ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN PRODUCTION NOTE University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Library Brittle Books Project, 2015.COPYRIGHT NOTIFICATION In Public Domain. Published prior to 1923. This digital copy was made from the printed version held by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. It was made in compliance with copyright law. Prepared for the Brittle Books Project, Main Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign by Northern Micrographics Brookhaven Bindery La Crosse, Wisconsin 2015IN ACUTE DISEASES NARRATIVE OF A MISSION TO IRELAND DURING €{]t /antntB anir ftrttlwra nf 1847, By JOSEPH KIDD, M.R.C.S., MFMBIR OF TITE BRTTISTT HOMCEOPATHTC SOCIETY.THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY Prom the collection of James Collins, Drumcondra, Ireland. Purchased, 1918. EMOTE STORAGES ,BRITISH HOMEOPATHIC ASSOCIATION, 3P«sttient. HIS GRACE THE DUKE OP BEAUFORT, K.G. Fte-$r«foent. FIELD-MARSHAL THE MARQUIS OF ANGLESEY, K.G., G.C.B. Chairman. MARMADUKE B. SAMPSON, ESQ. ^teasuwr. JOHN DEAN PAUL, ESQ. f^onorarn Sbecmatjf* " 4 ^ , HICHARD WALTERS HEURTLEY, ESQ. Committee. THE MOST NOBLE THE MARQUIS OF WORCESTER. THE RT. HON. THE EARL OF ESSEX. THE RT. HON. LORD AYLMER. THE RT. HON. LORD GRAY, LORD FRANCIS GORDON. LORD ALFRED PAGET, M.P. CAPTAIN J'HANFORD, R.N. RICHARD BEAMISH, ESQ., F.R.S. ADOLPHE BOURSOT, ESQ. JOHN BROADHURST, ESQ. COLONEL DISBROWE. R. W. HEURTLEY, ESQ. CHARLES HAMILTON, ESQ. J. P. KNIGHT, ESQ., R.A. THOMAS J. KNOWLYS, ESQ. THE HON. AUGUSTUS MORETON. GEOFFREY NIGHTINGALE, ESQ. SAMUEL SAMPSON, ESQ. JAMES SIMPSON, ESQ. EVELYN J. SHIRLEY, ESQ., M.P. CHARLES CULLING SMITH, ESQ. THOMAS UWINS, ESQ., R.A. THOMAS VINCENT, ESQ. WILLIAM WAT KINS, ESQ. Hocal Conmtt'tto—Hiberpool. ALFRED CASTELLAN, ESQ. A. H. KINDERMANN, ESQ. JOHN YATE LEE, ESQ. THE REV. B. A. MARSHALL. J. B. NEILSON, ESQ. ROGER WATERHOUSE, ESQ. ROBERT NEILSON, ESQ., Local Hon. Sec. f^onorarg iftfUmbcrs. FREDERIC FOSTER QUIN, ESQ., M.D., President of the British Homoeopathic Society, EDWARD HAMILTON, ESQ., M.D , Treasurer to the British, Homoeopathic Society. J. CHAPMAN, ESQ., M.A. Cantab. andM.D., Hon. Sec. to the British Homoeopathic Society. S. T. PARTRIDGE, ESQ., M.D. HUGH CAMERON, ESQ., M.R.C.S.E. , VICTOR MAS SOL, ESQ., M.D. J. J. DRYSDALE, ESQ., M.D. J. RUTHERFORD RUSSELL, ESQ. M.D GEORGE NEWMAN, ESQ., M.R.C.S. JAMES GOODSHAW, ESQ., M.D. THOMAS ENGALL, ESQ., M.R.C.S. HENRY R. MADDEN, ESQ., M.D. FRANCIS BLACK, ESQ., M.D. GEORGE IIILBERS, ESQ., M.D. D. WIELOBYCKT. ESQ., M.D. ROBERT WALKER, ESQ., M.D. JAMES LOFTUS MARSDEN, ESQ., M.D. F. W. IRVINE, ESQ., M.D. BUCHANAN KER, ESQ., M.D. GEORGE DUNN, ESQ., M.D. JOHN NORTON, ESQ., M.D. SYDNEY HANSON ESQ., M.D. CIIAS. H. MACKINTOSH ESQ., M.D. EDWARD C. CIIEPMELL, ESQ., M.D. JOHN OZANNE, ESQ., M.D. C. D. J. LOWDER, ESQ., M.D. J. B. METCALFE, ESQ., M.R.C.S. JOSEPH KIDD. ESQ., M.R.C.S. J. H. RAMSBOTIIAM, ESQ., M.R.C.S. ROBERT D. HALE, ESQ., M.R.C.S. J. M. GULLY, ESQ., M.D. BOUGHTON KINGDON, ESQ., M.R.C.S. J. R. LEADAM, ESQ., M.R.C.S. JOSEPH HEWITT, ESQ., M.R.C.S. EDMUND SMITH, ESQ., M.R.C.S. LEON SIMON, ESQ., M.D. C. CROSERIO, ESQ., M.D. J. BELLUOMINI, ESQ., M.D. JOHN F. GRAY, ESQ., M.D. A. GERALD HULL, ESQ., M.D. ERNEST STAPF, ESQ., M.D. CHARLES WENICKE, ESQ., M.D.HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. NARRATIVE OF A MISSION TO IRELAND DURING #1J* /iTttllEB D# Df 1847. By JOSEPH KIDD, M.U.C.S., MEMBER OF THE BRITISH HOMOEOPATHIC SOCIETY. PUBLISHED UNDER THE SUPERINTENDENCE OP THE BRITISH HOMCEOPATHIC ASSOCIATION. LONDON: SAMUEL HIGHLEY, 32, FLEET STREET. M.DCCC.XL1X.LONDON: THOMAS HARRILD, PRINTER, SILVER STREET, FALCON SQUARE.ip \ (p > 3 ViS3Vi remote storage t/i ut H HOMEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. A~ A There are few patients commencing homoeopathic treatment, who do not feel and express their dread of the insufficiency of that treatment in acute disorders r>r where life is endangered, in their ignorance of the fiict, that in none more completely than in the most dangerous diseases does Homoeopathy stand success- ful over the practice of the old system. The same objection is also attempted to be made by the greater portion of our medical brethren of the old school, and has been often witnessed in the first trials of the homoeopathic principle and medicines by illopathic practitioners, in their transition state from he uncertainty of their former practice, to the true rational medicine" of the Homoeopathists, founded on a general law which experience proves to be un- erring in its guidance, in the proper adaptation of medicine to disease.4 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. , To be able to dispel this illusion, it has been ever deemed by the true friends of Homoeopathy, mi3St desirable to accumulate evidence, by submitting ti^e system to the most severe and open tests, whenever the opportunity presented itself for applying it in the treatment of acute diseases. It has been felt, in- deed, that the success gained in trials of this native must be the true touchstone of the system, inasmuch as the most favourable results in chronic diseases may always be exposed to special criticism and inge- nious explaining away, which writers like Dr. Forbt confessing the force of the results, but not inclined to give credit to the means, are usually ready to mak<3 use of when no other arguments remain. Thus it is that the full confidence in the truth ancj universal applicability of the homoeopathic principle has ever caused its professors to look with delight Oh every possible opportunity of testing its actual value as well in individual cases as in the severest epide<, mics, whenever and wherever occurring. The treatment of the epidemic of typhus fevei- which occurred in Germany in 1813, by Hahnemann himself, is a prominent instance of this kind, when nearly two hundred patients were treated, without the loss of a single case, at the time when an enor mous mortality attended, the mode of practice sane tioned by ages.* Again, we have an equally re * A most interesting and curious proof of the certainty with which the homoeopathic law enables practitioners to apply medi- cines to any disease, may be found in the fact, that the medicinesHOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 5 markable instance in the promptitude and zeal with which numbers of homoeopathic practitioners in Germany, Russia, and France, came forward to a pply the treatment in the Asiatic Cholera, at the last visitation in 1831-2.* Also in various epidemics of scarlatina, measles, &e., treated homoeopathically on the continent and i this country, a very interesting account of an epi- demic of scarlatina thus treated being contained in the British Journal of Homoeopathy, Yol. III. j). 91, by Dr. Ozanne, of Guernsey, and another of •measles, in the January Number of the present year of the same Journal, by the same able practitioner, in both of which remarkable success resulted from the means employed. As evidence of the same, may be adduced the re- sults obtained in the treatment of acute diseases at the homoeopathic hospitals of Vienna and Linz, where the most dangerous diseases have been treated with such success-|- as to have caused the violent remedies of the old system to be lain aside, and to be consi- used by Hahnemann in 1813, in typhus, with such success (bryo- nia and rlius tox), and by Dr. Quin, of London, in the typhus fever following cholera in Moravia, in J 831, were those which a comparison of the typhus in Ireland with the materia medica en- abled me to select, and which my experience found most useful, although ignorant at that time of their use in either of the former cases. * See ante, p. 187. t Comparative results of homoeopathic and allopathic treat- ment in certain acute diseases, furnished by Dr. Fleischmann, of6 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACXJTB DISEASES. dered, indeed, positively injurious by many of their former most attached admirers, one of the most cele- brated of whom (Skoda, Physician to the General Hospital at Vienna,) now regards "hay water" as the best and universal medicine for all diseases. tlie Homoeopathic Hospital at Vienna (from Introduction to the Study of Homoeopathy, by Drs. Drysdale and Russell). Pneumonia (Inflammation of