VOL. XLVir.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 227 



Hl^. Concerning the Dissection nj a Rupture. By Mons. Le Cat. Translated 

 from the French, by Tho. Stacli, M. D., F. R. S. p. 341. 



Mr. le Cat here mentions, that when he sent the remarks on the singular 

 hernia of Catherine Guillematre, (Phil. Trans. N". 46o) he had already made 

 some fruitless attempts to cure her, but had not then lost all hopes of success. 

 He imagined, that a long use of emollient cataplasms might restore suppleness 

 to the intestine which constantly kept out of the belly, and was turned inside 

 out, because it was the portion continuous to the cascum, colon, rectum, and 

 anus, which could be of no use, but much incommoded the patient by this ex- 

 traordinary situation. But all his trials were of no avail, though they were car- 

 ried so far as to render this gut quite bloody : its long exposure to the air made 

 it become too thick and hard ; and at the same time so robust or insensible, 

 that all these vigorous applications made no bad impression on the rest of the 

 animal economy. In fine, Catherine Guillematre quitted the hospital without 

 any other benefit but that of having afforded M. le Cat and his colleagues an 

 opportunity of instructing themselves. 



From that time he had no news of this woman till the 6th of May, 1750; 

 when he was informed, that her body actually lay in the dead ward, and that 

 she died in the hospital of old age and a broken constitution, as much as of 

 any disease. 



He was extremely curious to embrace this opportunity of having ocular de- 

 monstration of the probable conjecture, which he had made in this woman's life- 

 time, and a confirmation of his having solved the enigma arising from this sin- 

 gular hernia ; which, on opening the body, was accordingly confirmed. 



Lf^. //« Account of Dr. BohadscKs Treatise, communicated to the Royal So- 

 ciety, entitled Dissertatio Philosophico-Medica de Utililate Electrisationis in 

 Curandis Morbis, printed at Prague., 175 J . Extracted and translated from the 

 Latin by Mr. Wm. fVatson, F.R.S. p. 345. 



The author of this treatise, Dr. Bohadsch, was a Bohemian, a very learned 

 gentleman, who, while he was in England about 2 years before, was frequently 

 at the meetings of the r. s., and was very conversant with, and much esteemed 

 by many of that body, from whom he received very great civilities. He was 

 more particularly taken notice of by his grace the late Duke of Richmond, whose 

 loss we yet lament. 



This treatise, from its title, promises only an account of the advantages of 

 electrization in medicine: but this is not the whole of which it treats ; it exhibits 

 also a series of observations of the effects of electricity on both solid and fluid 

 bodies, on animals in a state of health, as well as on the distempered. 



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