FOUR COURSES OF LOWELL LECTURES. <J81 



of them to create a pressure for the expulsion of the gases, 

 the rate of efflux being regulated by stop-cocks. The 

 platform on which I stood with the apparatus was of lim 

 ited dimensions ; and, while passing by the gasometers, I 

 hit a six-pound iron weight which lay on the top of one of 

 the gasometers, when it fell from the height of four to four 

 and a half feet upon my right foot, the great toe of which 

 received a severe blow, causing me to draw a long breath ; 

 and, before I could recover my natural breathing, I became 

 satisfied that I should not faint, although the pain was in 

 tense. The sensation of the foot was as if standing in a 

 fluid, which, in this case, was blood, as appeared on draw 

 ing off my boot at the hotel, the stocking being soaked 

 with blood. The nail of the large toe was torn up at the 

 root, and merely hung like a loose shingle on a roof. I 

 went on half an hour or more, and finished the lecture. 

 Blood continued to issue from the wound during ten days, 

 the bloody dressings being removed every morning ; and 

 bleeding kept the inflammation down. The nail grew out 

 again very slowly. At the end of eight months it had not 

 entirely covered the original surface. In my childhood I 

 had split this toe with an axe, and the nail grew out after 

 that accident, carrying the mark of the axe along with it 

 This marking was still preserved in the recent restoration, 

 but the parts of the nail were not united, or only at the 

 root, and grew out separately, but side by side, and are not 

 perfectly united now (1861), twenty-two years after the 

 injury. In connection with the subject in hand, I exhibited 

 the formation of water from its two elements, oxygen 

 and hydrogen, and adverted to its three physical con 

 ditions of vapor, fluid, or water and ice. In speaking 

 of the permanence of ice in very cold climates, I quoted 

 memoriter Cowper's graphic description of the palace con 

 structed of ice, in 1740 or 1745, on the river Neva, 

 near St. Petersburg, to celebrate the marriage of Prince 

 Galitzin. 



