Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air Part 17

The distilled water impregnated with so small a quant.i.ty of vitriolic acid, having a more agreeable taste than when alone, and yet manifesting the presence of an acid by means of the syrup of violets; I subjected it to some other tests of acidity. It formed curds when agitated with soap, lathered with difficulty, and very imperfectly; but not the least ebullition could be discovered upon dropping in spirit of sal ammoniac, or solution of salt of tartar, though I had taken care to render the latter free from causticity by impregnating it with fixed air.

EXPERIMENT V.

The distilled water saturated with fixed air neither effervesced, nor shewed any clouds, when mixed with the fixed or volatile alkali.

EXPERIMENT VI.

No curd was formed by pouring this water upon an equal quant.i.ty of milk, and boiling them together.

EXPERIMENT VII.

When agitated with soap, this water produced curds, and lathered with some difficulty; but not so much as the distilled water mixed with vitriolic acid in the very small proportion above-mentioned. The same distilled water without any impregnation of fixed air lathered with soap without the least previous curdling. River-water, and a pleasant pump-water not remarkably hard, were compared with these. The former produced curds before it lathered, but not quite in so great a quant.i.ty as the distilled water impregnated with fixed air: the latter caused a stronger curd than any of the others above-mentioned.

EXPERIMENT VIII.

Apprehending that the fixed air in the distilled water occasioned the coagulation, or separation of the oily part of the soap, only by destroying the causticity of the _lixivium_, and thereby rendering the union less perfect betwixt that and the tallow, and not by the presence of any acid; I impregnated a fresh quant.i.ty of the same distilled water with fixed air, which had pa.s.sed through half a yard of a wide barometer-tube filled with salt of tartar; but this water caused the same curdling with soap as the former had done, and appeared in every respect to be exactly the same.

EXPERIMENT IX.

Distilled water saturated with fixed air formed a white cloud and precipitation, upon being mixed with a solution of _saccharum saturni_.

I found likewise, that fixed air, after pa.s.sing through the tube filled with alkaline salt, upon being let into a phial containing a solution of the metalic salt in distilled water, caused a perfect separation of the lead, in the form of a white powder; for the water, after this precipitation, shewed no cloudiness upon a fresh mixture of the substances which had before rendered it opaque.

NUMBER II.

_A Letter from Mr. HEY to Dr. PRIESTLEY, concerning the Effects of fixed Air applied by way of Clyster._

Leeds, Feb. 15th, 1772.

Reverend Sir,

Having lately experienced the good effects of fixed air in a putrid fever, applied in a manner, I believe not heretofore made use of, I thought it proper to inform you of the agreeable event, as the method of applying this powerful corrector of putrefaction took its rise princ.i.p.ally from your observations and experiments on fact.i.tious air; and now, at your request, I send the particulars of the case I mentioned to you, as far as concerns the administration of this remedy.

January 8, 1772, Mr. Lightbowne, a young gentleman who lives with me, was seized with a fever, which, after continuing about ten days, began to be attended with those symptoms that indicate a putrescent state of the fluids.

18th, His tongue was black in the morning when I first visited him, but the blackness went off in the day-time upon drinking: He had begun to doze much the preceding day, and now he took little notice of those that were about him: His belly was loose, and had been so for some days: his pulse beat 110 strokes in a minute, and was rather low: he was ordered to take twenty-five grains of Peruvian bark with five of tormentil-root in powder every four hours, and to use red wine and water cold as his common drink.

19th, I was called to visit him early in the morning, on account of a bleeding at the nose which had come on: he lost about eight ounces of blood, which was of a loose texture: the haemorrhage was suppressed, though not without some difficulty, by means of tents made of soft lint, dipped in cold water strongly impregnated with tincture of iron, which were introduced within the nostrils quite through to their posterior apertures; a method which has never yet failed me in like cases. His tongue was now covered with a thick black pellicle, which was not diminished by drinking: his teeth were furred with the same kind of sordid matter, and even the roof of his mouth and sauces were not free from it: his looseness and stupor continued, and he was almost incessantly muttering to himself: he took this day a scruple of the Peruvian bark with ten grains of tormentil every two or three hours: a starch clyster, containing a drachm of the compound powder of bole, without opium, was given morning and evening: a window was set open in his room, though it was a severe frost, and the floor was frequently sprinkled with vinegar.

20th, He continued nearly in the same state: when roused from his dozing, he generally gave a sensible answer to the questions asked him; but he immediately relapsed, and repeated his muttering. His skin was dry, and harsh, but without _petechiae_. He sometimes voided his urine and _faeces_ into the bed, but generally had sense enough to ask for the bed-pan: as he now nauseated the bark in substance, it was exchanged for Huxham's tincture, of which he took a table spoonful every two hours in a cup full of cold water: he drank sometimes a little of the tincture of roses, but his common liquors were red wine and water, or rice-water and brandy acidulated with elixir of vitriol: before drinking, he was commonly requested to rinse his mouth with water to which a little honey and vinegar had been added. His looseness rather increased, and the stools were watery, black, and foetid: It was judged necessary to moderate this discharge, which seemed to sink him, by mixing a drachm of the _theriaca Andromachi_ with each clyster.

