. It has happened to me more than
once, and I suppose to most others, to have put my hands into an empty
bason standing in an obscure corner of a room to wash them, which I
believed to contain cold water, and have instantly perceived a sensation of
warmth, contrary to that which I expected to have felt.
In some paralytic affections, and in cold fits of ague, the sensation of
touch has been much impaired, and yet that of heat has remained, See Sect.
XIV. 6.
M. M. Friction alone, or with camphorated oil, warm bath. Ether. Volatile
alcali and water. Internally spice, salt. Incitantia. Secernentia.
10. _Stupor._ The stupor, which occurs in fevers with debility, is
generally esteemed a favourable symptom; which may arise from the less
expenditure of sensorial power already existing in the brain and nerves, as
mentioned in species 6 of this genus. But if we suppose, that there is a
continued production of sensorial power, or an accumulation of it in the
torpid parts of the system, which is not improbable, because such a
production of it continues during sleep, to which stupor is much allied,
there is still further reason for believing it to be a favourable symptom
in inirritable fevers; and that much injury is often done by blisters and
other powerful stimuli to remove the stupor. See Sect. XII. 7. 8. and
XXXIII. 1. 4.
Dr. Blane in his Croonian Lecture on muscular motion for 1788, among many
other ingenious observations and deductions, relates a curious experiment
on salmon, and other fish, and which he repeated upon eels with similar
event.
"If a fish, immediately upon being taken out of the water, is stunned
by a violent blow on the head, or by having the head crushed, the
irritability and sweetness of the muscles will be preserved much
longer, than if it had been allowed to die with the organs of sense
entire. This is so well known to fishermen, that they put it in
practice, in order to make them longer susceptible of the operation
called _crimping_. A salmon is one of the fish least tenacious of life,
insomuch, that it will lose all signs of life in less than half an hour
after it is taken out of the water, if suffered to die without any
farther injury; but if, immediately after being caught, it receives a
violent blow on the head, the muscles will shew visible irritability
for more than twelve hours afterwards."
Dr. Blane afterwards well remarks, that "in those
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