The febris inirritativa is the typhus, of which the defcription is fhort and unfatisfactory. "As the patient awakes, with all the fenfations of fainting and apprehenfion of dying, Dr. Darwin imagines that fome volition is required to carry on the functions fuppofed to be involuntary, and that, from the defect of irritation, this volition is not excited.

The first five fpecies of the fecond genus, confifting of decreased actions of the fecerning fyftem, are only fymptoms of the cold fit of fever; and, though they are inirritative diseases,. they are very remotely, if at all, connected with the genus.

6

In innutrition, that is foftness, of the bones, Dr. Darwin recommends falt of urine, phofphorated foda, calcined hartshorn, bone athes, and hard waters. Most of these remedies were recommended by M. Bonhomme in the Annales de Chymie; not alkalies and teftacea' only. In one inftance, great relief was obtained in a beginning curvature of the fpine, from fitting half an hour, every evening, in a temperate bath, and taking twice a day fome extract of bark, foda phosphorata, chalk, calcined harts-horn, and laudanum. The diet was animal food for dinner and fupper, and the common drink Port wine and water. The patient frequently lay on a fofa in the day, and used the neck-fwing. The remarks on the

neck-fwing, and on the management of young ladies at school, in these respects, are useful and valuable. Their importance would render an abridgment unfatisfactory; and their length precludes an infertion of the whole. In curvatures of the Spine, the author speaks of iffues with commendation: We have feldom feen them ufeful, and well know how fallacious experience is on thefe fubjects; for, when the cause of the difcafe is checked by tonics, nature accommodates herself to the changes with furprifing facility. Dr. Darwin's opinion, that external stimuli increase the fenforial power in the furrounding and fubjacent parts, has probably induced him to be partial to these remedies.

He treats lefs copioufly of dropfies (which are among the fpecies of his third genus) than we could have wifhed. In many he recommends electricity. In the hydrops pectoris, convulfive paroxyfms fometimes occur, which he relieves by opium. A letter from Mr. Power, furgeon of Bofworth, in Lei cefterfhire, is inferted, which deferves fome attention. Speaking of dropfies of the ovarium, he defcribes a curious cafe, where the water was contained in a cyft, connected with the ovarium by a narrow neck. The fluid was dark; but this arofe from the cyft, which is defcribed as fphacelated. In future cafes, he intimates that he may be tempted to extirpate the ovarium.

Though anafarca ufually proceeds from a difeafed liver, it may fometimes, in the opicion of our phyfician, arise from a disease of the brain. He feems to have adopted this diftinction from finding that, in fome cafes, the liver was found, It does not, however, require a distant fource: a debility of the exhalants, or a want of action in the abforbents, will fuf ficiently account for it,

Under the fourth genus, are arranged difeafes confequent on decreased actions of other membranes and cavities.

In the fpecies of this genus, Dr. Darwin is more attentive to the diagnofis than in fome others. The diftinction of arthritis ventriculi is taken from the cold felt in the ftomach. The flatulent colic is properly diftinguished from the pains which resemble it. The faturnine colic is juftly confined to' lead as a caufe, when it has been long taken, or copiously abforbed from a large furface. All the author's ingenuity has been exerted to reduce the tooth-ach and ear-ach to torpor of membranes; but we think he has not fucceeded. We once, in a good state of health, felt a violent pain in the ancle: the pain was tenfive and throbbing. Having at hand fome ftrong alkali, made with quick lime, we applied it. The hand that held it was excoriated: a drop that efcaped above the part, formed an eschar and a deep ulcer, while the skin that covered the pained joint was not even inflamed. No torpor could be

discovered; none was probable; and the pain went off in copious perfpiration. This we think must have been inflammation; and the active powers of the inflamed veffels feem to have deprived the fuperior veffels of their irritability. In this way the coldness of the cheek, and the efficacy of warm external applications, may be explained without recurring to an hypothefis, for which no one fact can, we think, be fairly adduced.

The third order contains the retrograde irritative motions. Sickness feems to Dr. Darwin to proceed from want of ftimulus; and though there are fome difcordant facts, the weight of evidence is in favour of this opinion. He explains all these motions, from the fame caufe, with great plaufibility.

The fluids difgorged by the retrograde motions of the various vafcular muscles may be diftinguished, 1. From those, which are produced by fecretion, by their not being attended by increase of heat, which always accompanies increafed fecretion. 2. They may be diftinguished from those fluids, which are the confequence of deficient abforption, by their not poffeffing the faline acrimony, which thofe fluids poffefs; which inflames the skin or other membranes on which they fall; and which have a faline tafte to the tongue. 3. They may be diftinguifhed from thofe fluids, which are the confequence both of increased secretion and abforption, as thefe are attended with increase of warmth, and are infpiffated by the abftraction of their aqueous parts. 4. Where chyle, or milk, are found in the feces or urine, or when other fluids, as matter, are tranflated from one part of the fyftem to another, they hav been the product of retrograde action of lymphatic or other canals.' P. 150.

