TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 81 



Some Observations on a Case of Deafness, Dumbness, and Blindness, with 

 Remarks on the Muscular Sense. By Dr. Fowler. 



The case was that of a young woman in the Rotheihithe Workhouse ; she was 

 born deaf and dumb, and was blinded by small -pox when three years old. She is 

 now about twenty, and does not hear the loudest efforts of the voice, but starts on a 

 poker held by a string against her ear being struck against a grate, or when her 

 nurse stamps' on the boarded floor. Touch was the only sense which others used 

 for communicating with her, or she employed in examining persons or objects. She 

 possessed both taste and smell, but did not appear to have used them. Until the age 

 of fourteen or fifteen her existence appeared merely animal, but then a marked differ- 

 ence took place in her habits ; she became as attentive to dress and personal deco- 

 rum as any other girl. She feels her way without a guide to every part of the work- 

 house, recognizes all its inmates by the feel of their hands, makes her bed, and sews, 

 not only plain work, but even the more intricate parts of dress. She is very tena- 

 cious of what she deems her own, and was much pleased with a shilling which was 

 put into her hands, smiling, curtseying, and feeling it eagerly for some time after- 

 wards. The author deems the true key to so much and minute information derived 

 from touch alone to be the development of the muscular sense, and of the reciprocal 

 influence of the adjustments of the different organs of sense on each other, by which 

 all the exquisite attainments of the artisan, the musician, the sculptor, the painter, 

 and even the orator are regulated. Several instances were given of the existence of 

 this sense in the lower animals, and practical suggestions made for its application in 

 educating the deaf and dumb, particularly when these defects are complicated with 

 blindness. 



Abstracts of an extraordinary case of Albuminous Ascites, ivith Hydatids ; of 

 Jive cases of Hqyatic Abscess, and of two cases of Phthisis. By Sir D. J. 

 H. Dickson, M.D., F.R.S.E., F.L.S., Inspector of Hospitals, and of tlw 

 African Institute of Paris. 



J. Prendergast, set. 46, who had been invalided from this hospital two years pre- 

 viously, and subsequently in Haslarwith ascites, was re- admitted, greatly emaciated, 

 and with the abdomen enormously enlarged, on the 11th of September last. The 

 dyspnoea and oppression were so great, that, though with little hope of benefit, it was 

 deemed advisable to attempt to relieve him by tapping, on the 17th, but about a pint 

 only of a yellow, gelatinous looking fluid, slowly escaped through the round canula, 

 and he died on the 27th of September, 1841. — Sectio Cadaveris, thirty-one hours 

 post mortem. The abdomen was much distended by a clear semi-concrete matter, 

 nearly resembling half-liquefied calves-foot jelly, while a thinner eftusion occupied the 

 interstices between the intestines and viscera, which had been inseparably accreted 

 by pre-existing inflammation of the peritoneal coat. A great quantity cf this matter 

 covered the peritoneum, and adhering to its processes, was detached in filmy vesicular 

 masses, and also nearly filled the cavity of the pelvis. Other globular bodies, more 

 distinctly invested by a fine, pellucid membrane, accurately resembled hydatids ; 

 some of them being smaller, were appended to larger ones, which were attached by 

 pedicles to the peritoneal surface of different organs, or in firmer cysts were imbedded 

 in their structure, especially in the spleen : these vesicular cysts were of various 

 sizes, from a small grape or nut to that of an orange, but they decreased in di- 

 stinctness of organization as they increased in size. The more fluid portion of this 

 jelly-like effusion, coagulated by heat, and on being tested by the nitric acid and acetic 

 acids and tincture of galls, &c., was found to consist chiefly of albumen with a smaller 

 proportion of gelatin. 



Sir David Dickscm subsequently communicated abstracts of five cases of hepatic 

 abscess, the contents of two of which made their way through the diaphragm and 

 were discharged by expectoration ; one, by opening it externally, and another into 

 the cavity of the abdomen. These cases were accompanied by some remarks on the 

 infrequency of serious organic diseases of the liver, which, though at variance witli 

 the very generally received opinion, are corroborated by extensive necroscopic in- 

 vestigations during seventeen years at Plymouth Hospital. 



In a concluding paper he adduced two cases of phthisis, one of which terminated 

 1841. G 



