FOREIGN BODIES INJURING THE HEART. 407 



and fading insensibly into the muscular tissue, which was pale 

 and discoloured, and beginning to undergo a fibrous degenera- 

 tion. 



In the base of the right ventricle, at a level corresponding 

 to the opening of the pulmonary artery, was a very irregular 

 ulcer, penetrating the whole thickness of the ventricular 

 wall, and large enough to admit the end of the little finger. 

 Another existed on the surface of the median septum, pene- 

 trating as far as the endocardium of the left ventricle, but 

 leaving it intact. 



The bronchial lymphatic glands were hypertrophied, softened, 

 and black. The adipose tissue at the base of the heart was 

 considerably infiltrated, and contained a large number of 

 little cysts of the form and size of an ordinary bean, and filled 

 with coagulated blood; these had doubtless escaped from the 

 right ventricle through the ulceration, and become inclosed 

 in laminse of areolar tissue. A fibrous cord, pierced by a 

 canal, extended from the pericardium into the reticulum, the 

 canal was filled with pus, and established a connection be- 

 tween the cavities of the pericardium and the reticulum. 

 Abdominal dropsy had commenced. 



The other five cases did not differ materially; the second 

 was peculiar in having no eructations, the needle was bent 

 almost at a right angle, and on separating the diaphragm 

 from the reticulum, five canals were observed : their connec- 

 tion with the reticulum was obstructed, so that a probe could 

 not be passed into it; three of them, each the length of the 

 needle from its bend, led into a cul-de-sac, the size of a little 

 bean, and filled with grayish thick pus. One led into the 

 pericardium, the other led into a sac, the size of a pint 

 measure, filled with grayish purulent blood of a foetid odour, 

 analogous to that in the pericardium. This case was at first 

 taken for pneumonia, and treated as such, with the effect of 



