CLASS. I. 2. 4. 8. OF IRRITATION. 1 1 1 



lead may in part adhere to the sides of the bottle, and become 

 dissolved in the acid of the wine or cider. Milk kept in lead is 

 highly pernicious, as in the instance above related. Nor should 

 coppers for brewing be edged at the top of them with lead, which 

 is frequently done; nor should flesh-meat be salted in leaden 

 cisterns. Another way by which lead is liable to be taken into 

 the stomach is by broth, which is boiled in copper vessels 

 tinned within. Now the lining of these vessels consists, I am 

 well informed, of nearly half lead mixed with the tin; which is 

 very soluble in hot grease. From this cause those who live 

 much on soups long boiled, as the French, are perpetually sub- 

 ject to complaints of the stomach and intestines. When a 

 sauce-pan has been new tinned, if the finger be rubbed hard on 

 it, it becomes black; which is owing to the lead, which is mixed 

 with the tin. Hence the broth for all sick people should be 

 boiled but a short time, and be immediately put into a china- 

 bason. 



In an ingenious pamphlet lately published by Mr. Clutterbuck, 

 several cases are given of the successful use of mercury in the 

 constipation, colic, and paralysis of the wrists, produced by lead. 

 In some of these patients a drachm of strong mercurial ointment 

 was rubbed morning and night on the wrists, till the mouth be- 

 came sore. In others calomel one grain was given daily with ol. 

 ricini; and in others a quarter of a grain of hydragyrum muria- 

 tum, sublimate of mercury, was given three times a day with 

 great apparent advantage. The author ingeniously asks, if 

 small doses of some preparation of lead might not be given inter- 

 nally to counteract the ill effects sometimes believed to result from 

 the too long use of mercury. On the Poison of Lead, Boosey, 

 Lond. See Class III. 2. 1. 4. 



The effect of metals in destroying or preventing the acidity 

 of wine or cider, may be nicely observed in attending to the 

 colour of syrup of violets; which, if it ferments, is changed by 

 the acid thus produced from blue to red: but if it be kept in a 

 tin vessel, this does not occur; as the acid is attracted by the 

 metal producing an oxyde. Other metals are said by M. Guy- 

 ton, to have the same effect in preserving the colour of syrup of 

 violets. 



M. M. First opium one or two grains, then a cathartic of 

 senna, jalap, and oil, as soon as the pain is relieved. Oleum 

 ricini. Alum. Oil of almonds. A blister on the navel. Warm 

 bath. The stimulus of the opium, by restoring to the bowels its 

 natural irritability in this case of painful torpor, assists the action 

 of the cathartic. A clyster of the smoke of tobacco pushed high 



