LET 
LET 
'without let prefented bis army before the city of Belgrade. 
Knollcs's Hijlory of the Turks. 
It had been done ere this, had I been conful ; 
We had no hop, no let. Ben Jonfon's Catiline. 
Juft judge, two lets remove; that free from dread, 
I may before thy high tribunal plead. Sandys. 
LET, the termination of diminutive words from lyte, 
Sax. little, fmall-, as, rivulet, a fmall ftream ; hamlet, a little 
village. 
LET-GAME, f. [from let, to hinder.] One that hin¬ 
ders pleafure ; a fpy, a teltale. 
LE'TA, a river of Italy, in the marquifate of Ancona, 
which runs into the Adriatic in lat. 43. 8. N. Ion. 13. 
15. E. 
LE'TA, f. A court-leet. 
LE'TAC, a cape on the weft coaft of the ifland of Jer- 
fey: fix miles north-weft of St. Aubin. 
LET'ALA, a town of Sweden, in the government of 
Abo: thirty miles north-north-weft of Abo. 
LETA'NUM, a town of Propontis, built by the Athe¬ 
nians. 
LETCH'ER. See Lecher. 
LE'TECH,/. A Hebrew meafure; half a homer. 
LETHAE'US, a river of Lydia flowing by Magnelia into 
the Maeander.—Another of Macedonia.—Of Crete. 
LE'THAIS, a town of Mingrelia, on the Black Sea: 
ten miles north of Anarghia. 
LETH'AL, adj. [from lethalis, Lat.] Mortal. Bailey. 
LETHALITY,/ Mortality. 
LETHAM, a town of Scotland, in the county of 
Angus, with a market five miles eaft of Forfar. 
LETHAR'GIC, adj. \lethargique, Fr. from lethargy .] 
Sleepy by difeafe, beyond the natural power of fleep.—A 
lethargy demands the fame cure and diet as an apoplexy 
from a phlegmatic cafe, fuch being the conftitution of the 
lethargic. Arhulhnot on Diet. 
Let me but try if I can wake his pity 
From his lethargic fleep. Denham's Sophy. 
LETHAR'GICNESS,/ Morbid fleepinefs; drowfiriefs 
to a difeafe: 
A grain of glory mixt with liumblenefs, 
Cures both a fever, and lethargicnefs. Herbert. 
LETH'ARGIED, adj. Laid afleep ; entranced : 
His motion weakens, or his difeernings 
Are lethargied. Shakefpeare's King Lear. 
LETH'ARGY, / [\r,§cegyicc, Gr. lethargie, Fr.] A 
morbid drowfinefs ; a fleep from which one cannot be 
kept awake.—Europe lay then under a deep lethargy, and 
was no otherwife to be refeued from it, but by one that 
would cry mightily. Atterbury. —A lethargy is a lighter 
fort of apoplexy, and demands the lame cure and diet. 
Arbuthnot on Diet. 
Although his eye is open, as the morning’s. 
Towards lulls and plealures; yet fo fall a lethargy 
Has feized his pow’rs tow’rds pubjic cares and dangers. 
He fleeps like death. Denham's Sophy. 
The lethargy is, in faff, a minor degree of apoplexy ; 
it originates from the fame caufes, and implies a fimilar 
ftate of preflure on the brain, the common centre of the 
nervous energy, as occafions that difeafe. Various de¬ 
nominations have been given to lethargic complaints, 
according to the difference of the degree of feverity ; and 
fome nolologifts have treated of thefe varieties as diltinfl 
fpecies of difeafe. But it is obvious, as Dr. Cullen long- 
ago obferved, that thefe various appellations and defini¬ 
tions. defignate the fame difeafe, in different degrees of 
feverity. We may juft obferve, that it originates from 
fame compreflion upon the fubltance of the brain, by 
which its iunftions are impeded, and its influence on the 
lyltetn at large, through the medium or the nerves, ob- 
Itiucted; that the moft frequent caufe of compreflion is 
VOL. XII. No. 850. 
