 

 artery was tied in two places under the ham. Not only was 

 the usual coldness which follows an interruption of the circu- 

 lation thus prevented; but the extremity, so managed, acquired 

 a degree of heat much greater than the ordinary temperature 

 of the body. The same apparatus, when applied to a healthy 

 limb, was unable to produce that excess of caloric, obviously 

 in consequence of the energy of life opposing such an effect. 



" 10. Mr. Earle has published an interesting paper*, to 

 prove that, when a limb is deprived of its due share of vitality, 

 it is incapable of supporting any fixed temperature, and is pe- 

 culiarly liable to partake of the heat of surrounding media. 

 The cases which are adduced prove also that a member so 

 circumstanced cannot without material injury sustain a degree 

 of heat which would be perfectly harmless, or even agreeable, 

 to a healthy part : thus, the arm of a person became paralytic, 

 in consefjuence of an injury of the axillary plexus of nerves, 

 from a fracture of the collar-bone. Upon keeping the limb for 



• Cases and Observations, illiistratin<; the Influence of the Nervous Sy- 

 ntcni in rcgnlatinj; Animal Heat : by II. Earle, Esi|. Published inthe 7th 

 volume of the Transactions of the Medico-Chirurgical Society. 



3 C 2 nearly 



