GENERAL PATHOLOGY. ' 65 



gee, reviving the use of the thermometer,* first proposed 

 in 1754 by De Haen, a celebrated Clinical teacher in the 

 Hospital of Vienna, as the best aid in the diagnosis of 

 pyrexia ; instituted a series of remarkable experiments in the 

 use of one of Oasella's registering thermometers. He dis- 

 covered an elevation of temperature in the earliest stage of 

 yie disease, varying from one to four degrees, Fahr., ''preced- 

 ing the acceleration of the indse and every other symptom.''^ 



He inserted the bulb and about two inches of the stem of 

 the thermometer within the vagina or rectum, and kept it in 

 place a couple of minutes. To i3revent error in the use of 

 the instrument, he adopted the jjrecaution, between each 

 observation, of dipping it in water (90° Fahr.) and used a 

 few drops of Gaudy's disinfecting fluid for cleansing pur- 

 poses. He found the temperature of these parts, when the 

 animals were in a healthy condition, and the females not in 

 the period of oestrum or sexual excitement, varying from 

 100° to 101°, rising occasionally to 102°, and perchance, in 

 a hot day or when driven from their pastures, *' one or two- 

 tenths more" than usual. He visited, on the 17th of Novem- 

 ber, a stock of Ayrshires, at Corehouse, near Lanark, where 

 a cow seized on the 9th had died on the 14th, a second case 

 occurred on the 15th, a third on the 16th; and where, on 

 cursory examination, he found six more ill. On the 18th he 

 examined forty-two cows with a thermometer dipped in water 

 100° Fahr., before each observation, inserting the instrument 

 in the rectum up to that portion of the stem marked 80°. Of 

 this entire lot, one or two had slight discharge from the eyes ; 

 one gave more marked indications in rapid respiration, one 

 in urine of dark brown color, and a half dozen in scanty 

 supply of milk. The rest were eating and ruminating, giv- 

 ing full quantity of milk, &c. ; none had diarrhoea. ** The 

 temperature was recorded at 102° in one case ; at 104°, 1- in 

 another ; at 104°, 8- in two ; from 105° to 106° in ten ; from 

 106° to 107° in seventeen; in the rest from 107° to 107°, 8-. 

 Twenty-five succumbed by the 22d inst., and only five were 

 living on the 25th, " in spite of careful nursing and the best 



* Also tried by Dr. Sanderson (Sequel, &c., p. 13). 



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