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funeral, but went in a coach. Mr. Stanley discontinued his visits about that time. Mr. Stanley might have called on that day, but he could not speak positively. The plaintiff's principal object in going to Hammersmith was to see the Duke of York's funeral; he also thought the change of air would do him good. During his absence Mr. Stanley called twice. The plaintiff came back in a fortnight from Hammersmith.

Re-examined-Mr. Stanley said he might take moderate exercise as soon as he was able; his son always pointed out the knee-pan as the seat of pain.

Examined by the Judge-He did not think Mr. Stanley had notice of the discharge in the plaintiff's knee.

Mr. Charles Lilly is a Member of the College of Surgeons. He was called in to attend the plaintiff in September; he found him very feeble; there was a hard moveable substance in the kneepan near the surface. He examined it, and advised soothing poultices to be applied and the patient to be kept quiet. In a month his health was very much improved, and on examining the knee at the end of the second month he found the hard substance had advanced so near the surface that one point of it had come through the wound. He enlarged the orifice, and extracted the flint now produced, and afterwards removed a second piece of flint; a third portion came out in the dressing of the knee. The pan was certainly not fractured; and if it had been broken, that could undoubtedly have been discovered.

Cross-examined-When first he saw the knee, he thought the hard substance was bone. He

could not imagine where it came from, or pretend to say how it arose. Exercise, he supposed, would tend to bring the hard substance to the surface, but nature would, of course, have the same effect; if the mode of treatment required that no probing should take place, the same course would be adopted whether there was a piece of bone in the knee-pan, or a foreign substance.

Re-examined-It would be impossible to say, from the appearance of the scar, if it was large enough to admit the piece of flint. If that had been taken out in the first instance, the wound would have been healed when he first saw it.

Mr. Sergeant Taddy addressed the Jury for the defendant, and called the following witnesses :

Sir Astley Cooper, Bart.-I have attended to the accounts given by the different witnesses, and, having given the subject all the attention I am capable of, I cannot discover any want of skill or attention on the part of Mr. Stanley; and if I had discovered a hard substance under the same circumstances, my mode of treatment would have been the same as Mr. Stanley's. The present was a very doubtful case, and one which required great caution. No man is more informed in anatomy than Mr. Stanley. Probing the wound at that time might have destroyed life, or, at least, occasioned the loss of the limb; for the smallest wound made in the knee-joint, such as that made by probing, might have destroyed life. I have seen an opening in that part less than that which might be made by a crow-quill, and such opening, to my knowledge, destroyed life in less than

a week.

If an incision had been made, or probing used under these circumstances, he (the surgeon) would probably have opened the knee-joint in doing so, and in that way would have inflicted some serious injury upon the limb, and this latter mode of treatment ought not to have been followed under such circumstances. A fall from a horse would be likely to break the patella, and it is the only way I have known longitudinal fractions of the patella occur. The natural process for a hard substance (as in the present case) is to approach the surface of the skin. I think Mr. Stanley a most complete judge in such cases; and if I had been in attendance upon the patient, I should not have varied the treatment in any way from that followed by the defendant.

Cross-examined--I consider myself capable of saying what treatment ought to be used in a case I had not seen, supposing all the circumstances are afterwards detailed to me. I have heard the facts from Mr. Stanley before I came into court; he called on me and mentioned the circumstances, and I gave my opinion on his statement of the case; but my opinion has been very much influenced by the evidence I have heard to day, and particularly by the clear and distinct statement of Mr. Lilly. I believe the knee-joint was not broken. If I had been called to attend a patient who complained that a certain spot was the seat of constant pain, I should (if any new circumstances occurred) look again at the wound; but, if I had made up my mind from the beginning, from my knowledge of anatomy I would not alter the mode of treatment; it would be very

dangerous to be constantly removing the bandages, and I should say that the man who would frequently examine fracture, and remove bandages for that purpose, would be a very unskilful surgeon, and extremely unfit to have the care of a patient.

