I 
Secl.IX. Burs^ MucosiE of the Human Body. 4t 
incifioii was fo violent asj^o kill the animal, after producing an. adhefion of 
the lungs with the upper part of the pleura, in the fpace of thirty -fix hours. 
(D.) The danger of the admiffion of air to the cavity of the pericardium 
and furface of the heart is proved by the following very fingular cafe, which 
occurred to me about fix years ago. Two men in liquor, difpiiting about 
their fldll in fencing, the one challenged the other to a match with pokers heat- 
ed at the points, that there might be no miftake about the hits ; and his chal- 
lenge was accepted. One of them received a thruft under the cartilage of the 
fourth rib of the right fide, about a finger-breadth from the edge of the fier- 
num, in a flanting direction inwards. He complained little till the third day 
after the accident, when fymptoms of deep-feated inflammation began to ap- 
pear, and, notwithftanding blooding and other remedies, continued to in- 
creafe. Thefe, on the tenth day thereafter, w^hen I was called to him, were 
fucceeded by rigor and coldnefs of the extremities, with a fmall, frequent, 
and intermitting, pulfe ; and two days thereafter he died. On opening his bo* 
dy, a flanting pafla^e was difcovered on the outfide of the pleura into the me* 
diaftinum and cavity of the pericardium ; in which lafl: about five ounces of 
purulent matter were found. The internal part of the pericardium, and the 
whole furface of the heart, were much inflamed ; but there was no mark of 
injury done to the heart by the point of the poker : and it appeared to me 
evident, that the fatal fymptoms had been chiefly produced by the air enter- 
ing the pericardium in the time of infpiration. 
, (E.) The abdominal vifcera, I have already obferved, are dangeroufly af- 
fected by the air of the atmofphere admitted through wounds. But I have 
met with three cafes in which the air efcaped from the alimentary canal into 
the cavity of the peritoneum, and occafioned a true tympany, attended with 
fuch a degree of inflammation^ as occafioned, in a few days, flight adhefion of 
the different parts of the inteftines with each other and with the peritoneum, 
and no doubt contributed much, with other complaints, to the death of the 
patients. In the firfl; of thefe cafes, to which I was called by the late Dr D. 
I‘ Clark 
A 
