the weak spirit of
marine salt, which is sold in the shops, and into solution of mild alcali;
and into a solution of caustic alcali; and into oil of turpentine; without
their being dissolved. All these mixtures were after some time put into a
heat of boiling water, and then the oil of turpentine dissolved its
fragments of bile-stone, but no alteration was produced upon those in the
other liquids except some change of their colour.

Some fragments of the same bile-stone were put into vitriolic aether, and
were quickly dissolved without additional heat. Might not aether mixed with
yolk of egg or with honey be given advantageously in bilious concretions?

I have in two instances seen from 30 to 50 bile-stones come away by stool,
about the size of large peas, after having given six grains of calomel in
the evening, and four ounces of oil of almonds or olives on the succeeding
morning. I have also given half a pint of good olive or almond oil as an
emetic during the painful fit, and repeated it in half an hour, if the
first did not operate, with frequent good effect.

4. Another disease of the liver, which I have several times observed,
consists in the inability or paralysis of the secretory vessels. This
disease has generally the same cause as the preceding one, the too frequent
potation of spirituous liquors, or the too sudden omission of them, after
the habit is confined; and is greater or less in proportion, as the whole
or a part of the liver is affected, and as the inability or paralysis is
more or less complete.

This palsy of the liver is known from these symptoms, the patients have
generally passed the meridian of life, have drank fermented liquors daily,
but perhaps not been opprobrious drunkards; they lose their appetite, then
their flesh and strength diminish in consequence, there appears no bile in
their stools, nor in their urine, nor is any hardness or swelling
perceptible on the region of the liver. But what is peculiar to this
disease, and distinguishes it from all others at the first glance of the
eye, is the bombycinous colour of the skin, which, like that of full-grown
silkworms, has a degree of transparency with a yellow tint not greater than
is natural to the serum of the blood.

Mr. C. and Mr. B. both very strong men, between 50 and 60 years of age, who
had drank ale at their meals instead of small beer, but were not reputed
hard-drinkers, suddenly became weak, lost their appetite, flesh, and
stre