Report on the first eighteen months of the fourth yellow fever epidemic of British Guiana / by Daniel Blair.
- Blair, Daniel.
- Date:
- [1856]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Report on the first eighteen months of the fourth yellow fever epidemic of British Guiana / by Daniel Blair. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![APPENDIX. The link in the chain of evidence referred to by the author as deficient when he wrote the concluding section of his paper, appears to me to be supplied by his later researches—^those of which he gives an account in the following letter: George Tovni, Demerara, March 8th, 1856. Mt dear Sib,—I beg to enclose for your examination a small fragment of material which was ex])ectorated by a seaman, Thomas Bailly, suffering from yellow fever in the Seaman's Hospital, on the 29th ult. The expectoration at the time of observation was of considerable quantity, amounting probably to an ounce. Some of it had a clear glairy appearance, and some was of rather an opaque white, and of a tenacious consistence. Mixed with this expectoration were several red spots, apparently minute blood-clots. On microscopic examination, the pale portion was found to consist chiefly of epithelium, but no cUia were observed on the cells, which were in general very perfect. Several fragments of broken capillaij vessels were found mixed with it. When the red spots were subjected to examination, they were found to consist of bundles of capillary fragments, tinted of a bright pink or crimson, and without blood-corpuscles being present. Under the one-fourth and one-eighth inch object-glass of Ross, several of these capillaries were found to be colourless. I enclose a small portion of this material in tinfoil; and, lest decom- position should injure the specimen before it arrives at its destination, I have mounted a minute portion in Canada balsam, which is also sent. Although it is only a week put up in the balsam, I find that it has lost much of its brightness of colour alreac^. The fimbriated ends are also injured. It would likely nave done better in a glass cell preserved in Goadby's solution, but I feared that the thin glass of the cell would have been fractured in passing through the post-oflBce. I hope, however, that between the two samples sent, sufficient may reach you to enaole you to form a correct idea of its structure. On the 4th of last month, in the case of a seaman named Morrison (fatal), I for the first time observed the undoubted presence of broken capillary vessels in the excretions of yellow fever. In his case, also, it was first noticed in the expectoration. On all former occasions, epistaxis or bloody expectoration was looked on carelessly, as merely a manifesta- tion of the hscmorrhagic tendency, and nothing was expected to be seen but blood- corpuscles under the microscope. These symptoms were therefore abnost un- heeded hitherto. On this occasion, however, some turn of thought suggested more particular attention to the subject, and tlie examination of Morrison's oloody sputa led to important results. I have since found the existence of broken capillary vessels one of the commonest plienomcna of the disease. They are to be found sometimes in great abvmdance in the urine, in the alvine evacuations, in the white vomit, in Ihe ilaky sediment of the black vomit, in the bloody exudations and hsemorrliages from the mouth, and even on the blistered surfaces. In the flakes of black vomit, it is sometimes necessary to dissolve off the albuminous matter by a drop or two of liquor potassoe before they come fully into view. I H](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22283614_0091.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
