TO CORRESPONDENTS.

NOTICE. All communications for the Editor must be addressed, pre-paid, to his house, No. 25, LLOYD-SQUARE. THE EDITOR is at home every day until One o'clock; and on the evenings of Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, from Seven till Nine.

DRAWINGS OF THE HUMAN BODY,
In Health and in Disease.

WE purpose to commence, in our third volume, Jan. 4, 1851, a Series of Illustrations of the ANATOMY AND PATHOLOGY OF THE HUMAN BODY. We have obtained the valuable assistance of MR. HENNING, who as an artist enjoys an European fame, and who, for many years, was the favorite draughtsman of the late Sir Astley Cooper: his drawings will be engraved on wood by a gentleman who, in his branch of art, is second to none. Each number of the Journal will contain one or more Engravings of some important organ or structure, and will be accompanied by a description of the part delineated, and the physiology of its function; in writing which, we shall continue to bear in mind that "a technical term unexplained is a dark spot on the field of literature; explained, it is a clear and steady light."

Notwithstanding the increased expense which the Editor will incur, it is not his intention to increase the price of the Journal. May he, therefore, respectfully ask for the continued support of his present subscribers, and beg that they will, individually, introduce his periodical to the immediate circle of their acquaintance? WINTON (Southampton)-We inserted an article on the CAUSES of INTERMITTENT and REMITTENT FEVERS in No. 17. Refer to it. MARIANNE (Brompton).-Use a gargle thus composed :-Take, muriatic acid and nitric acid, of each ten drops; honey of roses, one ounce; barley water, half a pint. Mix.

F. (Bolton Terrace, Hampstead Road).-There is no person of the name of " Wilton" recorded in the Medical Directory as a qualified medical man, practising in London or the suburbs. FREDERICK H.-The symptoms you describe may, by good fortune, be occasioned by a disordered state of the digestive organs; on the other hand, they closely resemble those of organic disease of the heart. We dare not venture to give an opinion without a personal examination by aid of the stethoscope, &c. It will not be out of place, in answer to such a communication as yours-which is certainly far more definite and better expressed than the majority of letters addressed to usto repeat a remark that we have before made in our Journal; namely, we never hazard an opinion, and never prescribe for or direct a patient through our columns, unless the history of the case furnished to us is so clear and distinct that a doubt as to the proper treatment cannot possibly exist.

D. M. (Eaton Place).—We really feel very grateful for your kind suggestion and promise of support, but beg respectfully to decline the offer. We are not ambitious of any public appointment, not even to an institution so useful and well supported as the one your interest can influence. The Journal and our own private practice engage all our time and thought. Believe that we decline your good offices respectfully and thankfully. GAME.-We beg to caution our readers not to purchase game, especially partridges and pheasants, that do not appear to be "lawfully" killed; that is, by powder and shot. At our own table we have recently noticed the absence of broken legs and wings, and our teeth have not been "grated," as of yore, by the contact of a shot-corn. The reason, we now learn, is, that poachers throw down grain that has been steeped in a solution of corrosive sublimate, in the feeding-places and haunts of the birds, who are thus poisoned. Several persons have been made dangerously ill by eating birds purchased from those pseudocountry hawkers of game and "real catsup" who buy their hares, &c. in Newgate Market, as the Whitechapel smuggler buys his "real India, China, ma'am!" and "French brocade, ma'am!" at some pieceshop in the ward of Bassishaw. THE EXPOSITION OF 1851.-There is one article of English manufacture, that will defy all competition, which we hope will occupy a prominent place in Paxton's crystal palace. We wish to see it exposed to the gaze of our human brotherhood, as Elihu Burritt would say,—not as an example to imitate, but as a pest to shun. We have seen several specimens of the thing, and will endeavour to describe it. In form it is like a man, the features those of a Jew; the upper lip and chin display moustache and beard; it speaks ungranimatical English; it exists by the aid of indecent advertisements inserted in venal newspapers; it feeds upon food purchased by the gold of confiding fools who believe all they see in print to be truth; its delight is to rob the unwary, to intimidate the weak, to alarm the strong, to destroy the health of all,-and to make monies. The thing is called Ax ADVERTISING QUACK.

