A treatise on the blood, inflammation, and gun-shot wounds / by John Hunter ; with notes by James F. Palmer.

  • John Hunter
Date:
1840
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A treatise on the blood, inflammation, and gun-shot wounds / by John Hunter ; with notes by James F. Palmer. 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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    The serum of the blood is sometimes wheyish, and then upon settling it often throws up a white scum like cream. This was most probably first observed in the human blood, but is not peculiar to it. Although these appearances pretty often happen, yet few in- stances fall under the observation of one man in the common course of bleeding. When they have occurred to myself I have made inquiry after the state of health of the patient, as well as examined the nature of this change and whether there was any variety in it. So far as I have been able to observe, it can hardly be said to have any leading cause; having found it, however, more frequently in the blood of breeding women, I conceived it might have some con- nexion with that state; but I have seen it in others, and sometimes in men. Yet it is possible that the state of pregnancy may adapt the constitution for forming such appearances, as well as for pro- ducing other symptoms in the blood like those of inflammation ; for we often find the same effect or disease arising from various causes which have no immediate connexion with each other. There have been many opinions formed about the nature and cause of this appearance of the serum. It has been supposed to be occasioned by chyle not yet assimilated; but it does not occur fre- quently enough to be attributed to this fluid. Mr. Hewson supposed it to be absorbed fat or oil; which certainly is not the case, for it is not the same in all cases.* so as to occasion headache, sickness, fainting, dysentery, and even death. In suppression of urine it acquires a strong urinous character. Orfila and more recently Barrueil (Ann. d'Hygiene, i. 274, 550. Revue Med., Sept. 1829,) have attempted to establish the possibility of distinguishing the different tribes of animals by the peculiarity of smell disengaged from blood-spots or stains upon the addition of strong sulphuric acid. The odour which exhales is said to re- semble strongly the perspiration or respiration of the animal from which the blood is derived, which in men having dark hair and complexions and in carni- vorous animals is said to be peculiarly characteristic. M. Leuret, in order to test the accuracy of M. Barrueil's assertions, sent four specimens in phials con- taining ox blood, horse blood, and blood from the human subject both male and female. M. Barrueil detected the two former, but in regard to the two latter he mistook the male's for the female's ; a mistake, however, which, under the cir- cumstances, strongly confirmed his own views of the case, for it so happened that the man from whom the blood was taken was fair, whereas the woman had dark hair and was remarkably strong. These statements have been supported by Leuret and Chevallier, and as stoutly denied by Raspail, Villerme, and Soubeyan, so that considerable doubt at present hangs over the subject; and evi- dence founded on these data would not, I apprehend, be admissible in a court of justice on any medico-legal question. (Raspail, Chim. Organ., p. 383. Ann des Sc. d'Obser. 1829, ii. 183, 465.) Blood-spots on linen clothes or steel instruments may be distinguished from any other marks : 1st, by the evolution of ammonia on dry distillation ; 2d, by the effects of acids and neutral salts on solutions of the colouring matters ; 3d, by the usual tests for albumen ; and 4th, by blood scaling ofTfrorn steel instruments on being heated, and leaving them tolerably clean and free from rust.] * [Opaline or milky serum would appear to depend on certain principles (steanne and oleine) naturally present in the blood (see Analysis, p. 26), but which under certain circumstances superabound in the system. In a very well marked case of this kind, Dr. Babington estimated the proportion of oleaginous matters at three per cent, of the whole serum. {Med. C'hir. Trans xvi p 46) ■