537 
a plethoric ftate, or an accumulation and congeftion of 
blood in the venous veffels of the head, operating, ac¬ 
cording to its degree, in producing over-diftention or ef- 
fufion. Lethargic complaints may, therefore, both pre¬ 
cede and fucceed afluaF apoplexy, and are not unfre- 
quently the forerunners of a fit. From this confidera- 
tion, the importance of obviating their progrefs in the 
outfet, before a rupture of the velfeis of the brain, or ac¬ 
tual effufion, takes place, muft be obvious; for, however 
impracticable it may be to remove the fluids fo eft'ufed, 
or to occalion their abforption, lo as to preferve the life 
of the patient, or to lave him from an incurable pally, if 
he furvive ; yet, in the previous ftate of mere plethora of 
the veffels of the brain, the proper remedies may be em¬ 
ployed with every profpeCl of removing the lethargic 
iymptoms, and warding off the impending danger. The 
plethora may be corrected by general evacuations by 
blood letting, if there is~an imminent threatening of apo¬ 
plexy ; or by local evacuations by means of leeches, fca- 
rification, and cupping, blillers, or iflues, where the 
danger is lefs imminent. In a word, a lethargy is to be 
conlidered as an impending apoplexy, or an apoplexy al¬ 
ready begun, and to be treated accordingly. See the ar¬ 
ticle Pathology. 
A Angular cafe of a lethargy coming on fuddenly hap¬ 
pened lately at Horfley, in Gloucefterlhire : The fon of 
Benjamin Gillman, a weaver, of that place, aged about 
five years, went to bed in apparent good health and fpi- 
rits ; in the morning he was llill afleep, and, though in¬ 
clined to be fat, was obferved to be very much fbrunk in 
his flefh. He continued fleeping for twelve days and 
twelve nights fucceflively, exilting only on fmall por¬ 
tions of liquid poured with great care down his throat 
with a tea-fpoon, during which time he continually and 
gradually wafted away. Upon his waking, he was quite *• 
unconfcious of what had happened. No apoplexy enfu- 
ed; and the child flowly recovered. 
The native Africans about Sierra Leone are fubjeft 
to a fpecies of lethargy which proves fatal in almoifc 
every inftance. The Timmanees call it marree, or 'nluoi ; 
the Bulloms nagonloe or kadeera-, the Soofoos, kee kollee kon- 
dee, or (leepy fleknefs ; and the Mandingos , feenoyuncaree, 
a word of fimilar import. This difeafe is very frequent 
in the Foola country, and it is faid to be much more 
common in the interior parts of the country than upon 
the fea-coaft. Children are very rarely, or never, affefted 
with this complaint. At the commencement of the dif¬ 
eafe, the patient has commonly a ravenous appetite, eating 
twice the quantity of food he was accuftomed to take 
when in health, and becoming very fat. When the dif¬ 
eafe has continued fome time, the appetite declines, and 
the patient gradually w’aftes away. Squinting occurs fome- 
times, though feldom, in this difeafe; and in fome rare 
inftances the patient is carried off in convulfions. Small 
glandular tumors are fometimes obferved in the neck a 
little before the commencement of this complaint, though 
probably depending rather upon accidental circuinftances 
than upon the difeafe itfelf. Slave-traders, however, ap¬ 
pear to confider thefe tumors as a fymptom indicating a 
difpofltion to lethargy; and they either never buy fuch 
flaves, or get rid of them as foon as they obferve any fuch 
appearances. The difpofltion to fleep is fo llrong, as 
fcarcely to leave a fufficient refpite for the taking of food ; 
even the repeated application of a whip, a remedy which 
has been frequently ufed, is hardly fufficient to keep the 
poor wretch awake. The repeated application of blifters 
and of fetons has been employed by European furgeons 
without avail, as the difeafe, under every mode of treatment, 
ufually proves fatal within three or four months. The na¬ 
tives are totally at a lofs to what caufe this complaint 
ought to be attributed ; fvveating is the only means they 
make ufe of, or from which they hope for any fuccefs : this 
is never tried but in incipient cafes, for, when the difeafe 
has been of any continuance, they think it in vain to 
make the attempt. The root of a grafs called by the 
6 X Soofoos 
