xvho had Swalloxmd a tiumher qf‘ Clasp-Kiiives. 
ed five knives. Next morning, being the 5th day of the month, 
the ship‘*s company was anxious to see the performance renewed 
the second time : by the encouragement of the people, and the 
assistance of good grog, (and his lot was ordained to be miser- 
able hereafter in consequence of the same), he swallowed nine 
that day to his own knowledge; and the spectators informed him 
afterwards that he swallowed four more, that he knows nothing 
about : they were all clasp-knives, and some of them very large. 
Upon the 6th of December he was under the necessity of ap- 
plying to a doctor, who was surgeon of the ship. The doctor, 
finding he was in a bad situation, made a strict enquiry of the 
principal men that were eye-witness to the transaction, which 
the captain and the rest of the officers found to be a true story. 
The surgeon, indeed, never neglected to pay the greatest at- 
tention, and prescribed what medicines he thought proper to- 
wards his relief ; but all to no effect. At the expiration of three 
months, by taking a quantity of oil, he felt them dropping down 
to his bowels. In a few days after he was able to walk any 
part of the ship, and in that continuance till the 4th of June 
following, when he vomited one side of the handle of a knife, 
marked Cunningham, the same man that it belonged to, in the 
same ship ; and, by asking him if he knew any thing about 
such a knife, he directly confessed that it was part of the knife 
Cummings swallowed of his. The surgeon keeps the said piece 
in his possession. Four months passed without any thing extra- 
ordinary having happened. On the 4th of November he passed 
another piece, the same as the former, with the lining of a knife 
along with it; two more he passed during that month. In Fe- 
bruary following vomited another lining of a knife ; in the course 
of that month passed four more pieces, and since nothing ex- 
traordinary came away. 
June IS. 1807, he was discharged the ship, in consequence 
of his complaint, and likewise being found, at the survey, unser- 
viceable ; after which, he was admitted into Guy’s Hospital, un- 
der the care of Dr Babington. Great many never believed such 
a circumstance. After five weeks being in the hospital, was 
presented out, and was in lodgings for the space of five weeks ; 
but, finding himself getting worse, was obliged to make the se- 
cond application, and was re-admitted under his physician again.” 
voL. viT. NO. 14. OCT. 1822. r 