Lungs). Mortality under ordinary treatment. Authorities. No. of Cases. Deaths. Guisolle 304 43 Briquet 364 85 Edinburgh Infirmary 222 80 Skoda - 19 4 Total 909 212 Mortality under ordinary treatment. Mortality 23*32 per cent., or nearly one out of four Mortality under Homoeopathic Treatment. Fleischmann - 299 - - 19 6*70 per cent., or about one out of fifteen. Pleuritis (Inflammation of the lining membrane of Lung). Mortality under ordinary treatment. Edinburgh Infirmary 111 - - 14 12*61 per cent., or about one out of eight. Mortality under Homoeopathic Treatment. Fleischmann - 224 - 3 1*24 per cent., little more than one out of a hundred. Peritonitis (Inflammation of the lining membrane of the Ca- vity of Abdomen and of Intestines). Mortality under ordinary treatment. Edinburgh Infirmary 21 - - 6 27*61 per cent., or more than one out of four. Mortality under Homoeopathic Treatment. Fleischmann - J 05 - - 5 4*76 per cent., or less than one out of twenty-five.HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 7 Finally, perhaps, the same confidence in the tru|h and universal applicability of the homoeopathic sv stem may be found in the results of its trial in the epidemic of fever and dysentery in Ireland, in 184>7, undertaken by myself, at the request of the Com- mittee of the English Homoeopathic Association, and carried out in the face of difficulties and dangers not to be surmounted, save by a firm confidence in the unvarying truth of the homoeopathic law. As introductory to our more immediate object, a. glance at the history of the great Irish famine of 1846-7, will be necessary. Ireland has been visited, from time to time, for centuries, with partial and almost periodical famines,* which, except as matters of history, and for the suffering produced in the localities afflicted, "were soon lost sight of, and their sad but instruc- tive lessons unheeded. Few of the present genera- tion will ever forget the melancholy visitation of 1846-7, when, at the approach of some unseen but (ill-powerful agent, of which we know exactly nothing, * In the year 1740-1 (called the year of slaughter), it was tistirriated that one-fifth of the entire population perished of want Jind fever! In the years 1798 to 1800, general scarcity and dear- ness of all provisions. In 1817-8, general distress all over Ireland, from the same causes, one million and a half of the population having been affected with fever that year. In 1822, almost total loss of the potato crop in Munster and Connaught. In 1831, the same in Galway, Mayo, and Donegal. In 1835-6-7, partial famine in various parts of Ireland. In 1839, a partial failure of the potato crop in most parts of Ireland.8 HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. the food of millions of human beings was destroy ed in the course of a very few days,* and when in the face of the most amazing efforts made for its relief by all classes of society in England, America, and various continental countries, hundreds of thousands of victims told how insufficient all human aid must prove at such a crisis. The recent potato disease first appeared in Ire- land in the autumn of 1845, and caused the destruc- tion of a large portion of that season's crop, but only in particular districts, and to a partial extent , which was in some degree compensated for by an abundaht crop of corn and of green vegetables;, hay, &c., so that none were prepared for the uni- versal destruction of the next year's crop, which occurred much earlier in the season (long before vegetation had ceased), and more generally than al: the previous visitation. The corn crops also proved1 very deficient, both in those countries, and all over Europe, necessarily followed by an extraordinary * The following extract from the able and impartial history off the " Irish crisis/' by Mr. Trevelyan, in the Edinburgh Review? (January 1848), conveys a good description of the rapid destruc- tion of the potato crop which then took place :—* " On the 27tb of last month (July), I passed," Father Mathew writes in a letter published in the parliamentary papers, " from Cork to Dublin, and this doomed plant bloomed in all the luxuriance of an abundant harvest. Returning on the 3rd instant (August), I beheld with sorrow one wide waste of putrifying vegetation. In many places the wretched people were seated on the fences of their decaying gardens, wringing their hands, and wailing bitterly the destruction that had left them foodless." 'HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 9 inc rease in prices, so that in most parts of Ireland the cost of provisions became more than doubled, and in many places (where food at other times was cheapest) nearly trebled. The almost inevitable consequences soon followed ; the greater-part of the population, previously existing—almost without the use of money—on potatoes, easily obtained by a small outlay of labour and seed, found themselves without food, or the means of purchasing it, and w ant and starvation began to prevail very generally. At this particular juncture, the system of "public works" was humanely instituted by the Government, a fterwards so grievously abused, and gradually ex- tended during the winter and spring, till the major portion of the male population was employed.* As the winter advanced, distress increased to a most fearful extent, in spite of the employment given 'to myriads of the people, and melancholy instances of death from actual starvation were of daily occur- rence by the roadsides, in the fields, and often of entire families, shut up in their wretched hovels. 'Thus did matters go on without improvement till the latter end of March, when vast supplies of Indian * The numbers were—in October, 114,000, in December, 440,000, in January, 570,000, thence gradually increasing till March, when 734,000 (representing nearly three millions of the population) "were so employed, when the Government found it necessary to dismiss twenty per cent., and the remainder gradually, till nearly all were disbanded in June, as otherwise the lands would have remained uncultivated.10 HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES, corn and meal arriving from America, and the conti- nent,* prices declined most rapidly, and the supply even in the most backward places became abundant, from which time the previously numerous instances of death by starvation became more and more rare, finally disappearing as the system of out-door relief under the new Poor-Law Act came into operation, towards June and July. As might have been expected, disease rapidly followed in the track of famine,-j- adding fressh victims to the ravages of the latter, prolonging (or renewing) the period of suffering and affliction. Dysentery had appeared early in that fearfud winter, increasing in amount until spring (the time most to be dreaded for epidemics), when fever followed,, and the entire of Ireland became covered with a widely-devastating pestilence, by which numbers oif the clergymen of all persuasions, medical men, and the resident gentry, who had devoted themselves to the relief of their afflicted fellow-creatures, fell victims to their benevolent exertions. J * In the last week of March, it was estimated that in the harbour of Cork alone, upwards of 250 vessels were lying, con- taining nearly 50,000 tons of Indian corn, and a fall in price of three to four pounds a ton took place within a few weeks.