136 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1751. 



sent him the 5th vol. of the Edinb. Medical Essays, containing Dr. Whytt's 

 account of the good effect which the taking of soap and limewater had had in 

 cases similar to his; with ingenious reflections and directions relating to that 

 cruel disease, and the remedy for it. He read them with great satisfaction, 

 and would have immediately fallen into that method, but his relations, touched 

 with the fatal effects, which Dr. Jurin's lixivium* had had on the late Lord 

 Orford, would not suffer him to follow his own inclinations. But while he had 

 a severe fit upon him, he was visited by the Earl of Morton, who, on hearing 

 what was his disorder, gave him an account of the powerful benefit and entire 

 cure, which Mr. Summers had found in voiding the stone, that had tormented 

 him for many years, by adding lime-water to the soap, which he had taken for 

 some time without any success. 



This example, by the encouragement of Mr. Graham, his apothecary, fixed 

 his resolution to follow that method; and accordingly before he left the town, 

 he often perused Dr. Whytt's Essay relating to the stone. In March 1 747-8, 

 he began at first with taking every day -i^ oz. of Alicant soap, made up into pills 

 with the syrup of marshmallows, and drank upon it about a pint of lime-water 

 made of oyster-shells ; mixing a spoonful of milk with it, and drinking a spoon- 

 ful after it, to take away the nauseousness of the tastes. 



On the road as he went into the country in May 1 748, he had a most severe 

 fit at Newport, making bloody water, with frequent interruptions at short in- 

 tervals, attended with violent pains, which continued on him to such a degree, 

 that he could not endure the horses to go more than a foot-pace for about 70 

 miles, till he came home. After his arrival there he was tolerably well for some 

 days; but the least motion in a coach, or even in walking, brought the dis- 

 order upon him. He was always entirely easy when he lay in bed, but was ob- 

 liged, when he got up, to take his couch ; and could not venture to move fitjm 

 thence but on necessary occasions. In the mean time he continued to take the 

 soap and lime-water, which by degrees he increased so far, as to take at different 



Sir Robert Walpole, vol. i. p. IS4) he had been trained to business, under Stanhope, in Spain ; under 

 Carleton, when chancellor of the exchequer, and secretary of state ; under Townshend, at the con- 

 gress of Gertruydenberg, and during the negociation for the Barrier Treaty in 1710. At the acces- 

 sion of George I., he was appointed secretary to Lord Townshend, and afterwards secretary to the 

 treasury; and, as envoy to the states general, had conducted with great skill and ability the compli- 

 cated negociations which took place at the Hague in 1715 and 17l6. In 1722 he was deputed as en- 

 voy to the Hague, which post he filled with great credit and dignity, and was particularly noticed by 

 George 1. as a man of business and address. 



* In the medical practice of the preseiit day neither the lixivium here mentioned, nor lime- 

 water (both which, but particularly the first of the two, possess a causticity which proves hurtful to 

 the stomach,) are prescribed in calciJous affections j but in their stead the so called soda-water, in 

 which the alkaline salt is rendered mild by super-saturation with the carbonic acid, (fixed air,) in 

 which state it does not injure the stomach, and may be safely continued a great length of time. 



