501 



CANCER. 



CANDELABRUM. 



603 



till the tissue in which they are developed is destroyed, and the system 

 is worn down by their unnatural growth, are hidden in obscurity. 

 Sometimes a suspicion has been created of inoculation, at other times 

 hereditary tendency seemed to account for it. With regard to the 

 first, the evidence is deficient. With regard to the second, it is shown 

 that only a limited number of cases occur in persons whose parents 

 have had the disease previously. Mr. Paget, in his ' Lectures on 

 Surgical Pathology,' says that in only a sixth of the cases of cancer can 

 there be traced any hereditary transmission. As cancer is not an un- 

 common disease, a large proportion of these cases may have no relation 

 of transmission, but have occurred independently in people related. 

 The tendency to the transmission of this disease is. under any circum- 

 stances, not so great as is usuaHy supposed. 



With regard to treatment, this must always be palliative. The 

 disease is necessarily a fatal one, and the presumption always is, 

 in the case of a tumour getting well, that it was not cancer. This 

 ought to put people on their guard against those who pretend to cure 

 cancer. Harmless tumours are always easily cured [TUMOUR], and 

 these are often called cancer, and thus credit is obtained by ignorant 

 or designing men for the cure of this disease. A temporary benefit is 

 sometimes derived from the removal of the tumour. Mr. Paget states 

 that the average duration of life after the appearance of the cancer is 49 

 months. He then adds, " In 49 cases in which the cancer was once 

 removed by operation, the average duration of life after the first obser- 

 vation of the disease was again something more than 49 mouths. I 

 believe, therefore, that the removal of the local disease makes no 

 material difference in the averaye duration of life." But, he adds, it 

 appears " probable that the course of the more rapid cases is retarded 

 by operation." 



With regard to the treatment, it divides itself into local and general. 

 The local treatment is directed either to remove the disease, or to 

 relieve the pain. The evidence is not more satisfactory of a removal of 

 the disease by escharotics, as caustic potass, chloride of zinc, tannic 

 acid, &c., even when applied after producing incised wounds in the 

 tumour, than in removing by the knife. The relief of pain seems a 

 more rational indication, which may be obtained by the application of 

 hemlock, henbane, opium, chloroform, and other local anaesthetics. 

 The general treatment consists in keeping up the strength of the 

 patient, and procuring freedom from pain, and sleep, by the soporific 

 narcotics. 



(Paget, Lectures on Suryical Pathology ; Bennett, Clinical Lectures on 

 the Principles and Practice of Medicine.) 



Cancer in the Domesticated Quadrupeds is oftenest observed in the 

 bitch, and every character and stage of it may be satisfactorily traced. 

 A small, hard, insensible, isolated tumour is felt in one of the teats. 

 It seems to give no pain, and causes no kind of inconvenience ; it is 

 not larger than a pea, perhaps not of greater size than a millet seed. 

 During many months it seems scarcely or not at all to grow, but it 

 never retrogrades. After an indefinite period of time however it begins 

 evidently and rapidly to increase, and smaller ones may be detected at 

 its base. It then assumes an irregular figure, and the whole, or 

 portions of it, become hard of a schirrous hardness, and perfectly 

 incompressible ; other portions are soft, perhaps hollow, and cellated. 

 At length a portion of the tamour begins to become prominent and 

 soft. It is intensely red, then purple, and after a while it breaks, and 

 discharges a corroding ichorous fluid. The tumour is evidently dis- 

 organised deeply within its substance, and a cancerous ulcer, with an 

 irregular elevated edge, is established. Perhaps it heals in the course 

 of eight or ten days, but it soon opens afresh, wider and deeper, and at 

 length the animal is destroyed, either by the general irritation which is 

 established, or by the contamination of the circulating fluids, which are 

 speedily affected by the vitiated secretion of the part. 



Iodine, which has so much power in dispersing glandular and many 

 other tumours, is inert, whether applied externally to the cancerous 

 tumour or ulcer, or administered internally, in order to affect the con- 

 stitution. The excision of the tumour is generally useless after it has 

 acquired any considerable bulk, for it will appear on examination that 

 the constitution is affected, and that the nuclei of other tumours are 

 to be found in the other teats. After the ulcerative process has been 

 once established the case is perfectly hopeless. Even if the nuclei of 

 new enlargements cannot be felt, the animal will nevertheless soon 

 periijh from the development of the disease internally, or, to speak more 

 properly, from metastasis of the disease. 



The only effectual mode of treatment is to remove these nuclei 

 an soon as they are perceived, and before the system can be con- 

 taminated. 



The cause of cancer in these cases is the comparative inactivity of 

 certain parts, which nature intended to be actively and usefully 

 employed. At every period of oestrum in the bitch, there is a 

 secretion of milk in the teats, which not being drawn away in the 

 natural process of suckling, the fluid is long detained in the teats, 

 irritates them by its presence, and produces this specific and fatal 

 inflammation. Hereditary predisposition, over-feeding, and sometimes 

 external violence, are sources of scirrhous tumours. 



Cancer is found also in the vagina and uterus of the bitch, and occa- 

 sionally canker in the ear assumes the character of true cancerous 

 ulcer. All applications and operations are perfectly useless. 



In the teats of the cat, cancer establishes iteeU to an extent that 



ARTS AND SCI. HIV. VOL. II. 



would scarcely be thought credible. The whole of the external 

 surface of the belly often presents one horrible mass of cancerous 

 ulceration. 



The horse is subject to cancer in the eye, and the scrotum exter- 

 nally ; and the kidney, and the vagina, and the uterus, and particularly 

 the pyloric orifice of the stomach internally. The symptoms by which 

 the presence of internal cancer might be indicated are not known, and 

 if they were, no medical skill could arrest the evil. 



Cattle and sheep are subject to cancer of the jaw, the eye, the 

 scrotum, and the udder externally ; and of the pyloric orifice of the 

 fourth stomach internally. 



CANCER, the Crab, the fourth constellation of the zodiac, being one 

 of those in Ptolemy. From the end of January to that of April, its 

 time of coming on the meridian in this country varies from midnight 

 to six in the evening. In the obsolete and useless division of this 

 ecliptic into signs, Cancer is the part of that circle between 90 and 

 120 from the vernal equinox. The surrounding constellation.'! niv 

 Hydra, Leo, Lynx, Gemini, and Canis Minor. 



There are edifying mythological stories in Hyginus, &c. [ZODIAC.] 

 The mythology of the minor constellations is hardly worth a reference. 

 There are no stars of conspicuous magnitude in this constellation. 

 The following are the designations of the brightest : 



Character. 



7 

 8 



No. in Catalogue 



of Flamsteed. 



43 



47 



65 



No. in Catalogue 



of British 



Association. 



2937 



2953 



3055 



Magnitude. 

 4 

 4 

 4 



CANDELA'BRUM, an article of furniture used by the ancients 

 both in their public edifices and private dwellings. The candelabra 

 used in public edifices were usually of a greater size, and made with a 

 large cup at the top to receive a lamp or sufficient unctuous material 

 to feed a large flame : they were also employed for burning incense in 

 the temples. Candelabra have been found in the private dwellings 

 discovered at Herculaneum and Pompeii, consisting of tall slender 

 bronze stands, sometimes with a flat circular top. In other instances 



[Bronze Candelabrum from [A, moveable Candelabrum ; C, moveable shaft ; 

 Herculaneum. 1 1 1, connecting joints of the legs.] 



they have a vase-like top, also flat, or with a socket, and projecting 

 feet at the bottom of the long stem on which the light was placed. 



o o 