—" The Irish Crisis," in Edinburgh Review, January 1848. f The connection between famine and fever will be resumed in another place. J The week after my arrival in Bantry, the Rev. Dr. Trail, of Skull (10 miles from Bantry), died of exhaustion, consequent upon repeated attacks of the epidemic, caught in close attendanceHOMEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. ,11 I cannot better illustrate the ravages which fever and dysentery were then committing, than by intro- ducing the following quotation from the second edition of my friend Mr. Sampson's work on Homoeo- pathy,* published in January 1848, which will at the same time explain the cause and origin of my mission to Ireland. " During the early part of 1847, the accounts from Ireland of the daily extending ravages of pestilence first took that frightful form, which caused the year to assume the place it now occupies in the records of human calamity. It was not, however, until the 26th of March that the extent of the evil became fully known. On that day the news came from three localities widely asunder, Armagh, Mayo, and Cork, that the progress of disease in the respective districts was such, that hundreds of the sufferers were totally without any medical assistance whatever, that the workhouses were crowded, and that the attendants and medical men were daily dying, so that, in many instances, both paupers and officers were alike destitute. ' " In Ballinrobe," said the Mayo Constitution of the 23rd of March, " the workhouse is in the most awfully deplorable state upon his poor parishioners; also Capt. Drury, the inspecting officer of public works in Kinsale; and the curate of Ban try (Rev, A. Hallowell), as well as the physician to the union, were both laid up with the same disease; also one or two Roman Catholic priests, in the county between Bandon and Cork. * Homoeopathy, its Principle, Theory, and Practice.12 HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. pestilence having attacked nearly all within its walls. In fact, the building is one horrible charnel-house, the unfortunate paupers being nearly all the victims of a fearful fever, the dying and the dead, we might say, huddled together. The master has become one of the victims; the clerk, a young man, whose energies were devoted to the well-being of the Union, has been added to the number; the matron, too, is dead, and the respected and esteemed physician has likewise fallen, in his constant attendance on the deceased inmates. This is the position of the Ballinrobe house, every officer swept away, while the number of deaths amongst the inmates is unknown. It yet remains, also, to add, that the Roman Catholic chaplain lies dangerously ill of the same epidemic." " From Cork the accounts were equally alarming, and amongst other details, mostly showing that' pro- fessional men seemed to be more particularly marked out as doomed victims of the malady,' and that, con- sequently, the great want amongst the mass of the sufferers was that of medical attendance, the follow- ing appeared in the Reporter newspaper:— "' Most horrible—most dreadful—are the last accounts from the west of Cork, even to listen to the description given by eye-wit- nesses of what is passing in that part of our county, and, above all, in the two Carberies. A gentleman who has sojourned there, whose duties compelled his stay, assured us, no later than last Sunday, that none of the communications appearing in our journal conveyed an adequate notion of the terrible realities. It is not food the unfortunate people now want most—it is medical attendance ; not additional poorhouses, but hospitals they require. A pesti- lential fever, more mortal and destructive than cholera or plague, is carrying off the poor. All the food, solid or liquid, on earth could not save them without medicinal and sanitary accompani- ments of the most extensive, active, and efficient sort. There is not a house from Bantry to Skull, that, with scarce a dozen excep- tions, does not contain either the sick, the dying, or the dead. The latter lie where they die, or are barely pushed outside the thresh-HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 13 olds, and there suffered to dissolve. Their living relatives within the huts are] too feeble to remove them further; and the strong, outside, from distant places (and they indeed are few) are afraid to handle unshrouded and uncoffined bodies. Judge of the consequences. The weather begins already to grow warm, and de- composition sets in more rapidly than a month since. Let us state two or three facts which we have on unimpeachable testimony. Our informant is one who, besides being incapable of an untruth, has an interest rather in exposing than encouraging exaggeration. He Ilis told us, that in one locality, where public works are in progress, the labourers^were forced to examine a cabin at some distance, in consequence of the noxious and intolerable effluvium issuing from it. They discovered in it five bodies in an advanced stage of putrefaction, the whole of a family who had died none knew when. None of the labourers dared touch the bodies, and to protect themselves while remaining on the work, where they were com- pelled to earn their bread and chance of life, they pulled down the hovel, heaped timber and thatch over the blackened corpses, applied fire, and kept aloof until the dwelling and the dead were consumed to ashes. Such was the interment. It is our duty to publish these appalling facts. We have authentic information of others just as dreadful, but our flesh creeps at the remembrance. We must, however, in order if possible to instigate the authorities to adopt proper measures, state one other fact for their considera- tion. In the neighbourhood of Dunmanus Bay three dead bodies were lying for many days, and still, we believe, remain exposed outside the thresholds of three cabins, while within, the families were dead, or dying, or struck down by fever. None of the pea- santry, for the world's wealth, would go near the bodies—such is their apprehension of contagious fever; even the Water Guards at a neighbouring station dreaded to approach them. There they lay festering in the sun, and breeding pestilence, and there, for aught we know, they still remain, emitting poisonous exhalations, and rendering the recovery of the sick within the cabins altogether hopeless." " When these accounts, which appeared in the Times of the 26th of March, first met the eye of the author14 HOM(EOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. of the present work, the idea instantly flashed upon him, that a more noble field on which to test the powers of Homoeopathy could not have been presented. He accordingly requested Mr. Heurtley, the Honorary Secretary of the English Homoeopathic Association, with which he and that gentleman were then con- nected, to summon a meeting of the Committee, with the view of proposing that a homoeopathic practi- tioner should be immediately despatched, at the ex- pense of the Association, to the scene of destitution, with instructions for him to proceed at once to Ban- try or Skibbereen, or whichever might prove the most infected district, and there to offer his gratuitous aid, without any other limit than that which would be occasioned by the exhaustion of his own physical powers. This proposal was at once hailed by the Committee, and after an attempt at opposition from two persons, whose motives subsequently transpired, and from whom the leading friends of Homoeopathy have subsequently disconnected themselves, it was immediately adopted and carried into execution. The party selected for the arduous mission was Mr. Joseph Kidd, an Irishman, but a member of the London College of Surgeons, and this gentleman joyfully undertook its duties without the slightest prospect of remuneration, and in the full conscious- ness of all the appalling circumstances with which he would be called upon to contend. He knew that in the midst of the ordinary difficulties of his task he would be assailed by the cries for food of the miser-HOMCEQPATHY IN ACTJTE DISEASES. 15 able beings by whom he would be surrounded, that he would have to attend the sick lying side by side with the dead, that all ordinary requirements would be disregarded, that fresh air, warmth, cleanliness, and every other aid would be wholly wanting, that he could hope for no professional co-operation, and that, in fact, it would have been difficult to have imagined circumstances of greater disadvantage un- der which his exertions could be carried on. But he had had some years' experience of Homoeopathy, and hence he went with undaunted confidence upon what, under other circumstances, would have seemed a hopeless and a most dangerous undertaking." This very serious step was undertaken by me, not in a spirit of blind enthusiasm, but after the most mature consideration of all the dangers, obstacles, and difficulties which might be expected to oppose our efforts, and in the full confidence that at all times Homoeopathy wants nothing but a field in which it may be tested, to prove triumphant. Nor was my confidence shaken even by the gloomy forebodings and discouraging opposition of a professional colleague, who was at that time a lead- ing member of the Committee of the Association, nor by the petty and vexatious impediments of an- other professional member, belonging to that " genus irritabile" whose love of approbation preponderating over the intellectual faculties, cause them to view an original idea of any other mind, no matter how beau- ful and perfect, as if it were unsightly, and to op-16 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. pose it by every petty shift and hindrance in their power.