Nov. 20, 1879] 



NA TURE 



quite independent of any supply from above, so that there 

 is no pumping required, and, indeed, no help whatever, 

 except a signal-man and cord. 



The experiment is being shown daily at the Royal 

 Polytechnic Institution, and I am indebted to the 

 managers for giving me the earliest notice of it, and for 

 offering me every facility for observation. I am equally 

 indebted to Mr. Fleuss for his readiness to carry out my 

 wishes, and I am sure the readers of Nature will be 

 interested with the facts I have now to offer them. 



Mr. Fleuss, the inventor of the apparatus, is a young 

 Englishman, twenty-eight years of age, who has served, 

 1 believe, as an officer in the P. and O. Company's service. 

 He has constructed the apparatus himself in a skilful but 

 not very ornamental fashion, and he is his own diver. 

 He went down in the apparatus, like a brave man, first 

 himself, and he only, up to the present, has been down in 

 it. He is a short slight man, of fair complexion, and 

 very pleasing expression. He has a quiet and resolute 

 enthusiasm which is quite refreshing. 



The dress in which he descends under water is like an 

 ordinary diver' s dress. A helmet, a breast- plate, and the 

 common water-tight armings and leggings. He bears on 

 his shoulders a weight of 96 lbs., and his boots are 

 weighted to 20 lbs. At twelve feet depth he moves 

 comfortably in the water under this pressure. From the 

 helmet there proceeds a light cord for signalling to the 

 signaller above. 



Before the helmet is fixed and the mask closed, it is 

 seen that he wears, firmly tied over his mouth and nose, 

 an ori-nasal mouth-piece, from which a breathing-tube of 

 an inch bore proceeds downwards. This mouth-piece is, 

 in appearance, just like the chloroform mouth-p ; ece 

 invented by the late Dr. Sibson, and afterwards added 

 by Dr. Snow to his chloroform inhaler. For many years 

 I used invariably the same kind of mouth-piece for 

 administering volatile anaesthetics, but Fleuss's fits much 

 •closer, and is fixed more firmly. 



When he is on the floor of the tank, Fleuss moves 

 about as he pleases, apparently without any impediment 

 whatever. He can pick up coins, he can sit down, and 

 he can even lie down and get up again, a feat, I believe, 

 entirely novel in diving. He breathes, he assures me, just 

 as easily as when he is in the air and quite as freely, and 

 from what I observed when he came out of the water from 

 a long immersion, I have no doubt as to the correctness of 

 his statement. He has some means of disposing of the 

 products of respiration as well as of getting a continuous 

 supply of air for respiration, since there is no escape of 

 expired air from him into the water. 



On the first occasion on which I witnessed the experi- 

 ment Mr. Fleuss remained in the water twenty minutes. 

 He came out quite free of any oppression. His pulse was 

 steady, his breathing free, and his complexion natural. 

 This was considered a short experiment, and on Saturday 

 last, November 15, therefore, I asked to see it prolonged 

 to an hour and to be allowed to follow it through all its 

 stages. The request was immediately granted. 



The diving-dress was adjusted on Saturday, at 6.33 

 P.M., and then Mr. Fleuss began to breathe from the ap- 

 paratus. At this time his temperature was quite natural 

 and his pulse was beating steadily at 68 per minute ; the 

 pulse was of good strength and tone. The temperature 

 of the air was 51° F. ; of the water, at the upper surface, 

 49° F. Fleuss said it was colder lower down, but the 

 difference was not determined. He descended at 6.40 

 and remained under the water, at a depth of twelve 

 feet, precisely one hour, namely, until 7.40 p.m. He 

 walked about the greater part of the time, picked up 

 pennie 1 , and once or twice partly reclined on the floor 

 of the tank. At the end of the hour he gave the signal 

 to come up, the cold of the water having caused great 

 numbness in his hands; he walked up the steps, carry- 

 ing the heavyweights (116 lbs.) briskly, and was relieved, 



after a short delay, first of his helmet and then of his 

 mouth-piece. At this point I found his pulse to be 

 beating at 120 per minute and somewhat feeble, but 

 the face was clear of any sign of asphyxia, though it was 

 a little pale. His breathing was quite free. He attri- 

 buted the quickness of the pulse to the labour of carrying 

 the weights up the ladder, and no doubt correctly. Seven 

 minutes later, the dress having been removed and warm 

 clothing put on, I found the pulse to be ninety per minute, 

 and the temperature of the body, taken from the mouth, 

 to be 94 F , rather more than 4 below the natural stan- 

 dard. At twenty minutes later, that is to say, at 

 twenty-seven minutes after release from the water, the 

 pulse was eighty per minute, while the temperature had 

 risen to 96° F. 



At this stage I took an observation of the pulse with 

 the sphygmophone. The three natural sounds were per- 

 fectly clear and in regular order, but the first or percussion 

 impulse sound was extremely tremulous ; the second or 

 recoil sound was slightly tremulous ; the third was clear. 



I next took a sphygmographic reading of the pulse, in 

 which all the events belonging to the natural pulse were 

 distinctly marked. The impulse stroke was short, as was 

 also the first descending stroke ; the second ascending 

 stroke was decisive, and the intervening lines between the 

 third and the recurrence of the percussion stroke were 

 shorter than is natural to Mr. Fleuss, as will be seen from 

 the comparison of the two annexed sphygmographic 

 tracings, 1 and 2. 



i. Pulse tracing after one hour's immersion in water at 49" F. Temperature 

 of mouth 56', pulse beat 80 per minute. November 15, 8.15 P.M. 



For the sake of comparison I took a subsequent tracing 

 of Mr. Fleuss's pulse on the morning of Monday, Novem- 

 ber 17, after breakfast. His pulse was at 63 per minute, 

 the same as it was on Saturday just before he entered the 

 water. It will be seen to be a pulse naturally slow and 

 steady, but not very powerful. 



Tracing of pulse in its nal 

 pressure. Ueats 63 pe 



rdinary condition under the same 

 November 17, 10 30 A.M. 



At fully seven minutes after his release from the water 

 the pulse had come down to sixty-eight beats per minute, 

 and the temperature had risen to 97 F. Ten minutes 

 later still the temperature was 97" '6 F., eight-tenths of a 

 degree below the natural. At this time my observations 



CC3SGG 



The facts above narrated prove that, without assistance 

 from above, a man who has had no previous experience 

 of diving or of remaining under water can take down with 

 him sufficient oxygen to live there easily for an hour. _ Mr. 

 Fleuss assured me— and I see no reason to doubt him— 

 that but for the cold he could have remained another 

 hour and a quarter, and that he could easily arrange to 

 remain four hours. Depth would make, he said, no 

 difference as to breathing within the apparatus. 



The mode by which the breathing is effected remains a 

 secret, but is, he says, extremely simple. At my first 

 observation, when he was under water twenty minutes 

 only, I thought it possible that he carried down sufficient 

 compressed air to live upon, and that he had a means for 

 allowing the expired air to escape into the water. The 

 later experiment shows me that this view was wrong. He 

 could not carry down in the dress sufficient air to last 

 him over an hour, and he does not seem to give out the 

 expired air. I have no knowledge from him or any one 