21st. The same putrid symptoms remained, and a _subsultus tendinum_ came on: his stools were more foetid; and so hot, that the nurse a.s.sured me she could not apply her hand to the bed-pan, immediately after they were discharged, without feeling pain on this account: The medicine and clysters were repeated.

Reflecting upon the disagreeable necessity we seemed to lie under of confining this putrid matter in the intestines, lest the evacuation should destroy the _vis vitae_ before there was time to correct its bad quality, and overcome its bad effects, by the means we were using; I considered, that, if this putrid ferment could be more immediately corrected, a stop would probably be put to the flux, which seemed to arise from, or at least to be encreased by it; and the _fomes_ of the disease would likewise be in a great measure removed. I thought nothing was so likely to effect this, as the introduction of fixed air into the alimentary ca.n.a.l, which, from the experiments of Dr. Macbride, and those you have made since his publication, appears to be the most powerful corrector of putrefaction hitherto known. I recollected what you had recommended to me as deserving to be tried in putrid diseases, I mean, the injection of this kind of air by way of clyster, and judged that in the present case such a method was clearly indicated.

The next morning I mentioned my reflections to Dr. Hird and Dr.

Crowther, who kindly attended this young gentleman at my request, and proposed the following method of treatment, which, with their approbation, was immediately entered upon. We first gave him five grains of ipecacuanha, to evacuate in the most easy manner part of the putrid _colluvies_: he was then allowed to drink freely of brisk orange-wine, which contained a good deal of fixed air, yet had not lost its sweetness. The tincture of bark was continued as before; and the water which he drank along with it, was impregnated with fixed air from the atmosphere of a large vat of fermenting wort, in the manner I had learned from you. Instead of the astringent clyster, air alone was injected, collected from a fermenting mixture of chalk and oil of vitriol: he drank a bottle of orange-wine in the course of this day, but refused any other liquor except water and his medicine: two bladders full of air were thrown up in the afternoon.

23d. His stools were less frequent; their heat likewise and peculiar _foetor_ were considerably diminished; his muttering was much abated, and the _subsultus tendinum_ had left him. Finding that part of the air was rejected when given with a bladder in the usual way, I contrived a method of injecting it which was not so liable to this inconvenience. I took the flexible tube of that instrument which is used for throwing up the fume of tobacco, and tied a small bladder to the end of it that is connected with the box made for receiving the tobacco, which I had previously taken off from the tube: I then put some bits of chalk into a six ounce phial until it was half filled; upon these I poured such a quant.i.ty of oil of vitriol as I thought capable of saturating the chalk, and immediately tied the bladder, which I had fixed to the tube, round the neck of the phial: the clyster-pipe, which was fastened to the other end of the tube, was introduced into the _a.n.u.s_ before the oil of vitriol was poured upon the chalk. By this method the air pa.s.sed gradually into the intestines as it was generated; the rejection of it was in a great measure prevented; and the inconvenience of keeping the patient uncovered during the operation was avoided.

24th, He was so much better, that there seemed to be no necessity for repeating the clysters: the other means were continued. The window of his room was now kept shut.

25th, All the symptoms of putrescency had left him; his tongue and teeth were clean; there remained no unnatural blackness or _foetor_ in his stool, which had now regained their proper consistence; his dozing and muttering were gone off; and the disagreeable odour of his breath and perspiration was no longer perceived. He took nourishment to-day, with pleasure; and, in the afternoon, sat up an hour in his chair.

His fever, however, did not immediately leave him; but this we attributed to his having caught cold from being incautiously uncovered, when the window was open, and the weather extremely severe; for a cough, which had troubled him in some degree from the beginning, increased, and he became likewise very hoa.r.s.e for several days, his pulse, at the same time, growing quicker: but these complaints also went off, and he recovered, without any return of the bad symptoms above-mentioned.

I am, Reverend Sir,

Your obliged humble Servant,

WM. HEY.

POSTSCRIPT

October 29, 1772.

Fevers of the putrid kind have been so rare in this town, and in its neighbourhood, since the commencement of the present year, that I have not had an opportunity of trying again the effects of fixed air, given by way of clyster, in any case exactly similar to Mr. Lightbowne's. I have twice given water saturated with fixed air in a fever of the putrescent kind, and it agreed very well with the patients. To one of them the aerial clysters were administred, on account of a looseness, which attended the fever, though the stools were not black, nor remarkably hot or foetid.