* Leaving London on the night of Saturday, April 3rd, with the utmost dispatch, the following Tuesday found me in the city of Cork, and, after making the necessary inquiries, I determined to press forward to some part of the west of the county of Cork, where most disease and destitution were reported to exist. Accordingly, I started for Bandon, where I called upon the rector (the Hon. and Eev. Mr. Bernard), who very kindly afforded me much information about the state of the country, and recommended me most earnestly to make Bantry the scene of operations, knowing it to be then overflowing with disease, and that, on account of the illness of its chief physician, and the increase of sickness, it was, in a great degree, destitute of medical aid. Without loss of time, therefore, I went forward, and reached Bantry towards midnight, where the sounds of misery soon came upon our ears from the sobbing crowds of children at the coach windows, as, drenched with rain, they importuned for food. Never was a more pitiable cry raised; and by those upon whom it fell, it can scarcely ever be forgotten. Bantry is a small town in the west of the county * It is deserving of remark, that no sooner had the idea thus opposed led to successful results, than the party last alluded to took immediate occasion to attempt the appropriation of a portion of the credit of the scheme, and to bruit about the share of eclat due to him, for his exertions in having vjirged it on.HOMCEOPATH Y IN ACUTE DISEASES. 17 Cork, with a population of about 5000, situated near the bay of that name; and within a few miles of those places, immortalized in the annals of suffering and distress, Skibbereen and Skull. The country surrounding it forms the most picturesque and grand district in the south-west of Ireland. Immediately after my arrival in Bantry, I called upon the vicar (the Rev. John Murphy), whose kind- ness was most liberally extended to me in many ways, during my entire stay, and the example of whose devotion to the relief of his destitute parishioners of all sects became a continual source of encouragement to me in my labours in the same field. This gentleman forthwith invited me to accompany him on one of his daily visits of charity, through the outskirts of the town, and then for the first time did the full reality and extent of the desola- tion of the people come upon my astonished vision. Up to this period' 1 had only seen, in my rapid passage through the country, a few of the ordinary horrors of the times; and as we visited one after another, the wretched huts filled to overflowing with disease and misery in the most loathsome and terrible condition to which human nature could be reduced, I found how far even imagination had fallen short of what was really to be witnessed. For months previously I had read, in common with every body else, the sickening details of the sufferings of those poor people in the English and Irish journals. I had read of them, till the whole thing seemed a B18 HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. mass of exaggeration, drawing the crowding horrors of all other centuries into one hapless period and locality. Even, however, with all this, and the glimpses of misery I had caught since my arrival in Cork, I was totally unprepared for the ghastly sights which encountered us at every step. In a very short time we saw some hundreds of cases of fever and dysentery lying in the most helpless and destitute condition. In many of the wretched huts, every inmate lay abandoned to their .fate. Fever and dysentery side by side on the same scanty pile of decomposing straw, or on the cold earthen floor, without food or drink. In a few cases we saw fever patients exposed under the lee of houses or walls, half protected from the inclemencies of that climate (proverbially a moist one) by a few furze bushes. Entering one house, our eyes met the coffins with sliding bottoms,* which it had been found necessary to introduce, and which in this instance were em- ployed to remove two of four victims to fever in one family, having been used for the others a few days previously, leaving two more almost in a lifeless condition in the midst of the same virulent disease.-)- * Owing to the enormous increase of mortality at Bantry, and several other places, it became almost impossible to procure coffins for the dead, which obliged the Relief Committee to have coffins made with moveable bottoms, Horses and men were employed to carry the dead in these coffins to the grave-yard, where they were buried in large pits, one of which, it is stated, contained nearly 500 bodies, before it was closed in June or July, all of whom had died in the wrorkhouse alone. f These two were amongst the first cases whose treatment IHOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 19 I communicated that night with Mr. Heurtley, the Honorary Secretary, apprising him of what I had witnessed, and stating that very little chance existed of any systematic plan of operation being carried out. It was therefore resolved that I should devote my services promiscuously wherever they might be most needed. Accordingly, each succeeding day found me alone amongst some of the most wretched of those that I had recollected seeing on my first survey, and after much trouble in each case, even in procuring vessels to contain the medicine, and loss of time in cleansing them myself, I was enabled to leave what was most appropriate. Thus did matters go on, gradually increasing the number of cases (every one of which was carefully entered in a note-book), till it reached nearly a hundred, before the end of a week. By degrees the sphere of operations enlarged, till, to visit one half of the entire number under treatment, became a hard day's work, requiring me to be out from ten or eleven o'clock in the morning till five, six, or seven in the afternoon, the greater part of which time was spent in the most intimate contact with fever and dysentery, being frequently obliged to remain nearly half-an-hour in one single hovel, crowded with poor sufferers, till human nature could hold out no longer, and an instinctive and almost convulsive effort would cause me to escape undertook. It will be seen from the note of cases 7 and 8 in the Appendix that they both recovered. B 220 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. from the close atmosphere of peat-smoke and fever- miasm to the open air. At the conclusion of the day's work, with face, hands, and clothes begrimed with smoke and dirt, would I reach home, with the same ordeal to pass through on the morrow, and every day; and yet, not- withstanding such exposure to the most fruitful sources of contagion, I escaped most perfectly, although the only precautions observed were, an hour's walk every morning over the hills of that beautiful country, and moderation in living. I shall now proceed with the history, description, and treatment of fever and dysentery in Bantry, in so far as it fell under my observation. The history of fever, as it appeared in Ireland during the spring and summer of 1847, is highly interesting in its medical relations, and also in the very important and instructive lessons of political economy, deducable from the very close connexion which it has proved to exist between famine and fever. A warm controversy has been carried on as to this connexion by two very able physicians in Dublin, Dr. Corrigan, of the Whitworth and Hanwick Fever Hospitals, and my friend Dr. H. Kennedy, of the Cork Street Fever Hopital. The former published a pamphlet in 1845,* ascribing the production of * On Famine and Fever, as Cause and Effect in Ireland, with Observations on Hospital Location, and the Dispensation in Out-HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 21 fever to the direct agency of famine, strengthening his assertion by many telling facts and coincidences collected