44 Dr. Burnett's Account of the Effect of Mercurial Vapours 



the transports in company. On their arrival in Cawsand Bay, 

 near Plymouth, on the 5th of July, not one remained on the 

 list for ptyalism. 



The effects of the mercurial atmosphere were not confined 

 to the officers and ship's company ; almost all the stock, con- 

 sisting of sheep, pigs, goats, and poultry, died from it ; mice, 

 cats, a dog, and even a canary bird, shared the same fate, 

 though the food of the latter was kept in a bottle closely 

 corked up. 



The surgeon (Mr. Plowman) informed me, in conversation, 

 that lye had seen mice come into the ward-room, leap up to 

 some height, and fall dead on the deck. 



The Triumph, previous to this event, had suffered consi- 

 derably, by having a number of her men attacked with malig- 

 nant ulcer, which at one time prevailed to a considerable ex- 

 tent in our ships, both at home and abroad; and in many of 

 the men who had so suffered, the ulcers, which had long been 

 completely healed, without even an erasure of the skin, broke 

 out again, and soon put on a gangrenous appearance. 



The vapour was very deleterious to those having any ten- 

 dency to pulmonic affections ; three men died of phthisis pul- 

 monalis, who had never complained, or been in the list before 

 they were saturated with the mercury ; and one man who had 

 suffered from pneumonia, but was perfectly cured, and an- 

 other who had not had any pulmonic complaint before, were 

 left behind at Gibraltar, labouring under confirmed phthisis. 

 Two only out of so large a number affected died from ptyalism, 



gangrene having taken place in their cheeks and tongue : they 

 ad previously lost all their teeth. In the case of a woman, 

 who was confined to bed in the cockpit with a fractured limb, 

 not only were all the teeth lost, but many exfoliations also 

 took place from the upper and lower jaws. 



The mercury showed its effects upon the ship herself, by 

 the decks being covered with a black powder ; but quicksilver 

 was not discovered at any time in this powder in a native or 

 globular state, though the brass cocks of the boilers, and the 

 copper bolts of the ship, were, covered with the metal, the last 

 to some extent within the wood ; a gold watch, gold and silver 

 money kept in a drawer, and likewise some of the iron-work 

 of the ship which had been kept bright, evidently showed the 

 influence of the prevailing atmosphere, being in some places 

 covered with quicksilver. 



In a communication with which Mr. Plowman, surgeon of 

 the Triumph, has obliged me, he states, that those who messed 

 and slept on the orlop and lower decks, with the exception of 

 the midshipmen, suffered equally, while those on the main or 



upper 



