590 
RESPIRATION. 
very distinct; it depends upon gaseous product, and this early in 
the accumulation of fluid. This sound is more a visionary than a 
real one, which must be obvious when we reflect that an unoc- 
cupied space or void cannot exist within the thorax of a living 
animal ; therefore the alternate rising and falling or descending of 
the fluid effused, experiences no sudden transposition by which 
a gurgling sound would be produced. In some cases of plastic 
formations and additional chambers filled with effused fluid, and 
subsequent to paracentesis, this phenomenon is observable. 
Diseases of the Heart change the characters of the respiration 
in a much less degree than in affections of the lungs and 
pleura, and much less diagnostic of their nature and extent. The 
most remarkable phenomenon observable in the respiratory move- 
ment in the several phlegmasia of the heart is, sighing: whether 
in endo-carditis, carditis, or pericarditis, the sense of oppression 
and anxiety in the precordia, which invariably attends these 
cases, always produces deep and frequent sighing, which seems 
to afford temporary relief. The respiration in each of the above 
lesions, free of complication, is always equal, whether it be fre- 
quent or accelerated; and however rapid the movements of the 
chest may be (which depends on the degree of pain the animal 
suffers), it is never laborious, and, as before stated, it is always 
equal, except when interrupted by sighing. Auscultation gives 
exalted murmur at every point of the thorax. All painful dis- 
eases of the abdominal viscera accelerate the respiration, and the 
most rapid movement I recollect to have witnessed was in a case 
of enlargement and extensive ulceration of the spleen. In all the 
abdominal diseases the respiration is always equal and complete, 
and the murmur universally exalted. 
Here terminates my essay on the movements of respiration ; and, 
in conclusion, 1 beg to observe, that my original purport was, briefly 
to illustrate the various movements of respiration, more especially 
in order to consider the pathology of the characters, rather than 
the natural philosophy of its mechanism. I preferred to consider 
the respiration abstractedly, from the circumstance that authors of 
works and transcribers of cases are, for the most part, so very defi- 
cient in their illustrations of this very important movement in the . 
diagnosis of some of the most formidable and destructive diseases 
in our patients. Intelligence arising from a study of the pulse 
seems to have quite the leading attraction, while the respiratory 
characters are barely glanced at; yet the former is ofttimes 
deceptive, and the latter very rarely is. 
Much of the reading in this essay may appear prolix and dry ; 
but it must be clinically read to be properly appreciated. In 
the loose box with the patient, I fear the descriptions of respira- 