from the histories of previous epidemics. This opinion was also very much favoured by the epidemic of the next year following immediately on the great famine of that year. Dr. Kennedy, how- ever, in his pamphlet,* published the year after Dr. Corrigan's, giving the matter a more searching and philosophical examination, controverts the position of the former, proving from numerous examples, and from the late visitation, that the amount of famine bore no relation to the amount of fever, that famine often occurred without fever, and vice versa, and that in some cases, famine existed for a long time without fever, and soon after abundance had replaced it that fever then broke out with great virulence. He also pointed out that several epidemics of fever in Ireland were ascribed by their historians to superabundance of food; and the conclusions he arrived at were, that there is a very intimate connexion between famine and fever, not as cause and effect, but as effects of one and the same cause, "the epidemic constitution," which, affecting the vegetable world, had caused the destruction of food, and which, in the human family, had produced fever and other door Relief of Food and Mediciric. By D. J. Corrigan, M.R.C.S.E. * Observations on the Connexion between Famine and Fever in Ireland and elswhere. By H. Kennedy, M.B., A.B., T.C.D.22 HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. epidemic diseases. His arguments are, that the epidemic tendency to fever and various other diseases (small-pox, scarlatina, &c.) had commenced before the famine, that these epidemic diseases had in most cases extended into other countries, far removed from the seat of famine; and that the same influence had also affected the lower animals with peculiar diseases. Fever became prevalent in Bantry and its neigh- bourhood in the beginning of February, and con- tinued to increase till the end of May, when it commenced to decline, both in frequency and in virulence, the amount in June being considerable, while in July and August a most rapid diminution took place, amounting, indeed, almost to a total disappearance.* The causes of fever have been generally divided into predisposing and exciting,-]* the former being those which induce or cause changes in the system (as improper and insufficient food, by lowering the general standard of health, and causing depression of the mind and spirits), that render the individual more susceptible of the disease, when exposed to an * Fever and dysentery have been again prevalent there this year, but to a slight degree, compared with the previous year. f Predisposing causes have been also named internal, or belong- ing to the system, that is, that the changes produced in the condi- tion of the solids and fluids of the body and of the morale of the mind by those causes, are the true predisposing causes, and not their direct agency. Exciting causes have also been named external, their agency being direct, and from without (as contagion, or exposure to cold and wet).H0MCE0PATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 23 exciting cause; the latter, those which actually induce or engender the disease. The principal of the predisposing causes may be considered mental and physical depression, the results of improper and insufficient food, over fatigue, or anxiety, sudden changes of temperature, the ordi- nary change of seasons, and the crowding together of many individuals in close, ill-ventilated rooms,5* where the light of the sun is entirely or partially excluded. The principal exciting causes of fever may be enumerated as, contagion (by contact or communica- tion with others previously affected), emanations from animal or vegetable matter in a state of decomposi- tion and exposure to cold or wet. These causes (both predisposing and exciting) ope- rate with different force and in different proportion in different epidemics, the most powerful in one being often absent in another; as an invariable rule, the more of them in operation, and the longer the time of that operation, the greater probability that fever will follow. In the epidemic which constitutes the immediate object of the present Essay, few will deny that famine, with its long train of secondary conse- quences, was the most powerful and constant of the * In some instances this would seem to become a direct or exciting cause, as in that of " the black hole" at Calcutta, where fever attacked every one of the survivors directly; also in the sudden crowding on board emigrant and convict ships, in gaols, &c.24 HOMtEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. predisposing causes, while of the exciting causes, the most active were contagion, and exposure to cold and wet. In the condition of the people at Bantry, and places similarly afflicted, every circumstance favour- able to the development of fever could be observed; in the crowding together* of numbers of debilitated individuals in the lowest state of mental and physical depression, in most cases existing upon one small meal (containing from six to eight ounces of solid nourishment) each day, for which they were obliged to remain in a state of semi-nakedness, j- exposed under the open air in a dense crowd surrounding the soup kitchen (where many scarcely recovered from fever were forced to come) for eight, ten, or twelve hours,J owing to the difficulty and delay in preparing cooked food for so many thousands. * Owing to the numbers of poor people obliged to desert their dwellings in the country parts (where starvation threatened), to seek refuge in the town, all the huts became filled to suffocation with occupants, (three, four, or five families occasionally living in one house or room,) in which fever was sure to break out, of a most dangerous and fatal character, f Early in the course of the distress, there was a universal rush amongst the people to pledge and dispose of their clothes to procure food, insomuch that every pawnbroking establishment in that entire country became suddenly filled, so that their capital being expended, they were ultimately obliged to remain idle or closed for many months; necessarily, the sufferings of the poor from the loss of their clothes, when the severe weather appeared, were incalculable. I Often have I seen a large portion of the crowd unserved with their scanty pittance at ten, eleven, or even twelve o'clock at night,HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 25 The most prevailing type of fever in Bantry was con- tinued fever; there was also a good deal of typhus with extreme nervous depression and debility; also some cases of inflammatory typhus with furious delirium, raving, and other evidences of cerebral implication. Continued fever generally commenced (in most cases after exposure to contagion) with languor, mus- cular exhaustion, and mental depression with head- ache ; after a few days becoming more thoroughly developed, with increase in frequency of pulse, (al- though the strength and volume were very deficient) dryness and heat of skin, heaviness and dull aching pain over the frontal region in the eyes and eyelids, constant thirst with dryness of mouth, white, brown- ish, or yellow coating of the tongue, loss of appetite, nausea, vomiting, with painful sensibility of the epi- gastrium, constipation, urine in general very little changed in quality, rather deeper in colour, but with- out deposit, and scanty. In many cases chest symptoms appeared, with cough of various characters, either dry and hard, with thick whitish phlegm, difficult of expulsion, with or without pricking pains in the chest on coughing, or full and shaking, with copious, thick, yellowish- white expectoration. In some cases the cough was attended with obstruction of breathing, and thick, occasionally obliged to leave without it till the next day; it was a matter of perfect certainty, that most of those remaining even to that time had not tasted food of any sort since the corresponding hour the day (or night) previously.26 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. tenacious, muco-sanguineous expectoration, and dull or acute pains in the chest. Almost invariably, in the early stages of this var riety of fever, appeared aching or shooting pains in the extremities (mostly in the lower), aggravated by movement, and attended with tenderness and pain in