VOL. XLII.] j PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 655 



hooks passed tlirough, by which he is to be suspended, as appears in the figure; 

 and then a man, being placed at the rope that runs over the pulleys, lifts the 

 patient up to the height necessary for the surgeon to search and dress the 

 wound, and for the assistants to make his bed, which, even for the greater 

 conveniency, may be pulled out from under the hammock. When all is done, 

 the bed is pushed back again to its former place, the patient is gently let down 

 upon it, the cross-beams are lowered and detached both frotn the hammock, and 

 the block, and put out of the way into a corner of the room ; instead of it, a 

 rope is fixed to the hook of the block, tied into an eilet at the end, coming 

 down towards the bed within the patient's reach, in order to help himself when 

 he wants to stir a little. 



The hammock being displayed, and the cross-beams taken away, the patient 

 is wrapped up in napkins as much as possible, to supply the sheet he wants be- 

 tween his body and the leather of the hammock ; he is afterwards covered with 

 an upper sheet, and other necessary bed-clothes. 



This machine may be further improved by use. For instance : after M. le Cat 

 had contrived this, he thought that instead of the border or hem of the ham- 

 mock, might be made strong cylindrical iron rods, like curtain-rods, formed into a 

 square, somewhat larger than the bedstead, as fig. 12, to the 4 corners of which 

 are fastened as many ropes, which meet at the pulley ; in which case the cross- 

 beams, and the ropes depending on them, become useless ; and instead of a 

 hammock all of one piece, might be fixed 4 broad straps of Turkey leather to 

 2 sides of the square rod, which may be placed under such parts of the patient's 

 body as will be proper, and which leave a space between each other where it is 

 convenient. These straps may be fastened to the iron rods by several buckles 

 with rings to slide along the rods, by the help cf which the straps may be 

 pushed on to such places where there is occasion ; they may also thus be 

 stretched or slackened, or even be taken off, or changed as is thought fit. 

 After the patient has been dressed, and the bed made, the 4 ropes may be 

 taken off both from the rod and from the block, and the rod be let drop 

 with the extremities of the straps down upon the floor round the bedstead, 

 which being narrower than the square of the rod, the latter will easily slip over it. 



An Account of a Treatise, intitled D. Alberti Halleri* Archiatri Regii et Elect. 

 Medicin. Anatomue, Baton. Prwiect. ^c. Enumeralio Alethodica Stirpium 

 Helvetiie indigenarum. Qua omnium brevis Descriplio et Synonyviia, Compen- 



* The Rev. Mr. Coxe has favoured the world with a biographical accoant of Haller in the 2d vol. 

 of his Letters on Switzerland. As most of our readers must be possessed of those entertaining and 

 instructive letters, it cannot be necessary, on the present occasion, to enter very circumstantially into 

 a history ot the life and writings of this illustrious character ; who, in every department of letters 

 and science to which he directed his attention (and his attention was directed to a ^rcat varietur of 