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JACQUES.-See answer to LE CAPET in this Number.

T. V. (Great Titchfield Street).-Lime water is thus made,-Take half a pound of lime, distilled water, twelve pints; first add a little water to the lime; when slacked, add the remainder of the water, and shake them together; then immediately cover the vessel, and set it by for three hours. The solution must be kept in a stopped bottle, so as to exclude the atmospheric air; it will pour off quite clear without filtering.

EDMUND CLARKE (Ongar). As a harmless night draught, take tincture of hyosciamus, half a drachm; camphor mixture, an ounce. There must be some great cause for the constipation, uneasiness after meals, and sleeplessness; until this cause be removed all remedies will only be palliative, not curative.

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W. D. (London Works, Birmingham).-The dimness of sight may be dependent on disordered stomach; "a severe cold" more frequently affects the appendages of the eyes, as the eyelids and tarse, or edges of the eyelids, than the organ of vision itself.

LE CAPET can only be answered privately. WM. BARBER (Wolverhampton).-You can obtain an excellent and useful respirator for 2s. 6d. by sending that amount, and 6d. for postage, to Mr. Hallows, chemist, Islington.

EDGAR (Norwich).—See page 43 in the Editor's "People's Edition" on INDIGESTION. ROBERT HARRIS (Woolwich).-Invest a shilling in a "day ticket" and call in Lloyd Square. 'Tis most flattering that many patients undertake journeys of hundreds of miles for the purpose of having half an hour's talk with the Editor-during the last summer we received on the same day a patient from Glasgow, one from Torquay, and another from Leeds.

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OLD SALT (America Square).-They are secondary symptoms of the original disease. See the DISEASES OF ERROR. A medicine chest at sea may be a great benefit or a great evil to the crew. A knowledge of the "lunars" does not also infer a knowledge of the properties of "mercury."

SUBSCRIBER AB INITIO (Hull).—We have received an intemperate letter thus signed, in consequence of our reply to a former note in our last number. We have now conducted this Journal for eleven months, and the letter in question is the second only that has not been addressed to us in the most courteous terms. We can imagine that the peculiar infirmity that affects "A SUBSCRIBER, &c." may make his temper irritable, but it should not convert a gentleman into a blackguard. Bearing in mind the well-known comparison of an anonymous slanderer to an assassin, we cannot avoid thinking that A SUBSCRIBER AB INITIO must be a dangerous, despicable dastard in private society. YOUNG HUSBAND (Woodford).-We have received many letters in reference to our intended illustration of the Journal. Yours embodies the spirit of them all: we therefore shall have great pleasure in inserting it in our next, and beg you and our other kind friends will accept our best thanks for the very generous interest they take in the success of our periodical.

POOR MAN IN GREAT TROUBLE (Manchester).-You are making yourself and your home miserable without the least cause. Have every faith in your wife, and banish all such foolish notions. What you attribute to improper or unlawful causes is the dictate of nature. HEALTH OF LONDON.-The number of deaths registered during the preceding week was 908: consumption was fatal in 125 cases; in other lung diseases, 175; typhus, 56; scarlatina, 39; measles, 24; diarrhoea and dysentery, 22. A woman died in Greenwich at the advanced age of 100 years, of paralysis; and another at the age of 101, at Limehouse. Births were-787 boys, 794 girls; in all, 1581.

London: Printed by CHARLES ADAMS, at his Printing Office, 8 St. James's Walk, Clerkenwell, for the proprietor, T. H. YEOMAN, Lloyd Square; and published by GEORGE VICKERS, 28 and 29 Holywell Street, in the parish of St. Clement Danes, Strand.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE PASSIONS ON THE HEALTH.

BY THE EDItor.

(Continued from page 138).

No. VI.-GRIEF.

GRIEF, under its various degrees and modifications, known as sorrow, sadness, melancholy, dejection, &c., induces powerful and serious phenomena in our bodily functions.

