the cold wet sheet is disagreeable; but no
sooner does the blanket cover the sheet, than the chill passes away, and
usually before the packing is completed, the patient begins to feel more
comfortable, and very soon the symptoms of the fever diminish. The pulse
becomes softer, slower, the breathing easier, the head cooler, the
general irritation is allayed, and frequently the patient shows some
inclination to sleep. When the fever and heat are very high, the sheet
must be changed on growing hot, as then it would cause the symptoms to
increase again, instead of continuing to relieve them. The best way to
effect this changing of the sheet is to prepare another blanket and
sheet on another bed, to unpack the patient and carry him to the new
pack, where the process described above is repeated. Sometimes it is
necessary to change again; but seldom more than three sheets are
required to produce a perspiration, and relieve the patient for several
hours, or--according to the case--permanently. The changing of the sheet
may become necessary in fifteen, twenty, twenty-five, thirty or forty
minutes, according to the degree of fever and heat. In every new sheet
the patient can stay longer; in the last sheet he becomes more quiet
than before, usually falls asleep, and awakes in a profuse perspiration,
which carries off the alarming symptoms.

47. A few minutes before the perspiration breaks out, the patient
becomes slightly irritated, which irritation is removed by the
appearance of the sweat. I mention this circumstance, to prevent his
being taken out just before the perspiration is started. When he becomes
restless _during perspiration_, he is taken from his pack and placed in
a bathing-tub partly filled with cool or tepid water, (usually of about
70 deg.,) which has been prepared in the meanwhile; there he is washed down
from head to foot, water from the bath being constantly thrown over him
until he becomes cool. Then he is wrapped in a dry sheet, gently rubbed
dry, and either taken back to his bed, or dressed and allowed to walk
about the room. When the fever and heat rise again, the same process is
repeated.

48. ACTION OF THE PACK AND BATH.--RATIONALE.

The action of the wet-sheet pack is thus easily accounted for:

According to a well-known physical law, any cold body, whether dead or
alive, placed in close contact with a warm body, will abstract from the
latter as much heat as necessary to equalize the temperature of