New remedies : with formulae for their preparation and administration / By Robley Dunglison.

  • Robley Dunglison
Date:
1856
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: New remedies : with formulae for their preparation and administration / By Robley Dunglison. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    Wc have already blinded to the effect of the acid when dropped upon the conjunctiva—a mucous surface, and therefore po of highly absorbing powers; but it cannot even be placed with impunity in eon- tact with surfaces, which, owing to their being covered with onticle, do not readily absorb. Orlila1 states, that a profeSSQT of Vienna having prepared a, pure and concentrated acid, spread a certain quantity of it on his naked arm, and died a short time afterwards. Dr. Chriflti however, says this was probably a mistake. On repeating lome of the experiments, ho found that a single drop, weighing scarcely B third of a grain, dropped into the mouth of a rabbit, killed it in eighty-three seconds, and began to act in sixty-three; that three drops, weighing four-fifths of a grain, in like manner, killed a strong cat in thin conds, and began to act in ten; that another was affected by the same dose in five, and died in forty, seconds; that four drops, weigh] grain and a fifth, did not affect a rabbit for twenty seconds, but killed it in ten seconds more; and that twenty-five grains, corresponding with an ounce and a half of medicinal acid, began to act on a rabbit, as soon as it was poured into its mouth, and killed it outright in ten se- conds at farthest. Three drops, projected into the eye, acted on a cat in twenty seconds, and killed it in twenty more; and the same quantity, dropped on a fresh wound in the loins, acted in forty-five, and proved fatal in one hundred and five, seconds.3 As before remarked, from the rapidity with which the toxical effects are observed after hydrocyanic acid has been taken, it has seemed to be almost impossible for the poison to have entered the blood-vessels, and have passed with the current of the circulation to the great vital organ on which its deleterious agency is exerted. The well-devised and carefully conducted experiments of Professor Blake,4 of St. Louis, show, however, that in the case of this poison, as of every other, the velocity of the circulatory current is so great, as to enable us to un- derstand that the deadly influence may be exerted in all cases by the reception of the poison into the blood. He found, that sufficient time always elapses between the application of the poison and the first evidences of its action to admit of such contact. In an experiment on a rabbit with hydrocyanic acid,5 the animal, immediately after the contact of the acid with the lining membrane of the mouth, jumped from the table, and when on the floor was perfectly able to stand on its feet. At two seconds and a half after the application of the poison it fell on its side, and in five seconds was dead. This, says Dr. Blake, is but one of many experiments which have been performed on cats and rabbits, and in no instance have I observed instantaneous death, or even the instantaneous action of the poison.6 If given in rather too strong a dose, or—if in proper doses—at too short intervals, it produces headach, and vertigo, which go off, however, 1 Toxicologic 2 Op. cit. p. 592; 3 Geoghcgan, in Dublin Medical Journal, for 1835, and Pereira, Op. cit. p. 2 12. 4 Edinb. Med. and Surgical Journal, April, 1830, p. 389, and St. Louis Med. and Surg. Journal, Nov. and Dec, ]S48. 5 American Journal of the Medical Sciences, July, 1840, p. 106. 6 See the Author's General Therapeutics and Materia Medioa, >th edit. i. 06, Phila. 1853.