New remedies : the method of preparing and administering them : their effects on the healthy and diseased economy, &c. / by Robley Dunglison.

  • Robley Dunglison
Date:
1841
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: New remedies : the method of preparing and administering them : their effects on the healthy and diseased economy, &c. / by Robley Dunglison. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    tion. In a few minutes, convulsive expirations were observed, but no indications of returning life: the face was sunken and livid; the hands and feet deadly cold; the forehead and face cold and dry; and the eyes half open and glassy.* Dr. Damasonf relates the case of a druggist, who had some hydrocyanic acid in a vial with a ground stopper, and as it had been prepared almost three months, thinking that it was decom- posed, he opened the vial, and applied it to his nose to ascertain whether the acid retained any smell: he instantly fell down, and remained for half an hour without giving the slightest signs of life; but finally recovered after an illness of several days. Many experiments have been made on animals with this acid. A drop, introduced into the bill or anus of a sparrow, induced death in from one to two minutes, preceded by convulsions. Even holding the bill over a vial filled with the acid proved fatal. A duck was destroyed by fourteen drops. Twenty drops introduced into the stomach of a rabbit killed it in three minutes. When a few drops were injected into the jugular vein, death supervened still sooner. A small dog, to which two drops had been given, experienced shortness of breath; staggered, fell, passed its urine repeatedly; vomited twice, and afterwards seemed quite well. The same animal took, five hours later, eight drops, and fell into a tetanic, comatose condition, but recovered in half an hour. More severe but not fatal effects resulted from sixteen drops. Thirty to forty drops administered to dogs and cats, produced violent convulsions and death, in from six to fifteen minutes. The experiments of Emmert and Coullon seem to have shown that the action of hydrocyanic acid is more violent when it is injected into the jugular vein, or inhaled in a concentrated form; less so when injected into the rectum. In the case of a horser into whose jugular it was injected, death occurred in twenty-one minutes. When placed in contact with the dura mater, or with nerves, no striking phenomena were perceptible. [?] This fact was confirmed by Viborg.J On the other hand, when received into a wound in its concentrated state, it acts most violently. Scharring, who broke a glass containing the acid, and received some of it into the wound produced thereby, died in an hour after the accident. It is not easy to deduce comparative results from the statements of different experimenters, inasmuch as we are ignorant of the * Hufeland, Journal der practisch. Heilkund. Band. xl. St. 1, S. 85 to 92, and Osann, in Art. Blausaure, in Encyc. Worterb. der Medicinischen Wis- senschaft. Band. v. S. 528. Berlin, 1330. f Journal de Chimie M^dicale. Juin 1831.. | Osann, loc. cit. S. 580.
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