This passion, or emotion, may be simple, as is most common under the loss of kindred or friends; or it may be united with chagrin, or impatient and angry repinings. And, again, it may grow out of, and hence be blended with, the various malignant feelings of the heart, as envy, jealousy, hatred, revenge, all of which are more or less fraught with moral pain.

Grief may be acute and transient, or it may assume a more chronic and lasting character; in which case it is generally designated by the term "sorrow or "sadness." Other things being equal, its violence will be proportioned to the suddenness and unexpectedness of the cause producing it.

On the first strong impulse of mental affliction, an agonising sense of oppression and tightness is experienced at the heart and lungs, accompanied with a dreadful feeling of impending suffocation. The whole chest, indeed, will oftentimes seem as though it were tightly bound by a cord. The want of fresh air becomes at the same time urgent, giving occasion to the deep and frequent sighing so commonly observed in those stricken with calamity. This act, or sighing, consists in a long-drawn or protracted inspiration, succeeded by a corresponding expiration, which, beside furnishing an increased supply of air, may, by distending the lungs, facilitate the passage of blood through them, and thus serve, in a measure, to alleviate the painful oppression felt in these organs and in the heart.

So distinct and remarkable is the suffering at the heart in deep grief, that the term "heartache" is used to express it, and its victims are said to die broken-hearted. Under its aggravated influence even sharp pains of the heart, shooting perhaps to the shoulder, are experienced, and every pulsation of this organ is attended with the most thrilling distress. It not unfrequently happens, especially in nervous females, that a sort of spasm affects the throat, producing a sensation as though a ball was rising up in it, and choking the passage of air. Hence "to choke with sorrow" is an expression in familiar use. The dryness, too, in the mouth and throat, from the diminution in their natural secretions, adds to, and may even of itself occasion, this choking sensation; and is, moreover, the cause, at least in part, of the frequent and difficult swallowing so often observed in acute grief. Speaking, owing to this defect of moisture in the

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mouth and throat, as well as to the embarrassment of the heart and lungs, is attended with a marked effort, and the voice is thick, husky, broken, tremulous, and weak.

The circulation, as we should naturally infer, experiences a more or less marked influence. Thus the pulse is generally weakened, oftentimes increased in frequency, and the extreme vessels of the surface contracting unnaturally, and being unsupplied with the usual quantity of blood from the heart, the skin loses its customary warmth and its ruddy tint of health. The energies of the nerves, too, becoming depressed and deranged under the morbid impulse of this passion, tremors, with various other of those disturbances which we term "nervous," are liable to supervene. The organs of the abdomen are also implicated in the general suffering. An uneasiness, in many cases quite severe, is referred to the region, or what we call the pit, of the stomach. The appetite fails, and the powers of digestion become obviously impaired and sometimes altogether suspended. Grief generally tends to diminish the action of the liver, and the consequent secretion of bile; though very intense affliction will occasionally produce a contrary effect, exciting even bilious vomitings.

In the young generally, and in a large proportion of females at whatever age, on the first impression of grief the visage suddenly becomes distorted, or drawn into a distressed and gloomy expression, as under bodily suffering, which is strikingly significant of the painful condition within. With this change in the countenance, the respiration assumes a new or modified action. Thus there takes place a deep, and often sonorous and tremulous inspiration, followed by an interrupted, or broken and imperfect expiration, conjoined with the familiar sounds so peculiarly expressive of both mental and bodily anguish, called sobbing, or crying. The secretion of tears at the same time becoming much increased, they overflow the eyes, and roll down the cheeks. Now this act of weeping, especially when the tears run copiously, serves to relieve the inward distress and oppression, as of the heart and lungs, and thus forms a sort of natural crisis to a paroxysm of grief, just as sweating does to a paroxysm of fever. Some persons can never weep under afflictions of any character, and such generally experience much sharper sufferings than those whose sorrows find a more ready outlet at their eyes. Crying, though more particularly significant of grief, yet is by no means confined to it. And, on the other hand, the most acute sorrow in some instances is borne silently, all the actions of life appear arrested, the nervous energies are paralysed, and the unfortunate subject is motionless, overpowered, and stupefied.

