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fished after losing their way, in the mountains of the old and of the new 

 world. Thus, two thousand soldiers of Charles the Twelfth's army pe- 

 rished, during a siege, in the severe winter of 1709. 



To resist the effects of cold, a certain degree of strength and vigour is 

 therefore necessary , it is consequently very injudicious to recommend 

 the cold bath to very young children, to delicate and nervous women, to 

 persons whose constitution is not capable of a sufficient re-action. The 

 evil attending the injudicious use of this remedy in the cases that have 

 just been enumerated, justifies the apparently singular terms in which 

 Galen expressed himself: " Let the Germans, (says this first of physio- 

 logists) let the Sarmatians, those northern nations as barbarous as bears 

 and lions, plunge their children in frozen water; what I write is not in- 

 tended for them." 



On the other hand, if it be recollected, that there is within us a power 

 of re-action, which increases with use, that motion strengthens our organs, 

 it will be readily understood, that cold acts as a tonic, whenever it is 

 not applied to such a degree, as to extinguish the vital power. 



The manner in which enlightened physicians have, at all times, pres- 

 cribed the cold bath, shows that they were acquainted with this tonic effect 

 depending, not on the application of cold, which in itself is debilitating, 

 but on the re-action which it occasions. Hence along with the cold bath, 

 they are in the habit of recommending exercise, a generous wine, bark, 

 nutritious food, and an analeptic regimen, calculated to excite a salu- 

 tary re-action. 



LXXXII. Animal heat is, therefore, produced by the combination of 

 our fluids and solids in the process of nutrition; it is a function common 

 to all the organs, for, as they all nourish themselves, so they all disen- 

 gage, more or less, the caloric combined with the substances which they 

 apply to their nutrition. 



Though we are without precise information respecting the manner in 

 which a living body resists the admission of a degree of heat exceeding 

 that which is natural to it, one may consider cutaneous exhalation, which 

 is increased by the use of heating substances, as the most powerful means 

 employed by nature to get rid of the excess of heat, and to restore the 

 equilibrium. 



Lastly, the body resists cold, because the organs being rendered more 

 active by cold, there is disengaged a quantity of caloric equal to that 

 "which is carried off by the air, or by the other substances with which the 

 body happens to be in contact*. 



LXXXIII. The rapidity of the circulation of the blood through the 

 lungs, is equal to the velocity with which it flows in the other organs. 

 For, if on the one hand, the parietes of the right ventricle and of the 

 pulmonary artery, are weaker and thinner than those of the left ventri- 

 cle and aorta, the lungs, from their soft, easily dilated and spongy tex- 

 ture, are the most easily penetrated by fluids of all our organs. 



* The animal economy resists a moderate degree of cold, and is even strengthened 

 by it, owing to the re-action of the vital influence. If, however, the degree of cold be 

 either absolutely or relatively great, the energy of the system is entirely overwhelmed 

 by its sedative operation. The effects of cold differ not only according- to its degree, 

 but also according* to the duration of exposure to it to the state of the nervous 

 system previous to, or dining the exposure and to the general condition of the body 

 at the time. Copland. 



