ON THE ACTION OF THE METHYL AND ALLIED SERIES. 159 



minutes after tlie cessation of the respiration, i, e. after what appears to be 

 actual death. 



Chloral Hydrate.— It will be remembered by many that at Exeter 

 last year the substance called hydrate of chloral was first discussed in 

 this country. The news had recently arrived that the distinguished Lieb- 

 reich, of Berlin, had cUscovered in this hydrate a powerful narcotic ; and 

 our associate, Mr. Daniel Hanbury, F.E.S., having fortunately brought 

 a specimen of it to Exeter, the Physiological Department of the Biological 

 Section deputed me to test the substance (with which Mr. Hanbury kindly 

 supplied me) by direct experiment, and to report upon it during the 

 sittings of the Section. Eesponding to the wishes of the Section, and ably 

 aided by Dr. Kilburne King, of Hull, Dr. and Mr. Shapter, of Exeter, and 

 other friends, I was enabled to draw up a report that has been published in 

 the ' Transactions,' and which gave a fair and impartial estimate of the values 

 of the new remedy. The notice of this Beport, and of the discussion upon 

 it in the general and scientific papers, created the intensest interest in the 

 medical world. After my return to town, 1 had frequently from fifteen to 

 twenty communications a day respecting chloral hydrate. At the request of 

 members of the medical profession, I visited Birmingham, Bradford, York, 

 Norwich, and other large towns in the kingdom, to demonstrate the action 

 and application of the remedy, while in London I gave series of similar 

 demonstrations. These efforts made the hydrate widely known in this 

 country ; but the inherent good qualities of the compound itself were its 

 best and surest recommendation. Hence it settled in favour as it increased 

 in popularity, and it has now become an instrument for the cure of disease 

 scarcely second to any in the hands of the physician. If I were to say that 

 a million of persons' in sleepless pain had been made to rest quietly and 

 painlessly under its benign influence, I should certainly not overrate the 

 extent of its usefulness. 



It is satisfactory to feel that the conclusions we arrived at last year have 

 been, on the -whole, thoroughly sustained by the practice that has ensued. 

 I deduced, from the experiments which we performed, that the hydrate was 

 not an anaesthetic in the common sense of the term, but that it sometimes 

 induced a stage of hyperassthesia ; this has been confirmed by many who 

 have foUowed in the same method of inquiry. I inferred that the hydrate 

 could not be expected (as had been expected of it) to supersede the volatile 

 ansesthetics as a means of relieving the pain of surgical operations ; and this 

 view has been fuUy confirmed by the results of several attempts to make it 

 replace the ordinary anajsthetics. I inferred that the compound reduced the 

 animal temperature in a signal degree ; and this view, fully confirmed by the 

 after experiments of Demarquay, has met with the general acceptance of 

 observers. I was led to conjecture, from what I had seen of the influence of 

 the hydrate in controlling strychnine tetanus, that it would probably not be 

 a cure for acute tetanic spasm ; and this view has been supported by the 

 results of practice in many cases of tetanic disease. Lastly, I was led to 

 maintain that the hydrate, if it took position, would do so as the rival only 

 of the old and time-honoured organic compound, opium ; and this view has 

 been once more fully confirmed. 



It may be accepted, I think, on the whole, that chloral hydrate, which to 

 us thirteen months ago was an absolute novelty, is now a fixed and proved 

 instrument for the cure of disease. It is readily and cheaply manufac- 

 tured, and its administration is easy. That it wiU not be found to possess 

 all the virtues which have been attributed to it in its early days is certain ; 