Under the sudden shock of grief, the heart and nervous system may become so greatly agitated and disturbed as to place the life of the individual in much peril. Here a general

throbbing is felt throughout the body, and a distinct thrill may be perceived in all the arteries whose pulsations are sensible. The late Dr. Hope related the case of a healthy plethoric young female, who, on receiving the intelligence that her husband had deserted her, fell into a state of almost complete insensibility, "and the violently bounding, jerking, and thrilling arterial throb, together with universal flushing, heat, and perspiration of the surface, resisted every remedy, and only subsided with the wane of life."-Dr. Hope on Diseases of the Heart.

Sometimes the heart is completely overwhelmed, and all its vital powers instantly yield under the sudden impulse of extravagant grief.

"In the war which King Ferdinand made upon the dowager of King John of Hungary, a man in armour was particularly taken notice of by every one, for his extraordinary gallantry in a certain encounter near Buda, and, being unknown, was highly commended, and much lamented when left dead upon the spot, but by none so much as by Raisciac, a German nobleman, who was charmed with such unparalelled valour. The body being brought off the field of battle, and the Count, with common curiosity, going to view it, the armour of the deceased was no sooner taken off, but he knew him to be his own son. This increased the compassion of all the spectators; only the Count, without uttering one word, or changing his countenance, stood like a stock, with his eyes fixed on the corpse, till, the vehemency of sorrow having overwhelmed his vital spirits, he sank stone dead to the ground."-Montaigne's Essays.

Apoplexy, or some other equally fatal malady, is occasionally induced by sudden and poignant affliction, which may also call into action various nervous diseases, of a more or less grave and lasting character; as, for example, palsy, epilepsy, catalepsy, St. Vitus's dance, hysterics, &c., and settled mania has been known to follow upon the sudden impression of some heavy calamity.

When sorrow becomes settled and obstinate, the whole economy must ere long experience its baneful effects. Thus the circulation languishes, the body is improperly nourished, perspiration is lessened, and the animal temperature is sustained with difficulty; the extremities being, in a special manner, liable to suffer from cold. The skin, moreover, grows pale and contracted, the eye loses its wonted animation, deep lines, indicative of the distress within, mark the countenance, and the hairs soon begin to whiten or fall out. The effect of the painful passions in depriving the hair of colouring matters, is, in many cases, most astonishing. Bichât states that he has known five or six instances where, under the oppression of grief, the hair has lost its colour in less than eight days. And he further adds, that the hair of a person of his acquaintance became entirely white, in the course of a single night, upon the receipt of melancholy intelligence. (Anatomie Générale.)

Dyspepsia (indigestion), and all its train of distressing symptoms, is constantly induced by protracted sorrow. Dr. Heberden remarks, "There is hardly any part of the body which does not sometimes appear to be deeply injured by the influence of great dejection of spirits; and none more constantly than the stomach and bowels, which hardly ever escape unharassed with pains, an uneasy sense of fulness and weight, indigestions, acidities, heartburn, sickness, and wind, in such an extraordinary degree, as to threaten choking, and to affect the head with vertigo and confusion."

Chronic inflammation, and even cancer of the stomach, will sometimes succeed the deep and prolonged influence of grief. Laennec remarks that the depressing passions, when long continued, seem to contribute to the growth of cancers, and the various other accidental productions, which are unlike any

of the natural structures of the body.-(Traité de l'Auscultation.)

Bonaparte died of an extensive ulceration of the stomach, which the physicians who inspected his body pronounced to be cancerous. Now, that his malady was originated or excited by the sorrow and chagrin arising from his painful reverse of fortune, and his confinement on the Isle of St. Helena, is, to say the least, far from being improbable. The father of Napoleon having fallen a victim to cancer of the stomach, many have thought that a predisposition to this disease was inherited by the emperor. Admitting such to have been the fact, we can then only regard his complaint as developed and hastened, not as generated anew, by the depressing passions which tormented the latter period of his existence.

