RELATIONS AND VALUES OF THE ANAESTHETICS. 
251 
tists—that the majority of operations are performed during an 
imperfect condition of anaesthesia. 
In the previous paper in the Review, devoted to chloro¬ 
form, it was, I think, sufficiently shown that such premises 
are untrue, more especially the first. Admitting what was 
pointed out"by Dr. J. Snow, as long ago as 1856, that under 
specific circumstances chloroform may induce fatality in man 
through respiratory paralysis, or simultaneous arrest of res¬ 
piration and circulation, and is more prone to do so in animals 
under experimentation, for reasons before explained ; such is 
by no means a frequent or even common result, even among the 
latter; and further—the Felidcz possibly excepted—such has 
supervened in animals only when administered in specific 
quantities and volume, with the deliberate purpose of induc¬ 
ing death ! At the same time the Commission ignores the fact, 
unwittingly proven by itself, that complete and sudden vaso¬ 
motor paralysis, which has positively never been observed to 
follow ether anaesthesia, is a constantly threatening danger 
where chloroform is employed. 
The experiments of Dr. Anstie are doubtless familiar to 
most of my readers. Of ten rodent animals intended to be 
killed by being introduced into an atmosphere super-satu¬ 
rated with ether vapor, three recovered, six exhibited the 
heart still active at periods varying from three to twelve 
minutes after respiration had failed, and in one, cardiac and 
respiratory arrest were apparently simultaneous, or nearly 
so, as “ when the chest was slit open the heart seemed motion¬ 
less, except for a slight pulsation of the auricles; irritation by 
pricking failed to set the ventricles in motion again.” 
Recalling the fact that these experiments were made with 
the “ sulphuric ether,” of the British Pharmacopoeia of 1864, 
a somewhat imperfect product containing a goodly percent¬ 
age of alcohol, I recently personally repeated, upon a series 
of thirty-seven rodents, employing the etheris fortior of 
Squibb ; otherwise the circumstances and surroundings were 
parallel. The result was, that in each instance save one, the 
heart was found beating after respiration had ceased : the ex¬ 
ception was an animal that began to agafn respire while 