the muscular portion of the limbs; the sleep was generally disturbed at night, either by the teasing cough setting in towards midnight, or by general anxiety and restlessness. The first symptom of amendment was generally seen in diminution of the frequency of pulse, gradu- ally followed by amelioration of the pains in the head and limbs, in the cleaning of the tongue around its edges, returning appetite, softness and coolness of skin, and sleep, till convalescence became established (about the sixteenth to twentieth day). The medicines used by me in the treatment of this class of fever cases were aconite, bryonia, and bella- donna. In many cases, towards the middle and lat- ter stages, it was found necessary to administer nux vomica; in some cases, also, rhus toxicodendron was resorted to. Several other medicines were used in isolated cases, and against particular symptoms. The approach and progress of typhus differed very much from continued fever; from the very com- mencement the heat of skin and acceleration of pulse being very inconsiderable, and in the middle and lat- ter stages being almost invariably below the natural standard. For two or three days the patient wouldTIOMCKOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. n labour under lassitude and languor, with loss of ap- petite and of sleep, the tongue being generally the first index of the probable mischief in store. About the fourth or fifth day, the disease being generally well marked, with a very slight heat of skin, which felt soft and clammy, being covered with moisture, (not like the ordinary feel of a perspiring skin, but as if the skin were damped, and by some contrivance all evaporation prevented,) the pulse very little, if at all altered, except in strength, which even at this period would be somewhat deficient; the tongue presented a most characteristic appearance, in general dry, hard, and glazed, like brown leather, or deeply covered with brown or blackish fur. In some cases it appeared soft, moist, and tremulous, covered with a perfect and uniform layer of pure white paste or mucus, (this in general omened a very severe and dangerous form of the disease,) the gums and teeth became covered with brownish incrustations, thirst being incessant and insatiable, with nausea and vo- miting ; in many cases abdominal symptoms, as ten- sion and tympanitic resonance of abdominal wells, with tenderness and shooting pain over either iliac region (in general the right); bowels seldom costive, in general relaxed, with or without pain; urine in a few cases suppressed, in most unchanged; head in general implicated, in most from the beginning, with aching and heaviness at the forehead, throbbing at the temples, vertigo, sense of emptiness and bewilder- ment ; delirium, mostly at night, with low muttering,28 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. or with stupid, heavy insensibility, and incoherence of speech.* The eyes appeared dull, inanimate, and listless, with the head instinctively turned from the light. In a few cases, towards their termination, a peculiar sort of stolid deafness supervened, which gradually disappeared as convalescence advanced. Almost invariably, the lower extremities were com- plained of as being dead and numbed, rendering the least motion impossible (but without any actual pain), the feet and legs feeling cold and damp. General debility and prostration set in early in the disease, and proved the most obstinate of the symp- toms. In most cases sleep was disturbed or absent for many days and nights, with general restlessness, fre- quently caused by teasing cough, most usually com- ing on about midnight. In a few cases the cough was attended with abstruction of breathing, and sharp or dull pains in the chest, or with abundant mucous expectoration, which the patient had much difficulty in expelling. The first symptoms of improvement generally ap- peared about the fourteenth or fifteenth day, in the condition of the tongue, the dry glazed appearance becoming interspersed with patches of moist redness and the uniform white paste-like layer breaking off in flakes, exposing the natural pale-red appearance of the tongue below. Gradually sleep visited the * Where consciousness existed in this period, there was great mental anxiety and depression, with restlessness and want of sleep*HOMOEOPATHY IN ACXJTE DISEASES. 29 sufferer, appetite returned, and convalescence en- sued with tolerable rapidity, and was very well established in fifteen days after the improvement commenced. The medicines chiefly used in typhus were rhus tow., bryonia, arsenicum, and phosphorus; aconite being seldom employed except in a few cases where the treatment commenced very early, or where heat and dryness of skin existed for a few days. In most cases it was not found necessary at any period of the disease, the sphere of operation and utility of aconite in typhus being very small, compared with that in continued fever. The medicines upon which most reliance were placed, and which proved most successful, were the four already enumerated, although some others were used in a few cases. The convalescence of the fever patients was most satisfactory, indeed, too rapid in most of the cases of continued fever, as the poor sufferers, finding their strength to be so quickly restored, were apt to make too free with the cold air, and to partake largely of indigestible food, (Indian meal, in hard cakes or in porridge, even rice in many cases proving too indi- gestible), the result of which was, that nearly one- sixth of all the cases of continued fever suffered a relapse* to a fever of far worse character, although * The same unusually great liability to relapse had been pre- viously noticed in several epidemics of fever following famine in Ireland.80 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. of shorter duration than the original. This gene- rally occurred about the second or third day after all traces of the original fever had disappeared, and in most instances the one single cause (improper food) could be traced, which the first glance at its symp- toms immediately confirmed. In a few, exposure to cold in the open air, or to draughts of cold air in their houses, proved the exciting cause. Every possible effort was made to guard against this disagreeable consequence, by restraining the patients to bed, or to the room, as long as a symptom of fever remained, and by giving careful directions as to diet, also by explaining the dangerous nature of the relapse fever; but in many cases (as might natu- rally have been expected) without avail, as convales- cents after fever generally feel a very sharp appetite for the first few weeks, to restrain which would have required more philosophy and reasoning powers than those wretched creatures could be supposed to have possessed, particularly at such a time, with the dread of actual starvation impending over them. The food found to agree best with convalescents was rice, boiled in water, or milk (rarely); in some cases white bread and milk, boiled or not. These, however, were obtainable in a very small number of instances.