Facts relating to Hydrophobia. 143 



ing to the families of the plants which produce them. 3d, That 

 some being acrid and resinous may be injurious, and others being 

 mild and gummy may assist in the nourishment of other plants. 4th, 

 That these facts tend to confirm the theory of rotation due to M. 

 De Candolle.— ^i6. Univ. Mai, 1832. 



Art. XXIII. — Fads in relation to several Remarkable Deaths at- 

 tributed to Hydrophobia. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 



The death of a friend,* in the parish of Chester, in Connecticut, 

 having called me to that place in July, 1830; the occasion of his fu- 

 neral brought me into contact with some of the surviving friends of 

 four persons who, not many years before, had died there under very 

 remarkable circumstances. From the father of one of them, I receiv- 

 ed a very painful statement of facts, of which I had heard, somewhat 



vaguely before, and which had excited, in my mind, no little interest 

 and curiosity. This bereaved father, a sensible and judicious, elder- 

 ly man, expressed to me, in the most decided terms, his belief, that 

 his son died of the hydrophobia. As the circumstances of my visit 

 did not permit me, to make a full investigation, a letter was some- 

 time after, addressed to the Rev. William Case, the clergyman of 

 the village, (a gentleman upon whose zeal, intelligence, and candor, 

 the fullest reliance could be placed,) requesting him to transmit to me 

 a statement of the facts. 



There is no wish on his part or on mine, to agitate medical 

 theories ; and every one will, of course, form his own opinion as 

 to the possibility of the communication of the hydrophobic virus, 

 from one human being to another. On physical principles, no satis- 

 factory reason can be assigned, why the human subject of this mal- 

 ady should be unable to transmit the poison of the infected saliva to 

 the fluids of a wounded person, although it is confidently asserted, 



"* The late Dr. Burr Noyes. Chester is thirty miles north east of New Haven, in 

 the town of Saybrook, near the mouth of Connecticut river. Dr. Noyes was much 

 esteemed as a physician, and was in attendance in the case of C. C, described in the 

 succeeding pages. 



