MINUTE ORGANISMS TO INFLAMMATION 403 
very voraciously, swallowed the bud of the kail plant, and this became impacted 
in the upper part of the oesophagus. Of course she could not swallow, and 
she came to my house surgeon to be relieved. He made certain attempts, 
which were not successful, and three days after the accident I was asked to 
see her. During these three days she had remained in apparently perfect 
general health ; she had her usual florid complexion, the pulse was absolutely 
undisturbed ; the tongue, too, it so happened, was perfectly clean. But, what 
was very remarkable, she had had no sense of hunger for those three days ; 
but she had had a curious yearning sort of uneasiness in the epigastrium, induced 
by the presence of the foreign body in the oesophagus, and this abnormal sensa- 
tion, caused by the object in the oesophagus, had taken the place of hunger. 
By virtue of the sympathy existing between the oesophagus and the stomach, 
the sensation, or nervous action, which constitutes hunger had been prevented 
from occurring. I extracted the bud which was plugging her oesophagus, and 
the normal sensation of hunger soon returned. Here, then, was another example 
of physiological counter-irritation—a term which I have ventured to apply to 
cases in which the excited nervous action which the counter-irritation removes 
has not overstepped the limits (indefinite though they be) which separate health 
from disease. 
It appears, then, that it is a law of physiology that when two parts are 
nervously in sympathy with each other, if we excite a great action in the nerves 
of one we may distract action from the nerves of the other. Now this will serve to 
throw great light upon the nature of inflammation itself if we find that counter- 
irritation is really a valuable means for the treatment of inflammation. That 
such it is I will only give one or two illustrations. I once fell upon the ice with 
my knee bent, striking the knee and producing at once a severe strain and 
a severe contusion. The knee became violently inflamed, the inflammation 
being characterized by intense pain and effusion into the knee-joint. I treated 
myself by a splint to ensure rest, and hot fomentations. Every time a fresh 
hot fomentation was applied, though the heat was so great as to be painful 
to the skin of the knee, I rejoiced in it on account of the removal of the pain 
from the interior which always attended it. I remember once having a severe 
attack of sore-throat, and a mustard poultice was put on of pure mustard and 
water. The mustard, of course, caused a burning sense of uneasiness in the 
skin of the throat; but it was a delightful sensation to me, because I felt that 
while this burning uneasiness was caused to the skin, the sharp cutting pain 
of the interior of the throat was at once attacked, and gradually disappeared 
under the influence of the counter-irritant. Experiences like these in one’s 
own person have a more convincing effect than reports from the lips of patients. 
