OPERATIONS. 349 



flour must be substituted for It. This Avill almost always be 

 found to be effectual ; but should it prove otherwise, give a tea- 

 spoonful or two of tincture of opium in a little warm water.* 



The strength and composition of pliysic will be found in the 

 Materia 3Iedica. 



Clysters. 



This useful and innocent mode of exhibiting medicine Is too 

 much neglected, and when employed is frequently done in a 

 slovenly and ineffectual manner. The usual apparatus is a 

 pewter pipe, about 14 Inches long, and an inch in bore, to which 

 a large pig's or bullock's bladder is firmly tied. The apparatus 

 Invented by INIr. Head affords, however, l3y far the best method 

 of administering a clyster. Any quantity may thus be given, 

 and with a moderate force only. An opening clyster Is made 

 by mixing a handful or two of salt with four or five quarts of 

 warm water : to this a little hoix's lard or sweet oil should be 

 added. Linseed tea or thin gruel, with a little treacle or sugar 

 makes a good emollient clystei*. And an anodyne or opiate 

 clyster Is made by dissolving from one to three or four drachms 

 of crude opium in three or four pints of warm water. This last 

 kind of clyster Is employed in locked-jaw, especially when it Is 

 found impossible to give medicine by the mouth. In this case, 

 nourishment must be given also in clysters. Nourishing clysters 

 are made of broth, milk, rich gruel, and sugar. It was observed 

 by Gibson, that when nourishing clysters are given In locked- 

 jaw, they are sucked upAvards by the bowels, and absorbed into 

 the blood. He sustained a horse a considerable time in this 

 way. I have seen clysters sucked as It were upwards after the 

 pipe has been Avithdrawn, which Is evinced by the rumbling 

 noise made In the bowels soon after, and the plentiful discharge 

 of dung, evidently from the colon. The stimulus of a saline 

 clyster In flatulent colic seems to be propagated by the nerves 

 of the bowels, throughout the greater portion of the alimentary 

 canal. 



Blisters. 



Before a blister is applied the hair must be cut off from the 

 part as closely as possible. The blistering ointment is then to 

 be well rubbed into the part with the hand ; and after this has 

 been continued about ten minutes some of the ointment may 

 be smeared on the part. In blistering the legs the tender part 

 of the heel, under the fetlock joint. Is to be avoided, and It may 

 be better to rub a little hog's lard on it In order to defend it 



■ o 



* If the purging, liowever, should be excessive, we may treat the case as 

 advised for diarrhcea. 