* With few exceptions, therefore, the * Towards the close of my labours in Bantry, the humane exertions of Mr. Sampson enabled me to obviate this melancholy want, the Committee of the " British Association for the Relief of the Destitute in Ireland," having through hisHOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 31 cases 1 had dealt with were again taken under the treatment. In the detailed results, however, which will be found in the Appendix, these are not entered as fresh cases, and the double cure, therefore, is merely recorded as a single one. The symptoms of the relapse fever were in general throbbing, shooting pains in the forehead and at the top of the head, with vertigo, flushing of face, ex- pressive of intense anxiety, restlessness, and despair of recovery, the eyes looking dull and inanimate, with quivering of the eyelids, the tongue presenting one al- most unvarying character, being soft, moist, tremulous and covered with a dense layer of whitish fur or paste, nausea, sickness, and vomiting, frequently to a most distressing extent, with soreness at the epigastrium, aggravated by food, drink, or pressure, bowels gene- rally relaxed, with griping pains, or constipated, skin burning hot and moist, pulse rather accelerated, but weak or irregular, constant agitation and restlessness, with loss of sleep. The usual duration of the re- representations placed a quantity of rice at my disposal. His Grace the Archbishop of Dublin at the same time transmitted me, through the same channel, a donation of £10, and Mr. Samuel Jones Loyd a like amount. I also received £2 from Richard Beamish, Esq., F.R. S., the whole being for the relief of the destitute convalescents. This enabled me, as my professional exertions were coming to a conclusion, to provide with rice, bread and milk, and fuel, many hundreds, partly those who had reco- vered under my own care, and every one else that seemed in the same condition after sickness, that I could make out, that other- wise might have perished from imperfect convalescence, diarrhoea, and want.S2 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. lapse fever was from four to eight days, when the nausea and pain at the epigastrium diminished, and the tongue became clean, with gradual disappearance of the other symptoms. Nux vomica was found to be the most certain and useful medicine in these cases, (sometimes preceded by a few does of aconite), under its action the tongue becoming rapidly clean, the skin cool, and the head- ache disappearing, so that in a few days the patient was again in a fair way towards recovery, but with an increased degree of weakness. It was generally administered every four hours, in solution in water (the tincture), the intervals being gradually length- ened to twelve or twenty-four hours. Bryonia and arsenicum were also used. Two or three cases suffered a second relapse, and were again treated with success. There were in- stances even of a third relapse. Relapse followed typhus much less frequently, in proportion to the number of cases, than continued fever, which happy immunity was principally owing to the return of strength being more gradual, and the appetite not being so soon restored, which rendered the convalescents more careful in taking food, and in going into the open air. Where relapse did follow typhus, it approached more closely in character to the original fever than did the relapse of continued fever to its original type, and, as might have been expected, with an increased degree of debility and exhaustion, which rendered itHOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. S3 more dangerous and fatal than ordinary typhus; one of the two deaths from fever being in relapse after typhus (the second was in a case of continued fever, with pleuro-pneumonia). As health became restored to the convalescents, and as they reverted to their old mode of diet, diarrhoea frequently followed, particularly after typhus, or where much debility had previously existed; it was most usual in old persons, or in young from about the ages of six to sixteen years. From the utter impossibility of removing the exciting cause in most cases, it generally proved a tedious and dis- tressing complaint; at one time being almost cured, but again breaking out, as the cause came into more active operation. The medicines used were—arsenicum in the com- mencement, and rhus, china, secale., &c., in the latter stage. As another of the sequelae of fever, dropsical effusion into the cellular tissue occurred most fre- quently after typhus, and often to a very great extent. It usually appeared the first week after the convales- cence had been established. Phosphorus, bryonia, rhus, and china, were the medicines generally used. Dysentery.—The principal cause of this disease may be clearly traced to the abrupt change which took place in the dietary of the people, from potatoes and milk, and occasionally fish and meat, to the almost unvaried use of Indian meal, owing to the extravagant prices of the other farinaceous articles of c34 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. food, (flour, oatmeal, &c.,) and to the scarcity of milk, from the fatality amongst cattle during the winter. That Indian meal is a nutritious article of food, is undeniable (particularly well fitted for those at active labour), but it is equally undeniable, that it was the cause of much suffering and sickness, which may in a great degree be ascribed to its improper preparation, the grain being very coarsely ground, with the bran generally unseparated (which is far more irritating than the bran of wheaten flour), and the meal thus obtained, used, either boiled in water, or made into hard, flat cakes, in either mode alike indigestible. The distribution of food from the Relief Com- mittee, in the shape of porridge (made of various kinds of meal boiled in water, with salt, spices, and a faint trace of salt meat), also helped to produce and keep up dysentery. The actual change of diet must also be considered as a powerful cause, for in previous years the supply of potatoes generally fell short, in most parts of Ireland, during June and July, when oatmeal became the ordinary article of diet amongst the poor, as which time every dispensary physician in the country districts had an unusual amount of cases of gastric affections applying for treatment. These causes com bined, the change to a diet of indigestible, badly- cooked food, insufficient in quantity, with a general state of mental and physical depression, may be con- sidered as the origin of dysentery.HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 35 In order to study its nature and symptoms with more accuracy and satisfaction, three sub-divisions or groups may be distinguished and called, 1st, the acute dysentery; 2nd, the ordinary form as it attacked adults; and 3rd, as it appeared in children; this division not being merely artificial, but the natural arrangement which suggested itself to my mind at the time, and which was constantly acted upon in practice. 1. The symptoms of the first group generally came on suddenly, preceded by constipation for a few days, with excruciating pains all over the abdomen ; expression of intense anguish and anxiety on the countenance, with rapid exhaustion; and general symptoms of the most severe kind. Its progress was very rapid, and frequently towards a fatal termination. The medicines used in this variety were nux vomica and mercurius, which were generally admi- nistered in the commencement in frequently-repeated doses (half-hour, or hour), either singly or in alterna- tion, preceded or not by aconite, according to the urgency and rapidity of the case. In the most urgent cases, arsenicum and veratrum were used with marked success where nux vomica and mer- curius had been tried for a short time with little relief. 2. The ordinary form of dysentery, as it attacked adults, generally commenced with loss of appetite, nausea, and looseness of the bowels, which gradu- c 236 H0M(E0rATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. ally increased, till in the course of four or five days all the urgent symptoms of dysentery became developed. It was in this class of cases that the effects of mere, corrosivus and nux v. were best seen, given singly, in succession, or alternately (according to each particular case), at intervals varying from two to six or eight hours. It was seldom found necessary to give aconite, as the condition of the patient was rather the reverse of inflammatory, as indicated by slow and weak pulse, loss of strength, &c. Arsen. or veratrum, rhus, and china were also used in parti- cular instances. Anasarca in the limbs or trunk occasionally accom- panied and followed dysentery in adults, and con- tinued for some weeks after the healthy action in the intestines had been restored. The remedies used in it were almost the same as those previ- ously described in the treatment of dropsy following fever. Dysentery, as it appeared in children from the ages of one year to twelve or fourteen, differed in many respects from the same disease in adults, being more difficult of cure, and the symptoms peculiarly characteristic and more severe. Some of the prin- cipal points of difference were in the character of pain, in the enormous increase in development of the abdomen, the voracious appetite, the extreme degree of emaciation which ensued in most cases, the rare occurrence of anasarca, the higher ratioHOM(EOPATHY IN ACTJTE DISEASES. 