&XASS I. 2. 3. 25. OF IRRITATION. 101 



Mr. Home has published a very ingenious and useful work, 

 entitled a Dissertation on Strictures of the Urethra, in which 

 he has recorded many cases successfully treated by lunar caus- 

 tic, inserted in the end of a bougie, and applied to the contracted 

 part of the urethra, so as to destroy the stricture. 



From the form of the cavity of the urethra, taken by injecting 

 wax into it, there appears naturally to exist a kind of valve im- 

 mediately behind the -bulb of the urethra, which when the penis 

 is erect, shuts up the orifice, and prevents the regurgitaiion of 

 the semen into the bladder during the action of the accelerator 

 muscles in the act of its expulsion; and this natural constriction 

 or valve appears generally to be the first seat of stricture. 



Above the bulb, about two or three inches from the orifice 

 of the gians, the cavity of the urethra appears also lessened; and 

 in some cases the orifice of the very extremity appears less than 

 other parts of the canal; these parts are therefore more contract- 

 ed during the emissio seminis, and add to its velocity at its exit; 

 and are thence more liable to scirrhosity or stricture. And by 

 some observations, Mr. Home has shewn, that a sympathy exists 

 between the strictures of these parts; and that the more forward 

 strictures are frequently produced in consequence of that behind 

 the bulb; and finds it necessary to destroy them all, by frequent 

 application of the caustic. 



By the use of which, (which was first proposed by Wiseman, 

 first applied by John Hunter, and so greatly improved by Mr. 

 Home,) the lives of great numbers are rendered happy, who other- 

 wise gradually perish by a most painful and hopeless malady. 



25. Scirrhus oesophagi. A scirrhus of the throat contracts the 

 passage so as to render the swallowing of solids impracticable, 

 and of liquids difficult. It affects patients of all ages, but is 

 probably most frequently produced by swallowing hard angular 

 substances, when people have lost their teeth; by which this 

 membrane is over-distended, or torn, or otherwise injured. 



M. M. Put milk into a bladder tied to a canula or catheter; 

 introduce it past the stricture, and press it into the stomach. 

 Distend the stricture gradually by a sponge-tent fastened to the 

 end of a whalebone, or by a plug of wax or spermaceti candle, 

 about two inches long; which might be introduced, and left 

 there with a string only fixed to it to hang out of the mouth, to 

 keep it in its place, and to retract it by occasionally; for which 

 purpose the string must be put through a catheter or hollow pro- 

 bang, when it is to be retracted. Or lastly, introduce a gut 

 fixed to a pipe; and then distend it by blowing wind into it. 

 The swallowing a bullet with a string put through it, to retract 

 it oji the exhibition of an emetic has also been proposed. Ex- 



