Effects of the Prussic Acid. 195 



In the first stage of catarrhal, or tuberculous phthisis, I 

 am induced to believe, from observations made on five ca- 

 ses, that it will alleviate most of the urgent symptoms. — 

 Whether it will cure patients actually laboring under con- 

 sumption, in any stage of the disease, is, perhaps, as yet 

 undecided. But by the controul which it appears to pog- 

 .sess over the morbid irritation of the membranes, there is 

 little doubt but it will, at least for a time, retard the progress 

 of the disease, and prevent the approach of ulceration. 

 This position seems, indeed, to have been proved in a 

 considerable number of instances. 



In cases where the lungs are already ulcerated, with the 

 concomitants of the third stage of consumption, there is no 

 reason to believe it does any permanent good. I have 

 known one instance, however, of this kind, where it seemed 

 to operate as a palliative, by obviating the costiveness, and 

 lessening the disposition to cough. 



One word concerning the mode of giving the prussic acid, 

 and I have done. 



As this article is given only by drops, 1 have found it 

 most convenient to measure out a certain number of fluid 

 drachms of the vehicle, as of syrup of Tolu or of sugar 

 and water, into which is then dropped, one or two drops of 

 prussic acid to each drachm. The dose is then a measured 

 quantity of the julep. 



I have known several instances where the medicine lost 

 its effect by being exposed to the light, by taking out the 

 cork several times a day from a vial of unmixed prussic 

 acid, for the purpose of dropping out each dose, or from 

 leaving the cork loose. 



V. By Dr. A. S. Monson, of New-Haven. 



I would notice the following case as illustrative of the 

 beneficial operation of the prussic acid in incipient phthisis. 



The patient had been subject to chronic catarrh for seve- 

 ral years, to dyspnoea after much bodily exercise, and lat- 

 terly to slight cough, expectoration, and pain in the breastj 

 which symptoms, by recent additional colds, had been much 

 aggravated. 



The expectoration, mixed with florid blood, had now be- 

 come purulent and dark rolonrpd, of a very offensive odoW; 



