162 Memoirs of Erasmus Darwi?i y M.D. 



or relaxed with ease, as a lightish under waistcoat, with Si 

 double row of buttons. This is to compress the bowels and 

 increase their absorption, and it thus removes one principal 

 cause of corpulency,, which is the looseness of the skin. 

 Secondly, he should oiuit one entife meal, as supper ; by 

 this long abstinence from food the absorbent system will act 

 on the mucus and fat with greater energy. Thirdly, he 

 should drink as little as- he can with ease to his sensations ; 

 since, if the absorbents of the stomach and bowels supply 

 the blood with much, or perhaps too much, aqueous fluid, 

 the absorbents of the cellular membrane will act with less- 

 energy. Fourthly, he should use much salt or salted meat, 

 which will increase the perspiration and make him thirsty ; 

 and if he bears this thirst, the absorption of his- fat will be 

 greatly increased, as appears in fevers and dropsies with 

 thirst ; this I believe to be more efficacious than soap, 

 Fifthly, he may use aerated alkaline water for h-is drink,, 

 which may be supposed to render the fat more fluid, — or he 

 inav take soap in large quantities, which will be decomposed 

 in the stomach. Sixthly, short rest, and constant exercise. 



Bronchoeele. — Swelled throat. An enlargement of the 

 thyroid glands, said to be frequent in mountainous countries, 

 ■where river water is drunk which has its source from dis- 

 solving snows. This idea is a very ancient one, but perhaps 

 not on that account to be the more depended upon, as au- 

 thors copy one another. 'Tumid urn guttur quis miratur in 

 aloibus ?' seems to have been a proverb in the time of Juvenal. 

 The inferior people of Derby are much subject to this dis- 

 ease, but whether more so than other populous towns, I 

 cannot determine; certain it is, that they chielly drink the 

 water of the Derwent, which arises in a mountainous coun- 

 try, aitd is very frequently blackened as it passes through 

 the morasses near its source ; and is generally of a darker 

 colour, and attended with a whiter foam, than the Trent, 

 into which it falls : the greater quantity and whiteness of its 

 froth, I suppose,, may be owing to the viscidity communi- 

 cated to it by the colouring matter. The lower parts of the 

 town of Derby might be easily supplied with spring water 

 from St. Alkmond's well 5 or the whole of it from the 



abundant 



