FUNCTIONS OF MUSCULAR TISSUE. 327 



is tardy. This form of contraction is seldom seen in adult Mammalia, except 

 (as will be presently shown) when death has taken place from certain diseases 

 that have a special influence on the blood and muscular system; but it is stated 

 by M. Brown-Sequard 1 'to present itself more constantly in young animals, and 

 to be (so to speak) an exaggeration of the ordinary modus operandi of their 

 muscles, which, during life, are much more slowly thrown into contraction by 

 mechanical stimuli, than they are in adults. The most remarkable manifesta- 

 tions of it yet observed, however, have been witnessed after death from Cholera 

 and Yellow Fever; for in these cases, the muscular contractions, though capable 

 of being excited by mechanical stimulation applied to the muscles themselves, 

 are frequently spontaneous, and sometimes give rise to movements strongly re- 

 sembling the ordinary actions of the living state. Thus, in one case, about ten 

 minutes after the cessation of the respiration and circulation, Mr. N. B. Ward 

 saw the eyes open, and move slowly in a downward direction ; this was followed, 

 a minute or two subsequently, by the movement of the right arm (previously 

 lying by the side)' across the chest ; there was also a slight movement of the 

 right leg; and these movements of the limbs (those of the eyes occurring only 

 once) were repeated to a greater or less degree four or five times, and fully half 

 an hour elapsed before they entirely ceased. In a case observed by Mr. Helps, 

 the subject of which was a man of remarkable muscular development, the fingers 

 continually twitched and trembled after the respiration had ceased, and the 

 fibres of the muscles were in a state of rhythmical motion, so that when the fin- 

 gers were pressed on the belly of the biceps, a sensation as of the pulsation of 

 an artery was plainly felt ; the muscles of the arm acted forcibly on even slight 

 irritation, the forearm being powerfully flexed when the biceps was struck with 

 the side of the hand, and the fist being doubled or the hand extended, according 

 as the flexors or extensors on the forearm were irritated in the same manner. 

 Various other muscles were acted on, with the same results; and it was noticed 

 in this case that the longer the muscles were allowed to remain without irrita- 

 tion, the more powerfully did they contract when excited. 3 In regard to the 

 occurrence of this phenomenon after death from Yellow Fever, several interest- 

 ing observations have been recorded by Dr. Bennet Dowler, of New Orleans. 3 

 In one case, the subject of which was an Irishman, aged twenty-eight, the fol- 

 lowing series of movements took place spontaneously, not long after the cessa- 

 tion of the respiration : first, the left hand was carried by a regular motion to 

 the throat, and then to the crown of the head ; the right arm followed the same 

 route on the right side; the left arm was then carried back to the throat, and 

 thence to the breast, reversing all its original motions; and finally the right 

 arm and hand did exactly the same. In another case, that of a Kentuckian, 

 aged twenty -five, the movements were only exhibited on mechanical stimulation : 

 when the arm was extended to an angle of 45 from the trunk, and was struck 

 with the hand, or with the flat side of a hatchet, the hand was carried inwards 

 to the epigastrium ; but when the arm was extended upon the floor, so as to 

 form a right angle with the body, the hand slapped the mouth and nose. In 

 like manner, when the leg was hanging down, if the flexors of the hamstring 

 muscles were struck, the heel was drawn up against the buttock. The contrac- 

 tility began to decline in the third hour; and by the fourth, all motions of the 

 limbs ceased, though the pectoral muscles assumed the ridgy or lumpy form 

 when percussed. Five hours after death, the contractility had ceased, and 



1 "Gazette Medicale," Dec. 22, 1849. 



2 See Mr. Fredk. Barlow's " Observations on the Muscular Contractions which occasion- 

 ally occur after Death from Cholera," in the "Medical Gazette" for Nov. 9, 1849, and Feb. 

 1, 1850. 



3 "Experimental Researches on the Post-Mortem Contractility of the Muscles," re- 

 printed from the "New York Journal of Medicine," 1846. 