Mr. Sergeant Cross-There was no fracture in this case; 1 therefore wish to know from the witness if, in case the patient frequently pointed out a part as the seat of pain, whether he (Sir A. Cooper) would not have examined that part a second time, in order to see if there was any thing which required further consideration?

Sir A. Cooper-If I thought I could relieve pain by again examining the wound, I should do so; but I would examine a case of this kind, in the beginning, and, having made up my mind on the nature of it, I would not vacillate in my opinion, or alter the general mode of treatment.

Re-examined-Mr. Stanley did every thing a good surgeon could do, and left nothing undone. This is my opinion, putting out of my mind all I have heard out of Court, and judging only by the evidence adduced to-day. I must say that I came into Court with some doubt; but it was the evidence of Mr. Lilly that made me as firm as I am at present.

Mr. Brodie stated, that he is a surgeon of St. George's Hospital. He had been in Court since the opening of the case; and, judging by the evidence alone, he was convinced that Mr. Stanley had shown no want of skill or attention. A fracture of the patella is not uncommon when a fall from a horse has taken place. It would not be easy, under the circumstances, to distinguish a piece of

plaintiff, he would have followed

bone from a foreign substance. If witness had been called in he the same mode of treatment used by Mr. Stanley, against whom he saw no cause of complaint on the ground of want of skill or attention. Mr. Sergeant Cross having replied,

would have followed the same mode of treatment as that pursued by Mr. Stanley, whom he considered a skilful anatomist and experienced surgeon.

Cross-examined--If he had been employed to attend the patient, he would have kept him as quiet as possible, and done every thing to prevent inflammation. He does not recollect any thing else he would have done on the occasion. A person who saw the wound eight or nine months after the accident, might be better able to judge of it than at first; and a surgeon who examined it three hours after it occurred would see it to a disadvantage, as the part must then be considerably swollen. He heard several accounts of this case. The first was from a friend of the plaintiff; the second from the defendant; and the third from Mr. Lilly. From all he heard on the subject, he did not think that any blame was attributable to Mr. Stanley.

Mr. Travers and Mr. Green, surgeons at St. Thomas's Hospital, concurred in stating that the defendant had pursued a skilful and proper course of treatment in the present case, and that no blame could attach to him.

Mr. Bell, an eminent surgeon, said the defendant had used all due skill and attention in the mode of treatment above referred to.

Cross-examined--Some doubt might have been caused in his mind by the pain not subsiding, and the hard substance not adhering to the knee-pan after two months.

Mr. Abernethy was next examined, and he stated that if he had been called to attend the

Mr. Justice Burroughs summed up the case, and observed that if the Jury were of opinion that the defendant had been deficient in point of skill, or negligent in his attention to the plaintiff, they must find a verdict for the latter; but if they were of opinion due care had been used, and proper talent exercised, the defendant was entitled to their verdict. Some of the first surgeons in Europe all agreed in saying they would have done as Mr. Stanley had done; and, what was remarkable, they all said it would have been dangerous to have made an incision at the time; but, considering the evidence of the very learned surgeons who were examined, the plaintiff's case was extremely weak. If they (the Jury) believed what these witnesses said, he could not fancy but their verdict would be for the defendant.

The Jury, after retiring for an hour, returned with a verdict for the plaintiff.-Damages £30.

IV.

SELECTIONS FROM FOREIGN
JOURNALS.

On Certain Properties of Sulphur.

The effect of heat on sulphur in the first fusing it, but afterwards causing diminution of fluidity, in a certain degree proportionate to the temperature, has been long and generally known, as well also as the peculiar soft state into

which the sulphur may be brought, by pouring it, when hot and thickened, into cold water. M. Dumas has been led to examine these phenomena for the purpose of acquiring a precise and particular knowledge of the effects and changes.

Fused sulphur began to crystallize between 226 and 228 deg. Its fusing point may be considered as 226.4 deg. Between 230 and 284 deg. it is as liquid as a clear varnish, and of the color of amber; at about 320 deg. it begins to thicken, and acquire a red color; on increasing the heat, it becomes so thick that it will not pour. This effect is most marked between 428 and 572 deg.: the color being then a red brown. From 572 to the boiling point it becomes thinner, but never so fluid as at 248 deg. The deep redbrown color continues until it boils.

