252 
catarrhal and afthmatic affections, fudden- 
ly deprived, by the mercilefs hand of an 
empirical practitioner, of almoft all the 
few drops of blood that ftill lingered in 
his withered and nearly exhaufted veins. 
“The diftended and over- charged veflels of 
the vigorous and the young may admit, 
and fometimes even require, a partial eva- 
cuation of their contents. But to take 
from an emaciated old man, bent under the 
weight of years, any part of that vital fluid, 
with which he is fo {cantily provided, is an 
act that would never be rafhly committed 
by any difcerning or mtelligent practi- 
tioner. 
Fewer murders, perhaps, have been per- 
petrated by the fword than by the lancet. 
Next to the vaft {cythe of time, fcarcely is 
there any weapon that has committed more 
cruel ravages than thofe whichhave been ef- 
feéted by this Sowerful, although minute 
inftrument of deftru€tion. 
The inftances of hypochoridriafis, record- 
ed in our lift of difeafes, have in general 
occurred at an advanced period of life. 
There are few perfons indeed at an ad- 
- vanced period of life, in whom we’ may 
not detect, in a greater or lefs degree, the 
Proceedings of Public Societies. 
|“ [Aprilr, 
fymptoms of this difeafe. Objeétsin ge- _ 
neral having loft ina good meafure their 
power of interefting, being no longer en- 
tertained by the amufements, nor engaged 
earneftly in the ferious occupations of life, 
and moft of thofe focial conneétions being 
broken which tended formerly to divert his 
attention from himfelf, it is no wonder 
that the mind of an old man fhould often 
become occupied almoft entirely by the 
daily increafing infirmities of his body. 
This will be ftill more likely to occur’ 
in thofe cafes where a perfon has been fo 
unfortunate as, in the earlier periods of his 
life, to expend in licentious and enfeebling 
pleafures, the whole of that corporeal vi- 
gor, part of which ought carefully to haye 
been referved for the comfort and the fup- 
port of age. A remark which might 
be illuftrated by the inftance of a celebrated 
perfonage in facred ftory, who, after hav- 
ing exhaufled the powers of his conftitu- 
tion, by that unlimited debauchery; fo 
which his youth and manhood were de- 
voted, at length complains, in the true 
temper of an hypochondsiac, that—‘* 4// 
is vanity and vexation.of fpirit.” 
Red Lion fquare. > AR. 
PROCEEDINGS OF LEARNED SOCIETIES. 
NATIONAL INSTITUTE Of FRANCE. 
LABILLARDIERE read a me- 
» moir on two fpecies of the Uitch 
from the Moluccas. ‘Thele plants are na- 
tives of China, and were introduced into 
the Moluccas by the Chinefe inhabitants 
of thefe iflands. One of them, called raz- 
boutan by the Malays, is the mephelium 
lappaceum, Limn. the other, called by the 
natives ramboutan akai, is not known by 
botanifts. 
The xephelium has been fo little known 
that it has been fucceffively ranged under 
the compofite, the amentaceous, and the 
’ euphorbia.. The author of the memoir 
proves that it belongs to the family of the 
f2ponaceous. ( favoniers), and adds it to 
the litchi. (of | 
‘The calyx of this tree is compofed of 
four or five divifions, and hairy 3 ithas no 
corolla. It has from four to fix ftamina, 
inferred under the piftil, and very cadu- 
cous; which has caufed it to be confidered 
as moncecious. The feed-bud is formed 
of two rounded lobes, and the ftyle bifur- 
cates into two broad ftigmata. One the 
lobes generally, proves abortive, the other 
forms a red oval berry, brifiled with hairs 
that terminate like a fifh-hook, ana co- 
Ze 
vered with a tuberculated coriaceous coat. 
The nut is oval, femewhat flattened, and 
imbedded in a pulp, to which it adheres by 
its bafe. This tree, therefore, only dif- 
fers from the litchi in wanting a corolla, 
and in-having only four-to fix ftamina, in- 
ftead of fix or eight. The points of the 
fruit, though long, cannot make it rank 
as a feparate {pecies, fince the fruit of the 
common litchi is alfo ftudded with {mall 
points, likewile originating from tubercles 
which are bounded by irregular polygons. 
The pulp of this fruit is fomewhat acid; 
it is ufed in the Moluccas to quench the 
thirft of perfons attacked with malignant 
fevers. ~The furgeon to the expedition in 
fearch of La Peyroufe, has alfo ufed it with 
. fuccefs in dyfenteries. 
The litfea, ramboutan akai, differs from 
the preceding in having the divifions of 
the calyx blunter, the ftigmata fharpened, 
the fruit fet with tubercles truncated at 
the top, and the exterior covering thicker ; 
it likewile does not rife higher than about 
feventeen feet (Englifh), 1ts branches are 
horizontal, and its leaves have hx to eight 
leaflets. ‘The pulp is as agreeable to the 
tafte as the other, and the nut has a ker- 
nel-tafte,. An oil is drawn from it fimilar 
to 