The sleep of the afflicted is generally diminished, broken, disturbed by gloomy and terrifying fancies, haunted and distressed by a revival, in new and modified forms, of their waking sorrows; thus, even the limited solace of a few hours' oblivion to their sufferings is rarely granted to them. Repose is oftentimes almost a stranger to the couch of misery:

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Tired nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep,
He, like the world, his ready visit pays
Where fortune smiles; the wretched he forsakes;
Swift on his downy pinion flies from woe,

And lights on lids unsullied by a tear."

The depression of sorrow conduces to the action both of contagion and of epidemic influences, and is also, like that of fear, unfriendly to the restoration of health in all diseases and injuries of the body. Every one knows that the danger of sickness becomes essentially aggravated by mental afflictions. And what judicious surgeon but would feel diminished confidence in the success of an important operation, where the spirits of the sufferer were borne down by the pressure of grief?

In all cases of long-continued sorrow, the nervous system becomes depressed, the frame is shattered, the mind and its noble faculties are weakened; and, in the end, the energies of both sink, unable to sustain the afflictive burden. (To be continued.) ASTHMA.

No. II.

CATARRHAL, OR COMMON ASTHMA,

By T. H. YEOMAN, M.D.

(Continued from page 170).

CATARRIIAL asthma is the more frequent form in which this disease presents itself; it is thus characterised-the paroxysm comes on gradually; the constriction across the chest is heavy and oppressive; the cough is severe; the expectoration commences early, and is at first scanty and viscid, afterwards it is copious and then affords considerable relief.

Like dry catarrh (see page 3, Vol. I. No. 20,) it sometimes appears without any obvious cause; in the majority of cases, however, the person affected suffers from an habitual catarrh, which predisposes him to an attack upon the least exposure to cold, or any aggravation of the more simple and original disorder. We frequently see individuals who are so susceptible of cold, and liable to "catch cold," that they are seldom, if ever, free from some discomfort at the chest; any alteration in the dress, the least draught of cold air, a damp boot, standing for an instant on a cold or wet pavement, in fact any thing that may cause a sudden chill, is an all-sufficient cause for cough, irritation and difficulty of breathing. Now, invalids thus circumstanced-and really the amount of such disturbance of the system justly merits that the term invalid should be applied to them-too

lages of incrustation disappear from the surface of the bones, which become smooth and not unfrequently take on an ivory polish. Here, then, is one cause for the destruction of the cartilages of the joints, but seemingly not abrasion; these cartilages have disappeared, not by too much friction exercised on a part, but rather by too little, a cause just as effectual in causing absorption or disappearance of cartilage from the extremity of bones, as the opposite; it may indeed be laid down as an axiom in regard to the diarthrodeal cartilages, that they are affected, more or less, by every change of the joint, whether the change refer to an alteration of the mode of leverage, or to the mere exercise of the individual parts.

The dislocation outwards of the great toe I have just described, sometimes in one foot, sometimes in both, is one of the most common deformities met with in the human foot.

A SURGICAL REMARK APPLICABLE ALSO TO OTHER JOINTS.

I have never seen it in any savage race, but so far as I can judge, (and in Scotland opportunities for observing the naked foot at all ages are by no means infrequent,) the deformity is quite common amongst all ranks and every age, with the exception of the very young. It seems to me to arise from a congenital predisposition; everything I have seen, everything I have observed, and all the dissections I have made, are in my mind, subversive of the theory of Mr. Key, and others, who maintain that it may be traced to tight and short shoes, to too much standing erect, aided by age and corpulency.

Thus all I have seen during the last twenty years convinces me that the deformity in question is not caused, generally at least, by the use of tight shoes (theory of Mr. Key, and of all shoemakers.) nor by the instructions of the dancing-master directing us to turn our toes outwards in walking, nor by ill-made shoes generally, but arises mainly, if not solely, from a congenital tendency or disposition in the foot of some persons to assume this form; and that

First, it occurs at nearly all ages, often at five or six. Secondly, in males and females indiscriminately, whether heavy or light made, and whether they have worn shoes or not. Thirdly, it may be confined to one foot, or found on both. Fourthly, it leads to an atrophy or disappearance of the cartilages of incrustation, and of the synovial membrane; and as this cannot be by pressure, nor inflammation, nor apparently by ulceration, it must originate in the altered form of the joint, and the non-use of the cartilages themselves.

