194 Miscellanies. 
a rare one; and we congratulate the public, and especially the med- 
ical profession, that it fell into the hands of one who appreciated its 
value, and who possessed the requisite intelligence, perseverance, and 
candor, to make the investigation which it afforded, and to state the 
results of such investigation, in a plain, simple, intelligible manner, 
without bias from preconceived opinions, or fanciful hypotheses. 
The case which gave rise to these experiments will be understood, 
from’a brief summary of a particular account given of it, in the in- 
troduction to the book. 
In the year 1822, Alexis St. Martin, then in the employment of the 
American Fur Company, while at Michillimackinac, where Dr. B. 
_ was stationed, was wounded in the side by the accidental discharge 
of a musket loaded with buck shot. ‘The contents of the gun struck 
him upon the left side, and passed in an oblique direction forward 
and inward, literally blowing off integuments and muscles of the size 
of a man’s hand, fracturing and carrying away the anterior half of 
the sixth rib, fracturing the fifth, lacerating the lower portion of the 
left lung, and the diaphragm, and perforating the stomach. The pro- 
gress of the case, after so extensive a wound, involving parts of so 
much importance, was, of course, slow. The soft parts in the vicinity 
sloughed away : the ribs and their cartilages were successively at- 
tacked and destroyed by inflammation, and removed by the sur- 
geon; and it was not until June, 1823, a year from the time of the 
accident, that recovery, so far as it took place, was completed. At 
that time, the parts were in the following state: the injured parts 
were all sound, and firmly cicatrized, with the exception of the aper- 
ture in the side and stomach. The perforation was about two and a 
half inches in circumference; and the food and drinks constantly 
exuded, unless prevented by a tent, compress and bandage. At the 
point where the lacerated edges of the muscular coat of the stomach 
and the intercostal muscles met and united with the cutis vera, the 
cuticle and the mucous membrane of the stomach approached each 
other very nearly. They did not unite, like those of the lips, nose, 
&c., but left an intermediate marginal space, of appreciable breadth, 
between them, completely surrounding the aperture. ‘This space is 
about a line wide; and the cutis and nervous papille being unprotect- 
ed, are as sensible and irritable as a blistered surface abraded of the 
cuticle. The only change which has since taken place, is the gradual 
falling down from the upper margin of the orifice, of a fold of the 
coats of the stomach, fitting itself to the aperture, and forming a valve, 
