SPASMODIC AFFECTIONS. 449 



MCCCLXXVIII. After some sleep in the morning, the 

 patient, for the rest of the day, continues to have more free and 

 easy breathing, but it is seldom entirely such. He still feels 

 some tightness across his breast, cannot breathe easily in a ho- 

 rizontal posture, and can hardly bear any motion of his body, 

 without having his breathing rendered more difficult and un- 

 easy. In the afternoon, he has an unusual flatulency of his 

 stomach, and an unusual drowsiness, and very frequently these 

 symptoms precede the first attacks of the disease ; but, whether 

 these symptoms appear or not, the difficulty of breathing re- 

 turns towards the evening ; and then sometimes gradually in- 

 creases, till it becomes as violent as in the night before : or if, 

 during the day, the difficulty of breathing has been moderate, 

 and the person gets some sleep in the first part of the night, 

 he is, however, waked about midnight, or at some time between 

 midnight and two o'clock in the morning ; and is then suddenly 

 seized with a fit of difficult breathing, which runs the same 

 course as the night before. 



MCCCLXXIX. In this manner, fits return for several 

 nights successively ; but generally, after some nights passed in 

 this way, the fits suffer more considerable remissions. This 

 especially happens when the remissions are attended with a 

 more copious expectoration in the mornings, and that this con- 

 tinues from time to time throughout the day. In these circum- 

 stances, asthmatics, for a long time after, have not only more 

 easy days, but enjoy also nights of entire sleep, without the re- 

 currence of the disease. 



MCCCLXXX. When this disease, however, has once 

 taken place in the manner above described, it is ready to return 

 at times for the whole of life after. These returns, however, 

 happen with different circumstances in different persons. 



MCCCLXXXI. In some persons the fits are readily excited 

 by external heat, whether of the weather, or of a warm chamber, 

 and particularly by warm bathing. In such persons, fits are 

 more frequent in summer, and particularly during the dog days, 

 than at other colder seasons. The same persons are also readily 

 affected by changes of the weather ; especially by sudden changes 

 made from a colder to a warmer, or, what is commonly the same 



VOL. II. 2F 