37 of mortality, and the predominance of symptoms at night. The medicines found most useful in this class of cases were arsen., veratrum, mix v., mere., rhus, sul- phur, china, secale. Towards the .middle of June, the treatment of nearly two hundred cases having terminated, it was considered proper to bring my labours at Bantry to a close, sufficient time having elapsed to afford the system a full and complete trial, the amount of disease in the place also becoming rapidly diminished, and a new mode of relief being established in the erection of sheds for the reception of those suffering from fever and dysentery, with additional medical attend- ance, &c., under the provisions of the new Poor Relief Act, passed by Parliament a short time pre- viously. The duration of my stay in Bantry extended from the 9th of April to 15th June, a period of 67 days, or nearly ten weeks, during which the total number of cases treated was— Fever*.....- - 111 Dysenteryf ------ 81 192 * Twenty-four being cases of typhus, and eighty-seven con- tinued fever. f Of these eighty-one patients, forty-eight were from the ages of 1 to 16 years; twenty-three from 16 to 50; and ten from 50 to 70. Of the forty-eight young persons, 4 died; of the twenty-38 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. Fever:—Cases cured Dismissed •• Died 108 1 2 111 Dysentery :—Cases cured - 59 9 2 11 Much improved Dismissed Died - - •81 These results show a mortality of If per cent, in fever, and of 14 per cent, in dysentery. Those cases were all taken indiscriminately, as with the most perfect truth it can be said that no case was refused by me that came within a reasonable distance of my usual rounds, and that was without other medical attendance, regardless even of the most desperate cases, many of which were undertaken without a shadow of hope,* in accordance with my fixed determination to take all cases, without reserve or selection. The particulars of each of the cases, with the names at full length, the time and duration of the disease, are printed in the Appendix. The results above quoted consist of a series of reports drawn out from time to time for the Com- mittee of the Association, and ultimately completed three adults, 3; and of the ten old people, 4: which shows the mortality to have been by far the highest amongst old people. * A glance at the reports of some of the fatal cases of dysen- tery in the Appendix will illustrate this statement.HOMCEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. 39 to stand by themselves, in ignorance at that time of the results of the treatment of the same diseases in the Bantry Union Hospital, which at my request were afterwards kindly forwarded to me by Doctor Tuckey, its physician, who copied the following table from the books:— Infirmary. Fever Hospital. Dysentery and Dysen- teric Diar- rhoea. Other Dis- eases. Total. Fever. Other Dis- eases. Total. MAY. In hospital on the 1st . . Admitted during month . Total treated during month Died. ....... 50 9 7 28 20 78 117 40 69 25 60 65 129 14 7 48 195 109 85 194 52 9 61 8 26 34 JUNE. In hospital on the 1st . . Admitted during month . Total treated during month Died........ 42 90 21 30 63 120 31 112 26 35 57 147 132 51 183 143 61 204 25 6 31 16 15 31 JULY. In hospital on the 1st . . Admitted during month . Total treated during month Died........ 40 50 14 20 54 70 30 46 13 15 43 61 90 34 124 76 28 104 13 2 15 11 5 16 , AUGUST. In hospital on the 1st . . 37 18 55 13 6 1940 HOMOEOPATHY IN ACUTE DISEASES. Owing to the confusion consequent upon the ill- ness of one of the physicians of the hospital, the results for April could not be obtained, so that we can only compare the results of homoeopathic treatment during April, May, and the first half of June, with May, June, and July of the Bantry hospital. It is notorious that the months of April and May were the worst months of that year for fever, and March, April, and May, for dysentery, both in Bantry and all other parts of the county Cork (the mortality being then higher, and the amount greater). As we are thus precluded from a comparison with the results of precisely corresponding times, we are obliged to contrast our period, the greater part of which was at the worst time of those diseases, with the period of the hospital results, the greater part of which corresponded with the improving time of the same diseases. Even if we take this comparison as one on equal grounds, we find the total number of cases of dysen- tery admitted during those three months to have been 237, to which, adding 13, the difference between the number in the infirmary at the commencement, and the number at the close of the period, we have an aggregate of 250. Out of this aggregate, the deaths amount to 90, being a mortality of 36 per cent., whilst the mortality under homceopathic treat- ment was only 14 per cent. Again, the number of completed cases of fever in that period in the hospi-H0Mt ?—should get Mr. Sampson^ work."—Tyne Pilot. "Mr. Sampson supports his Christian purpose by arguments and illustra- tions that appeal strongly to the reason. The work is humane, intelligent, and vigorous. Opposed to the moral of the present law, it nowhere excites resistance to the strength of present institutions. Mild in its principles, it is also gentle in its prompting. What the author sees right to do, he would also teach to be rightly done. Mr. Sampson has written well, and there can be none who read his work but will wish well to his theory."—Monthly Ma- gazine. We welcome Mr. Sampson as a most valuable accession to the band of phrenological advocates of sound criminal jurisprudence."—Phrenological Journal. " One of the most able works written in recent times on Criminal Jurispru- dence."—Literary Gazette. " Those who are acquainted with Mr. Sampson's Criminal Jurisprudence, will infer that in dealing with any subject he would employ only dispassionate arguments, based upon indubitable facts."—Economist. iii. Price Sixpence, THE PHRENOLOGICAL THEORY of the treatment of Criminals JBdentetf, In a Letter to John Forbes, Esq., M.D., F.R.S. it. Price Two Shillings and Sixpence, SLAVERY IN THE UNITED STATES. " Mr. Sampson seems to have studied the subject of slavery with long and close attention.' '—New York Commercial Advertiser. " This is the work of an earnest, thoughtful, and withal practical Chris- tian man ; who, looking upon slavery as a sin, and yet aware of the difficul- ties which encompass all plans of abolition, has seriously turned his mind to a practicable remedy."—New York American. LONDON : S. HIGHLEY. 32, FLEET STREET.HOMOEOPATHIC MEDICINES, PREPARED WITH THE GREATEST CARE, AND BY HIMSELF SOLELY, MAY BE HAD OF WILLIAM HEADLAND, f^omceopatlnc GCfjemist, 15, PRINCES STREET, HANOVER SQUARE, LONDON, AND AT 63, HANOVER STREET, EDINBURGH, CHEMIST TO THE FOLLOWING AND OTHER MEDICAL INSTITUTIONS : The London Homoeopathic Institution. The West London Homoeopathic Dispensary. The City of London Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Edinburgh Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Marylebone Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Newcastle Homoeopathic Dispensary, The Dublin Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Brighton Homoeopathic Dispensary, The Glastonbury Homoeopathic Medical Institution. The Cheltenham Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Birmingham Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Kidderminster Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Leeds Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Islington Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Camberwell Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Leicester Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Norwich Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Southampton Homoeopathic Dispensary. The Liverpool Homoeopathic Dispensary. Sfc. Sfc. Sfc. Domestic Chests can be forwarded by post, varying in price from £1. 7s. to £3. 5s.This book is a preservation facsimile produced for the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. It is made in compliance with copyright law and produced on acid-free archival 60# book weight paper which meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (permanence of paper). Preservation facsimile printing and binding by Northern Micrographics Brookhaven Bindery La Crosse, Wisconsin 2015