The first genus of this order relates to the alimentary canal, the fecond to the abforbent, and the third to the fanguiferous: fome of the species follow;

On thefe diforders we have nothing to remark: the supposed retrograde motion of fluids in the lymphatics, we have already faid, appears to us a miftaken idea; and by none of the facts, adduced under the heads of the different fpecies, are we prompted to alter our opinion.

The fecond clafs contains the diseases of sensation, and is divided into three orders-increafed and decreafed fenfation, and retrograde fenfitive motions. The genera are fingular in a nofological fyftem. The firft genus of the first order contains diseases attended with an increased action of the 'muscles; the fecond, third, fourth, and fifth, thofe attended with the production of new veffels, by external or internal membranes, with or without fever; the fixth, with fever, confequent on the production of new veffels or fluids; the fe venth, with increased action of the organs of sense.

are

The difeafes, attended with increafed action of the muscles,

Thefe are only connected, as they are increafed actions, excited by a fenfe of pain or pleafure, for the purpose of dif lodging the offending caufe, attended with increafed heat, but without inflammation or convulfions. In our author's opinion, convulfions expend the fenforial power, and relieve by rendering the fyftem torpid, without the removal of the irritating caufe.

The obfervations on the diforders belonging to the first genus, are rather phyfiological and pathological, than practical difquifitions. What relates to humoral afthma, is more ftrictly practical; but Dr. Darwin feems to have confounded this disease with the convulfive fpecies, as well as with hydrothorax. In the convulfive asthma, he thinks, there is no fluid to be abforbed; and this conftitutes the diftinction, while he attributes the nocturnal paroxyfms to the accumulation of mucus. We would, however, rather call every cafe of afthma, with diftinct paroxyfms, convulfive; for, if they arife from accumulation of mucus, they would come on gradually at the later hours of the morning, and recur about the fame time every night; but the more violent fits do not constantly recur, and come on from twelve to three. The paroxyfms of afthma from hydrothorax (fymptomata ephialtica) recur at any hour. It is not to be fuppofed, that, because expectoration follows, accumulation was the cause; for

afthmas, brought on by various effluvia, are, about or after their termination, followed by fome expectoration. Accumulation, on the contrary, is only to be deemed the caufe, when the quantity difcharged is confiderable, and the relief is progreffive with, and proportional to, the fpitting. Another reason why we fuppofe Dr. Darwin to have confounded thefe two fpecies, is, that he prefcribes laudanum in the fit. We have given it in many inftances of humoral afthma, in every variety of dofe, either without effect or with difadvan-. tage; while, in the convulfive kind, it is an useful remedy, especially when joined with æther of volatile alkali.

The fecond genus contains the phlegmafia of Dr. Cullen, with the addition of the lumbago fenfitiva, ifchias, and pa ronychia, the gout and rheumatifm, as well as cynanche, being omitted, and the croup arranged with the peripneumony. As fever attends all thefe inflammations, febris fenfitiva irritativa ftands at the head; a diftinction only neceffary because these are difeafes of fenfation; for, in no view, either nofological or practical, is this fever different from the former febris irritativa, except in the concomitant local affection. The criterion of this inflammation is reprefented as the production of new veffels, which, we think, is only the extenfion of the old ones.

The obfervations on ophthalmia and phrenitis are juft and accurate; but thofe on peripneumony are neither fufficiently diftinct, nor correctly detailed. The management of the expectoration, particularly when the activity of the disease begins to decline, or the fputum to be fuppreffed, from weaknefs or diarrhoea, is fcarcely hinted at. We admit that the croup is a peripneumonic difeafe; but Dr. Darwin is certainly in an error, when he fays that it attacks only the upper part of the trachea. On diffections, the new membrane, the effect of the difeafe, follows all the ramifications of the windpipe, and fhows that the whole has been affected. Is peripneumony an inflammation of the veficles of the lungs and the bronchial glands (including all thofe of the trachea), and the croup, an inflammation of the whole membrane ?

The following obfervations on diaphragmitis, are curious and important. They merit, with a referve respecting the theory of the action of opium, our full approbation.

Diaphragmitis. Inflammation of the diaphragm. Pain round the lower ribs as if girt with a cord. Difficult refpiration performed only by elevating the ribs and in an erect pofture. The corners of the mouth frequently retracted into a difagreeable fmile, called rifus

Sardonicus.

Thofe animals, which are furnished with clavicles, or collarbones, not only use their foremost feet as hands, as men, monkies,