2. _Adipsia._ Want of thirst. Several of the inferior people, as farmers
wives, have a habit of not drinking with their dinner at all, or only take
a spoonful or two of ale after it. I have frequently observed these to
labour under bad digestion, and debility in consequence; which I have
ascribed to the too great stimulus of solid food undiluted, destroying in
process of time the irritability of the stomach.

3. _Impotentia_ (agenesia). Impotency much seldomer happens to the male sex
than sterility to the female sex. Sometimes a temporary impotence occurs
from bashfulness, or the interference of some voluntary exertion in the
production of an effect, which should be performed alone by pleasurable
sensation.

One, who was soon to be married to a lady of superior condition to his own,
expressed fear of not succeeding on the wedding night; he was advised to
take a grain of opium before he went to bed, and to accustom himself to
sleep with a woman previously, but not to enjoy her, to take off his
bashfulness; which succeeded to his wish.

M. M. Chalybeates. Opium. Bark. Tincture of cantharides.

4. _Sterilitas._ Barrenness. One of the ancient medical writers asserts,
that the female sex become pregnant with most certainty at or near the time
of menstruation. This is not improbable, since these monthly periods seem
to referable the monthly venereal orgasm of some female quadrupeds, which
become pregnant at those times only; and hence the computation of pregnancy
is not often erroneous, though taken from the last menstruation. See
Section XXXVI. 2. 3.

M. M. Opium a grain every night. Chalybeates in very small doses. Bark.
Sea-bathing.

5. _Insensibilitas artuum._ As in some paralytic limbs. A great
insensibility sometimes accompanies the torpor of the skin in cold fits of
agues. Some parts have retained the sense of heat, but not the sense of
touch. See Sect. XVI. 6.

M. M. Friction with flannel. A blister. Warmth.

6. _Dysuria insensitiva._ Insensibility of the bladder. A difficulty or
total inability to make water attends some fevers with great debility,
owing to the insensibility or inirritability of the bladder. This is a
dangerous but not always a fatal symptom.

M. M. Draw off the water with a catheter. Assist the patient in the
exclusion of it by compressing the lower parts of the abdomen with the
hands. Wine two ounces, Peruvian bark one dram in decoction, every three
hours alternately. Balsam of copaiva.