Before returning from this digression on a pathological condition of the human foot, I shall take the liberty of adding a few remarks in respect to a point or two which, to me, seems not well understood. It is well known that a short shoe or boot, although always unpleasant, may be put up with so long as the person remains seated or laying-down; but let him walk about, then the distress becomes insupportable with a rapidity dependant on the shortness of the "chaussure." Now, how is this? Anatomy explains it perfectly. The arch of the foot is not a solid osseous arch, unyielding and inelastic; but, on the contrary, possesses within itself the power of elongating itself (when the weight of the body is on the arch,) by means of the calceo-scaphoid ligament. The elongation may amount to nearly half an inch. The elongation is due to the elasticity of this ligament. Now, if the shoe merely fit the foot at rest, it cannot fit it in action; for under the weight of the body, the arch, by means of the ligaments, will lengthen about half an inch; this it is which so speedily renders the short shoe unsupportable.-[We extracted the foregoing article from some medical periodical a short time since, and omitted to copy the name of the author-which we much regret, as it a valu able communication.-ED. P. M. J.]

QUACKERY ACCORDING TO LAW. WE were struck, on reading the recent address of the King of Prussia to the Prussian Chambers, with the circumstance, that the policy and organisation of the medical profession was referred to as one of the great questions of national welfare to be discussed by the two Chambers of Representatives. The King's words will shortly be laid before you." were" the draught of a law regulating the practice of medicine

importance of medical affairs. But when shall we hear any reWithout question, this is taking a right view of the national ference to such vulgar matters as Physic and Surgery from the lips of our own gracious Sovereign, on meeting her two Houses of Parliament? When will the Lords and Commons of England be recommended to take the state of medical legislation in this country into their serious deliberation? We would commend these questions, and the considerations to which they give rise, to the reflections of those in authority. In Prussia, at a time of unparalleled warlike agitation, questions of medical government are still thought worthy of even royal notice. And it is not that the Prussian medical code is affected by any of the monstrous wrongs and inconsistencies which are rife in our own professional regulations.

We do not hesitate to declare that the present laws relating to medicine in this country are a national disgrace. England has now been blessed with thirty-five years of uninterrupted peace, yet the medical profession, essentially a profession which might be expected to flourish in such an epoch, is at the present time in a state of injurious anarchy. Practically speaking, all the laws relating to medicine are suspended. Thousands of mercenary and uneducated pretenders live by preying upon the health of the community. Murder by the quack is the only kind of murder tolerated and excused by the forms and principles of our courts of law, as now reduced to practice. Great Britain in 1850, is the only civilised country under the sun in which the Govern ment at once takes a revenue from quack medicines, and permits the most ignorant knave to prostitute medicine for purposes of gain, and with murderous results, without let or hindrance. Such a state of things would be a disgrace to a semi-barbarous country. The millions ruled by the knout are protected from such a state of things. The rights of life and health are the only rights not protected in this country. Let any pretender attempt to enter a pulpit, and he would be removed by the police without much ceremony. Let any man appear in our courts of law as a solicitor or barrister without a just qualification, and he goes straight to prison as a reward for the intrusion. But any fool or vagabond may take the place of the regular practitioner at the bedside of the dying, and administer the most hazardous medicines in perfect ignorance, and with perfect impunity. The false maxim of our laws, as at present interpreted, is, that he is no more criminal than a CHAMBERS or a BRODIE when death ensues. Conscience and property are abundantly protected; life, human life, is the only thing not worth caring for, in its grosser violations, by the state.

Against cholera, which has visited us twice in this century, the whole kingdom was in agitation; but against quackery, a greater destroyer, and always with us, governments have palsied limbs and tongues, and the laws are really dead. Immense preparations are made, and very properly, to prevent disease, but none to defend its victims against the ignorant empiric. Sewers may not emit their odours, nor chimneys their smoke, on account of the public health; but Coffinites, Morrisonians, and all the genus of quacks, may pursue their pestilent steps unmolested and unpunished.