108 I'HILOSOPHICAL TKANSACTIOXS. [aNNO 1730. 



neither diminished, nor sensibly increased, to the time of his death. No 

 ructiis or flatus, upwards or downwards, nor borborygmi, notwithstanding this 

 distension of the belly. He never once went to stool after he received the 

 wound, though pretty strong purgatives and several clysters had been given, for 

 the 3 days before ; and though no opiate (which might have been supposed to 

 have retarded their operation) had hitherto been exhibited : neither had those 

 purgatives nor clysters, ordered afterwards, the least effect. He took what 

 was thought a sufficient quantity of drink and liquid food. He never slept, or 

 but very little, by short slumbers, of about half an hour, or an hour at longest, 

 and that very rarely, though pretty large doses of opiates were given to procure 

 rest, after the doctor came. The wound in the integuments never digested in 

 the usual manner ; but looked flaccid, or flabby and pale, almost without pus. 

 The urine in very small quantity, at most 2 or 3 spoonfuls at a time, clear but 

 yellow, as if tinged slightly with safl^ron, and without sediment. His pulse was 

 full, strong and even, but not quick. No feverish heat to be fell in the skin, 

 on any part of the body. His tongue not hard, rough or black, as in a fever, 

 but of its natural colour, with a silky driness, and very little saliva. He was 

 not in the least delirious, from the beginning to the time of his death. Ho had 

 some slight fits of the hickup the second day after the Doctor saw him, and 

 some few retchings to vomit ; some intermissions in his pulse, sometimes one 

 in 10, 15, 20, or 30 a day before his death. 



On opening the body, the abdomen appeared distended as in a tympany, or 

 ascites, and the skin of the belly tinged yellow as saffron in many places. A 

 triangular wound appeared about 1 inches on the right side of the navel, the 

 direction slanting upwards obliquely through the integuments. The belly being 

 opened, discovered the wound to have penetrated through the peritoneum, and 

 the sword had slanted upwards from thence along the omentum, grazing slightly 

 upon it, which was superficially ruffled, but so as to be hardly perceivable. A 

 small triangular wound appeared in the bottom of the gall-bladder, which had 

 penetrated through the membranes into its cavity, but had no where wounded 

 the liver, nor any of the neighbouring parts. The gall-bladder was flaccid or 

 collapsed, containing only a few drops of gall, which, by pressing the cystis 

 slightly, flowed out into the cavity of the abdomen through the wound. The 

 guts throughout their whole tract being distended, so as could be judged to 

 triple the extent of their natural diameters, seemed to fill the whole cavity of 

 the abdomen, so as to give the outward appearance of a tympany, or ascites ; 

 which distension disappeared, and the guts collapsed, on making several punc- 

 tures with a lancet in their sides, to give vent to the air. The rest of the cavity 

 of the abdomen, which was not closely filled up by the distended guts, con- 