These clysters did not remove the looseness, though there was often a greater interval than usual betwixt the evacuations, after the injection of them. The patient never complained of any uneasy distention of the belly from the air thrown up, which, indeed, is not to be wondered at, considering how readily this kind of air is absorbed by aqueous and other fluids, for which sufficient time was given, by the gradual manner of injecting it. Both those patients recovered though the use of fixed air did not produce a crisis before the period at which such fevers usually terminate. They had neither of them the opportunity of drinking such wine as Mr. Lightbowne took, after the use of fixed air was entered upon; and this, probably, was some disadvantage to them.

I find the methods of procuring fixed air, and impregnating water with it, which you have published, are preferable to those I made use of in Mr. Lightbowne's case.

The flexible tube used for conveying the fume of tobacco into the intestines, I find to be a very convenient instrument in this case, by the method before-mentioned (only adding water to the chalk, before the oil of vitriol is instilled, as you direct) the injection of air may be continued at pleasure, without any other inconvenience to the patient, than what may arise from his continuing in one position during the operation, which scarcely deserves to be mentioned, or from the continuance of the clyster-pipe within the a.n.u.s, which is but trifling, if it be not shaken much, or pushed against the r.e.c.t.u.m.

When I said in my letter, that fixed air appeared to be the greatest corrector of putrefaction hitherto known, your philosophical researches had not then made you acquainted with that most remarkably antiseptic property of nitrous air. Since you favoured me with a view of some astonis.h.i.+ng proofs of this, I have conceived hopes, that this kind of air may likewise be applied medicinally to great advantage.

W. H.

NUMBER III.

_Observations on the MEDICINAL USES of FIXED AIR. By THOMAS PERCIVAL, M. D. Fellow of the ROYAL SOCIETY, and of the SOCIETY of ANTIQUARIES in LONDON._

These Observations on the MEDICINAL USES OF FIXED AIR have been before published in the Second Volume of my Essays; but are here reprinted with considerable additions. They form a part of an experimental inquiry into this interesting and curious branch of Physics; in which the friends.h.i.+p of Dr. Priestley first engaged me, in concert with himself.

Manchester, March 16, 1774.

In a course of Experiments, which is yet unfinished, I have had frequent opportunities of observing that FIXED AIR may in no inconsiderable quant.i.ty be breathed without danger or uneasiness. And it is a confirmation of this conclusion, that at Bath, where the waters copiously exhale this mineral spirit,[15] the bathers inspire it with impunity. At Buxton also, where the Bath is in a close vault, the effects of such _effluvia_, if noxious, must certainly be perceived.

Encouraged by these considerations, and still more by the testimony of a very judicious Physician at Stafford, in favour of this powerful antiseptic remedy, I have administered fixed air in a considerable number of cases of the PHTHISIS PULMONALIS, by directing my patients to inspire the steams of an effervescing mixture of chalk and vinegar; or what I have lately preferred, of vinegar and potash. The hectic fever has in several instances been considerably abated, and the matter expectorated has become less offensive, and better digested. I have not yet been so fortunate in any one case, as to effect a cure; although the use of mephitic air has been accompanied with proper internal medicines.

But Dr. Withering, the gentleman referred to above, informs me, that he has been more successful. One Phthisical patient under his care has by a similar course intirely recovered; another was rendered much better; and a third, whose case was truly deplorable, seemed to be kept alive by it more than two months. It may be proper to observe that fixed air can only be employed with any prospect of success, in the latter stages of the _phthisis pulmonalis_, when a purulent expectoration takes place.

After the rupture and discharge of a VOMICA also, such a remedy promises to be a powerful palliative. Antiseptic fumigations and vapours have been long employed, and much extolled in cases of this kind. I made the following experiment, to determine whether their efficacy, in any degree, depends on the separation of fixed air from their substance.

One end of a bent tube was fixed in a phial full of lime-water; the other end in a bottle of the tincture of myrrh. The junctures were carefully luted, and the phial containing the tincture of myrrh was placed in water, heated almost to the boiling point, by the lamp of a tea-kettle. A number of air-bubbles were separated, but probably not of the mephitic kind, for no precipitation ensued in the lime water. This experiment was repeated with the _tinct. tolutanae, ph. ed._ and with _sp, vinos. camp._ and the result was entirely the same. The medicinal action therefore of the vapours raised from such tinctures, cannot be ascribed to the extrication of fixed air; of which it is probable bodies are deprived by _chemical solution_ as well as by _mixture_.

If mephitic air be thus capable of correcting purulent matter in the lungs, we may reasonably infer it will be equally useful when applied externally to foul ULCERS. And experience confirms the conclusion. Even the sanies of a CANCER, when the carrot poultice failed, has been sweetened by it, the pain mitigated, and a better digestion produced.

The cases I refer to are now in the Manchester infirmary, under the direction of my friend Mr. White, whose skill as a surgeon, and abilities as a writer are well known to the public.