652 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [anNO 1723. 



Dissection of a Person aged lOQ, at Zurich, Feb. 2, 1723. By John James 

 Scheuchzer of Zurich, M. D. Professor of Mathematics, and F.R.S. N°376, 

 p. 313. jin Abstract from the Latin. 



John Leonhard Vopper, a Grison, was born May 1, l6]4. In l634, while 

 working in a mine, he was buried by the falling in of a vein of ore, for the 

 space of 33 hours ; but was at length extricated, almost dead from the violent 

 pressure on the abdomen. This accident was followed by an incontinence of 

 urine. In l637 he travelled into Hungary, Turkey, and the Holy Land, re- 

 turning by Venice. After 1639 he engaged in the military life, and served in 

 the Duke of Lorrain's army in the Milanese; in 1663 he served in Portugal; 

 in 1 682 he was at the siege of Vienna ; afterwards at the siege of Landau ; and 

 at the battle ofHochstadt; yet, notwithstanding the hardships and dangers in- 

 separable from the various situations of life in which he was placed, he attained 

 the advanced age of lOQ years and 3 months. 



On opening the body after death, the following appearances were observed: 

 In the cavity of the abdomen there was found a small quantity of serum 

 tinged with blood. Almost all the small intestines were inflamed; the duode- 

 num, in particular, was exceedingly distended, and its inner surface was in 

 a gangrenous state. The omentum was so much wasted, that it could scarcely 

 be traced. The pancreas was contracted; the liver was in a sound state; the 

 gall bladder full of bile; the ductus choledochus turgid with bile; and all the 

 adjoining parts of the intestines and mesentery were tinged green with bile, of 

 which there seemed to have been an extravasation ; for its passage into the 

 duodenum could not be traced. Near the pylorus, in the upper part of the 

 stomach, there was a sort of flatulent tumor, larger than a walnut. The 

 kidnies were in a sound state. The exterior membrane of the spleen ex- 

 hibited a curious appearance, being beset with spots of a snowy whiteness, and 

 of various sizes, resembling at first sight pustules of the small pox in a state of 

 maturity ; but proving, on further examination, to be of a cartilaginous hardness, 

 and rising up a little above the surface of the rest of the membrane. [Here 

 the author takes occasion to remark, that in consequence of the rigid and con 

 tracted state of the fibres in advanced age, they possess very little sensibility; 

 whence it happened that this person made no complaints of pain, though he 

 died of a violent inflammation of the intestines, which in a young subject 

 would have been accompanied with the greatest tortures.] 



The opening of the thorax was a matter of much labour, owing to the 

 ossified state of the cartilages. The surface of the lungs was thickly beset 

 with green spots, and in both sides of the chest there were adhesions of the 



