WITH RELATION TO VITALITY. 39 



sequent decomposition of it would ensue ; or, 

 if the matter received, acted by virtue of its con- 

 figuration, it would irritate and destroy ; laesion 

 #nd destruction would be the consequence.* 



* The mechanical action of foreign bodies, on the organs 

 of which the ystem is composed, was particularly manifested 

 in the man who had swallowed a number of knives. The 

 circumstances of his case are so singular and extraordinary, 

 that had I not myself seen the knives, and been perfectly 

 acquainted with all the circumstances of the case, from Dr. 

 BABINGTON and Dr. CURRY, two eminent physicians who 

 attended him while he was a patient in Guy's Hospital, 1 

 should feel some difficulty in giving credit to it. The circum- 

 stances were narrated in a manuscript, in the form of a small 

 book, which was found in the pocket of the man, after his 

 death j and, as the particulars stated in it, corresponded with 

 the symptoms of his disease, and especially with the appear- 

 ances on dissection, after death, there is every reason to sup- 

 pose that the whole is correct. He stated his name to be J. 

 CUMMINGS, aged 32 years, by occupation a sailor; that, being 

 at Havre de Grace, he went, accompanied by some of his 

 ship mates, to a fair held in the afternoon of a Sunday. At 

 this fair he saw a company of strolling players performing a 

 variety of tricks ; an account of which he detailed. On their 

 return, to the sailors on board, among the most remarkable 

 of the buffooneries which they had witnessed, (with the excep- 

 tion of Cummings) none appeared so extraordinary, as that of 

 the man who apparently swallowed a number of knives. Cum- 

 mings offered to do the same thing. Being urged by his com- 

 panions, he not only actually swallowed his own knife, bat 

 four other knives, which belonged to the other men. The 

 knives were all clasp-knives with horn handles, such as are 

 commonly used by seamen. In the course of three days, he 