When the most fluid sulphur is suddenly cooled, it becomes brittle, but the thickened sulphur, similarly treated, remains soft, and more soft as the temperature has been higher. Thus at 230 deg., the sulphur was very liquid, and yellow; and cooled suddenly by immersion in water, it became yellow, and very friable; at 374 deg. it was thick, and of an orange color, but by cooling, became at first soft and transparent, but soon friable, and of the ordinary appearance; at 428 deg., it was red and viscid, and when cooled, soft, transparent, and of an amber color; at the boiling point it was a deep brown-red color, and when cooled, very soft, transparent, and of a red-brown color.

It is not necessary, as is sometimes stated, to heat the sulphur

a long time to produce this effect; all depends upon temperature. The only precaution necessary is, to have abundance of water, and to divide the sulphur into small drops or portions, that the cooling may be rapid. If it be poured in a mass, the interior cools slowly, and acquires the ordinary hard state. When the experiment is well made at 446 deg., the sulphur may be drawn into threads as fine as a hair, and many feet in length.

M. Dumas, in remarking upon this curious effect of sudden cooling, classes it with the similar effect which occurs with bronze. Although difficult to assign the exact cause, yet he notices that the tendency to crystallize can evidently be traced as influential over some of the appearances, the hardness and opacity, for instance, which always occur together, when the crystalline state is assumed; whereas, when rapid cooling has hindered crystallization, the mass remains soft and transparent, until it crystallizes, which usually happens in twenty or thirty hours.-Ann. de Chimie.

Separation of Bismuth from Mer

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The reddish purple color which is produced by adding a decoction of Iceland moss to per-salts of iron, has been attributed to the presence of gallic acid, but is found by M. Pfaff to be occasioned by a new acid body, which may be separated in the following manner: A pound of the lichen cut small is to be macerated in solution of carbonate of potass, until all that is soluble is separated; the above quantity will neutralize two gros (about 120 grs.) of the carbonate. The filtered liquor is to be precipitated by acetate of lead, and the brown precipitate produced, when well washed, is to be diffused through water, and sulphuretted hydrogen passed through it until all the lead is separated. The filtered liquor is acid, and by spontaneous evaporation, yields dentritic crystals. The crystals, when heated, carbonize, but produce no odor like that of tartaric acid, and lime is left. If they be dissolved, and acted upon by alkaline carbonates, carbonate of lime is thrown down, and alkaline salts, containing the new acid, are produced.

The potash salt crystallizes in quadrilateral prisms, needles or

plates, and is not deliquescent. The soda salt has similar characters, and the ammonia salt crystallizes in needles. These salts abundantly precipitate the acetate and muriate of iron, of a redbrown color; they precipitate sulphate and nitrate of zinc white; muriate of manganese slightly of a clear brown color; barytic and strontian salts abundantly white; being mixed with strong solutions of muriate or acetate of lime, lar crystalline white precipitate; they gradually produce an aciduacetate of silver yields an abundant white precipitate, which does not change color in less than twenty-four hours: they do not precipitate salts of glucina, magnesia, alumine, uranium, nickel, copper, cobalt, gold, or platina. This substance has been named the lichenic acid, and is distinguished from boletic acid by the different character of its vapor, and by forming an insoluble salt with baryta.-Bull. Univ.

V.

HOSPITAL REPORT.

Bruised Hand.

March 15th.-John Bullock, seaman, North-port, aged 38. Accident happened on board vessel, an hour before he was brought into the Hospital. In reaching out his hand to put on a fender to prevent the vessel which had just arrived at the wharf, from striking it, his hand was caught between the vessel and the post of the wharf; the full force of the vessel being thus impelled against his hand. The palm of the hand

was very much injured, the integuments torn up so as to have the appearance of a flap. A piece of the thumb bone was broken at the joint, and came out through the flesh; the thumb being left supported only by

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