VOL. XLVII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 185 



inches. His arm in the middle of it was 2 feet 2 inches about, and his leg 2 

 feet 8 inches. 



He had always a good appetite, and when a youth used to eat somewhat re- 

 markably ; but toward the end of his life, though he continued to eat heartily, 

 and with a good relish, yet he did not eat more in quantity than many other 

 men of good appetite. Though he did not take any liquor to an intoxicating 

 degree, yet perhaps on the whole he drank more than might have been advisable 

 to a man of his very corpulent disposition. When he was a very young man, he 

 was fond of ale and old strong beer ; but afterwards his chief liquor was small 

 beer, of which he commonly drank about a gallon in a day. In other liquors 

 he was extremely moderate, when by himself, sometimes drinking half a pint of 

 wine after dinner, or a little punch, and seldom exceeding his quantity; but 

 when he was in company, he did not confine himself to so small an allowance. 



He enjoyed for the most part as good health as any man, except that in the 

 last 3 years, he was 2 or 3 times seized with an inflammation in his leg, attended 

 with a little fever ; and every time, with such a tendency to mortification, as to 

 make it necessary to scarify the part. But by the help of scarifications and fo- 

 mentations, bleeding largely once or twice in the arm, and purging, he was 

 always soon relieved. 



He married when 22 or 23 years old, and lived a little more than 7 years in 

 that state ; in which time he had 5 children born, and left his wife with child of 

 the 6th, near her time. 



His last illness, which continued about 14 days, was a miliary fever. It began 

 with pretty strong inflammatory symptoms, a very troublesome cough, great 

 difficulty of breathing, &c. and the eruption was extremely violent. His body 

 began to putrify very soon after he was dead ; so that notwithstanding the wea- 

 ther was cool, it became very offensive the next day before a coffin could be 

 made. The coffin was 3 feet 6 inches broad at the shoulders, 2 feet 3^ inches 

 at the head, 22 inches at the feet, and 3 feet I4 inch deep. '' 



XXFIII. The Effects of the Hyoscyamus Albus* or White Henbane. By Dr. J. 

 Stedman, late Surgeon Major to the Regiment of the Royal Grey Dragoons. 

 p. 194. 



In the month of August 1748, while the Greys were cantoned in the village of 

 Vucht near Boisleduc in Dutch Brabant, 5 men and 2 women of that regiment 

 having eaten of the leaves of the hyoscyamus albus, shred and boiled in broth, 

 were soon after seized with a giddiness and stupor, as if drunk. Dr. S. saw them 



• The plant here mentioned was, as Mr. Watson afterwards remarks, the hyoscyamus iiiger, 

 Linn, or common henbane ' 



VOL. X. Bb • 



