386 DISEASES CLASS IV. i. 2. 15- 



cheft, which they fuppofe a fit of the gout would relieve. But 

 in all thefe cafes the attempt to procure a paroxyfm of gout by 

 wine, or aromatics, or volatiles, or blifters, or mineral waters, 

 feldom fucceeds , and the patients are obliged to apply to oth- 

 er methods of relief adapted to other particular cafes. In the 

 two former fituations fmall repeated dofes of calomel, or mer- 

 curial unction on the region of the liver, may fucceed, by giv- 

 ing new activity to the veffels of the liver, either to fecrete or 

 to abforb their adapted fluids, and thus to remove the caufe of* 

 the gout, rather than to promote a fit of it. In the laft cafe the 

 tinclure of digitalis, and afterwards the clafs of forbentia, muft 

 be applied to. 



M. M. In young ftrong patients the gout (hould be cured 

 by venefection and cathartics and diluents, with poultices ex- 

 ternally. But it has a natural crifis by producing calcareous 

 matter on the inflamed membrane, and therefore in old enfee- 

 bled people it is fafeft to wait for this crifis, attending to the 

 natural evacuations and the degree of fever ; and in young ones, 

 where it is not attended with much fever, it is cuftomary and 

 popular not to bleed, but only to keep the body open with aloes, 

 to ufe gentle fudorifics, as neutral falts, and to give the bark at 

 the decline of the fit ; which is particularly ufeful where the 

 patient is much debilitated. See Arthritis ventriculi, Clafs I. 

 2.4. 6. and Seft. XXV. 17. 



Mr. Kelly, furgeon in the navy, in an ingenious treatife, 

 printed at Edinb. 1797, termed Obfervations on Compreflion 

 by the Tourniquet, advifes in both inflammatory and chronic 

 rheumatifrn to comprefs the artery of the affected limb by the 

 tourniquet, for 15 or 20 minutes, relaxing or tightening the 

 bandage, as the patient feems to bear it. And in inflammatory 

 rheumatifm, he advifes to take blood from a vein below the 

 bandage, which he fays relieves the pain and deftroys the in- 

 flammation. Could not this experiment be ufed fafely in the 

 gout of young or ftrong patients ? and perhaps with fpeedy 

 fuccefs ? 



When there is not much fever, and the patient is debilitated 

 with age, or the continuance of the difeafe, a moderate opiate, 

 as twenty drops of tincture of opium, or one grain of folid opi- 

 um, may be taken every night with advantage. Externally a 

 pafte made with double the quantity of yeft is a good poultice ; 

 and booterkins made with oiled (ilk,' as they confine the perfpir- 

 able matter, keep the part moift and fupple, and thence relieve 

 the pain like poultices. 



The only fafe way of moderating the difeafe is by an uniform 

 and equal diminution, or a total abftinence from fermented 



liquors, 



