126 DISEASES CLASS T. 2. 5. 4. 



And that on the same account their rooms should be kept silent 

 as well as dark; that they should be at rest in a horizontal pos- 

 ture; and be cooled by a blast of cool air, or by washing them 

 with cold water, whenever their skins are warmer than natural. 



4. Strabismus. Squinting is generally owing to one eye be- 

 ing less perfect than the other; on which account the patient 

 endeavours to hide the worst eye in the shadow of the nose, that 

 his vision by the other may not be confused. Calves which 

 have an hydatide with insects inclosed in it in the frontal sinus 

 on one side, turn towards the affected side; because the vision 

 on that side, by the pressure of the hydatide, becomes less per- 

 fect; and the disease being recent, the animal turns round, ex- 

 pecting to get a more distinct view of objects. 



In the hydrocephalus interims, where both eyes are not be- 

 come insensible, the patient squints with only one eye, and views 

 objects with the other, as in common strabismus. In this case 

 it may be known on which side the disease exists, and that it 

 does not exist on both sides of the brain; in such circumstances, 

 as the patients I believe never recover as they are now treated, 

 might it not be adviseable to perforate the cranium over the ven- 

 tricule of the affected side? which might at least give room and 

 stimulus to the affected part of the brain? 



M. M. If the squinting has not been confirmed by long habit, 

 and one eye be not much worse than the other, a piece of gauze 

 stretched on a circle of whale-bone, to cover the best eye in 

 such a manner as to reduce the distinctness of vision of this eye to 

 a similar degree of imperfection with the other, should be worn 

 some hours every day. Or the better eye should be totally 

 darkened by a tin cup covered with black silk for some hours 

 daily, by which means the better eye will be gradually weaken- 

 ed by the want of use, and the worse eye will be gradually 

 strengthened by using it. Covering an inflamed eye in children 

 for weeks together, is very liable to produce squinting, for the 

 same reason. 



5. Jlmaurosis. Gutta serena. Is a blindness from the inirrita- 

 bility of the optic nerve. It is generally esteemed a palsy of the 

 nerve, but should rather be deemed the death of it, as paralysis has 

 generally been applied to deprivation only of voluntary power. 

 This is a disease of dark eyes only, as the cataract is a disease of 

 lighfeyes only. At the commencement of this disease, very minute 

 electric shocks should be repeatedly passed through the eyes; such 

 as may be produced by putting one edge of a piece of silver the 

 size of a half crown piece beneath the tongue, and one edge of a 

 piece of zinc of a similar size between the upper lip and the gum ? 



