THREE FATAL CASES OF PUERPERAL FEVER. 
299 
turpentine over the back, including a part of the dorsal and the 
whole of the lumbar region, and ordered her to be drenched with 
plenty of warm gruel, and covered up warm with straw, &-c. 
The secretion of milk was suspended. About six hours after¬ 
wards she was raked and clystered, and half a pound of magn. 
sulph. with ten grains of croton farina, and double the former 
quantity of the aromatic, were given. The sight of both eyes 
was gone, and the head was continually thrown back on the 
spine. The pulse had risen to about 120, and was full. I bled 
her again, when she seemed rather more tranquil. Nothing 
passed through her, and she died about 10 a.m. 
Post-mortem appearances at half past S f.m. of the same day .— 
The lungs were in a state of congestion, and nearly black. The 
abdominal cavity presented a healthy appearance, with the ex¬ 
ception of an enormous gall-bladder, and that distended nearly 
to bursting, with perfectly healthy-looking bile. The pelvic 
cavity was healthy. The spinal cord presented an appearance of 
rottenness, with an effusion of a dirty grey-coloured fluid through¬ 
out the whole of the lumbar portion. The vessels of the brain 
were injected nearly to bursting. 
CASE TI. 
May 5thj 1838.—I w^as called about 11 p.m. to attend a cow 
that had calved in the morning of the previous day. She was 
observed to be shifting her feet frequently; trembling and stag¬ 
gering in her walk; and she had not been observed to ruminate 
during the day. She was in very high condition, having been 
frequently allowed a quantity of barley in the sheaf for the ex¬ 
press purpose of giving her a good show (a large udder), as the 
owner intended selling her with the calf at the next market. She 
was an excellent milker, and about eight years old. 
She had been bled by the farmer before I arrived. I found 
her considerably uneasy, w'ith the pulse very little above the 
natural standard, and scarcely to be felt. I abstracted about 
three pints of blood more, when the pulse fluttered, and the cow 
threatened to fall. I then stopped the bleeding, and placed a 
sheep-skin over the loins. The cow now became very uneasy, 
and fell. I gave her the same purgative medicine as in the 
former case, in gruel. I saw her bedded up w^arm, and ordered 
gruel to be given every hour, promising to call early in the 
mornino;. 
On the following morning I attended at six o’clock. I found 
that the bowels w'ere still in a constipated state—the cow grind¬ 
ing her teeth—the sight quite gone—deglutition very difficult, 
and the breath dreadfully foetid : they had given her about two 
quarts of a very strong decoction of groundsel (senecio vulgaris), 
