VOL. XLVIII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 477 



thought that this evacuation might contribute to produce a general relaxation, 

 and by consequence make the circulation of the blood, and other fluids, more 

 free tlirough their respective canals. It was surprising to see what difficulty the 

 surgeon found in opening the vein, on account of the hardness of the skin ; in- 

 somuch that, in the operation, the lancet yielded, and bent. However, at last it 

 pierced the skin and the vein, but not without much pain. The blood issued 

 forth with impetuosity, and the wound was some time before it healed; but at 

 length it formed an elevated and hard scar. 



By continuing the emollient diet and vapour bath, in about 40 days the skin 

 of her legs, where the hardness appeared the latest, began to soften. But as often 

 as she exposed herself to the fresh and cool air, the skin, which had begun to be 

 soft and flexible, was observed to become hard again, and imperspirable. It was 

 therefore thought proper, towards the end of September, to place her in a warm 

 room, where the air was kept of an equal degree of heat. This had the desired 

 effect: for by staying in her room, and from time to time repeating the vapour 

 bath, and by drinking, at her meals, a decoction of the woods, the perspiration 

 was constant and moderate; and the softness of the skin, which began in the 

 legs, extended itself upwards, and was in some degree perceptible in the arms. 



Five months had elapsed since the beginning of this treatment, when it was 

 believed that, without some more efficacious medicine, capable, by its motion, 

 weight, figure, and divisibility, of circulating with the blood, and of penetrating 

 into the most remote and subtil recesses of the vessels, it would be impossible to 

 open the obstructions, which were formed in the vascular structure of the skin, 

 and which, by hindering the fluids from circulating through their respective 

 canals, had deprived them of that humidity, which nature has made necessary for 

 their flexibility and softness. It was therefore thought proper to make her take 

 small doses of pure quicksilver; and that the mercury might the more easily be 

 determined to the skin, the patient was ordered to be constantly kept in a warm 

 air, to have the surface of her body rubbed with a flannel, and to continue the 

 use of the vapour bath. But, by way of preparation for this mercurial course, 

 she was gently purged, and blooded a second time, that the plenitude being 

 diminished, the mercury might better circulate through the finest vessels. 

 Here it is to be observed, that the surgeon, in this 2d blood-letting, did not 

 meet with that resistance, in piercing the skin, which he had experienced in the 

 first. The patient, thus prepared, began in December, 1752, to take daily 6, 

 and afterwards 12 grs. of pure quicksilver, in a drachm of cassia, drinking after it 

 half a pint of a decoction of sarsaparilla. In this course she continued 4 months 

 with chearfulness, and without any inconvenience; and within 2 months from 

 the beginning of it there appeared a somewhat viscid sweat, and the skin grew 

 more flexible, and yielding. About the end of March, 1753, she had an eflSo- 



