and an innocent proportion too, should be partakers of the "milk of human "kindness," than that "our wicked

5. A Letter to John Toben, Efq. late Member of His Majefty's Council in the Island of Nevis, from James Ramfay, A. M. Vicar of Tefton.

THIS pamphlet, like the three former by the fame author, is printed and fold by J. Philips, in George Yard.The mild and benevolent principles of the Quakers, which infpired them with the earliest defire of putting a stop to human flavery, and the fhocking traffic whereby it is kept up, led them to take under their patronage the Vicar of Tef zon in Kent, who firft undertook to difplay its horrors and expofe its guilt *. It could not be imagined that the fairest reprefentations would not be oppofed by intereft and false prefeription. Two anonymous attacks were made on Mr. Ramfay, who, in 1786, replied to them. He was answered in A Short Rejoinder, which rather attacks Mr. R's perfonal character than his caufe, and that in very unwarrantable language; to the avowed author of which, he addreffes this Letter.

4. A Letter to the Treasurer of the Society inftituted for the Purpose of effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade, from the Rev. Robert Boucher Nickolls, Dean of Middleham. THE worthy Dean, who is a native of the Weft Indies, though established in this country, fuggefts to the inquiry of the Society, that, "if it can be prov"ed that the natural increafe of the negroes already in the islands would be fully adequate to the cultivation of them, and that fuch natural increase would be fecured by humane treat"ment, no argument could then be "brought against the abolition of this "accurfed traffic, but from the private intereft of a few individuals on this "fide of the Atlantic chiefly." He gives fome instances, and urges feveral arguments in confirmation of this fug geftion; and expreffes an ardent with for the fuccefs of the cause: in which we heartily concur with him, accounting it no lefs effential to the interefts of Humanity, and our Holy Religion, that so large a proportion of the human fpecies,

* See our vol. LIII. p. 858; LIV. 597 ; LVI. 241.

rigours of Juftice tempered with mercy. Thus "Mercy and Truth would meet together-Righteoufnefs and Peace "would kifs each other."

7. The London Medical Journal. Vol. VIII, For the Year 1787. Part IV. 8vo. THE part we are now announcing completes the VIIIth volume of this valuable work, and contains the following articles.

ART. 1. Cafe of an Extra-uterine Fetus. Communicated, in a Letter 10 Dr. Simmons, by Michael Underwood, M. D. Licentiate in Midwifery of the Royal College of Phyficians, and Phyfician to The British Lying in Hofpital in London.

We have here the cafe, and a very curious and extraordinary one it is, of a Mrs. Shepherd, of Snow Hill, an healthy woman, who became pregnant in the year 1738, when in her thirtieth year; and at the end of the fifth month, being violently frightened, fainted away. Upon her recovery from this fainting, the felt fomething (as the exprefied it) break within her; and from this period her life was an almoft uninterrupted feries of pain and uncafinefs. Twentyone years after this fright, he began to void bones of a foetus by kool; and in the year 1774 it was computed that the had paffed, in this way, during the last fifteen years, between four and five hundred pieces of bone, of different fizes. In 1778, when he had arrived at the age of feventy years, the received a confiderable acceffion of fortune, which (owing, probably, to a frame enervated by forty years fuffering.) fo changed her temper, and deranged her mind, that the became peevish, emaciated, reftlefs, and, very foon after, maniacal. She continued in that state till her death, which happened not long ago; and having been removed into the country when the loft her fenfes, there was no opportunity of examining the body.

ART. II. Obfervations on Extra-Uterine Cafes, and on Ruptures of the Uterus. By Maxwell Garththore, M. D. F. R. S. and S A. Fellow of the Royal College of Phyficians at Edinburgh, and Physician to The British Lying in Hofpital in London.

"There are few things," fays the author of this paper, and very juftly,

66 more

ૐક

“On my first inspecting the wound, which was in a few hours after the accident had occurred, I found it filled with coagulat ed blood, vifibly moving with the pulfations of the fubjacent artery. From hence con

"perate." Among thefe, he thinks none are more ftriking than the means The frequently makes ufe of to free her felf of the burden of an extra-uterine foetus. He was firft led, it feems, to write on this fubje&t by the very curious cafe communicated to Dr. Simmons by Dr. Underwood, and defcribed in the preceding article. Dr. G. is inclined to believe, that in that cafe the uterus was ruptured when the patient fainted from the violence of the fhock the received in the fifth month.-Dr. G. has added feveral extraordinary infiances of the fame kind from his own experience, and from books; and, in the course of his paper, takes occafion to treat pretty fully of labours attended with convulfions, and of that most dreadful of all accidents, the rupture of the uterus. On all of thefe fubjects the reader will find him deli vering a variety of ufeful remarks.

ART. III. An Account of a large Mafs of Hydatids difcharged from the Uterus. Communicated, in a Letter to Dr. Simmons, by Mr. B. Wilmer, Surgeon at Coventry.

ART. IV. An Account of a Cafe, in which a Part of the Femoral Artery was dilated, in Confequence of its being laid bare by a Wound, and which was fuc cessfully treated by obliterating the Cavity of the Artery, at that Part, by Compreffion. Communicated, in a Letter to Dr. Simmons, by Mr. Robert Kinglake, Surgeon at Chipping Norton in Oxford

faire.

The practice in this cafe was as bold as it was fuccefsful; and it would, perhaps, be difficult to adduce an inftance more ftriking than this, in proof of the great improvement made by the moderns in the art of furgery. We fhail make no apology for giving the cafe at large a place in our collection.

"Richard Rooke, of Barton in Warwickhire, aged thirty years, and of a robust conft.tution, was goaded in the thigh, about four months ago, by a bullock. The wound was a lacerated one, and immediately oppofite the middle part of the femoral artery, which very narrowly escaped divifion. This circumftance of the extrenie proximity of the artery to the wound conftitutes the groundwork of what appears, in this cafe, to merit bfervation.

with the wound, I apprehended very dangerous confequences.. I began, however, to encounter the difficulties by a copious bloodletting, and by well evacuating the bowels & a moderate compreffion was alfo made on the artery, juft below where the profunda is fent off, with a view to diminish the impulse of the circulation on the part of the artery connected with the accident, and to afford an opportunity for an increased quantity of blood to pass through the collateral branches: but, notwithstanding thefe precautions, the part of the artery at the wound, from being deprived of an equal and ufual refiftance. from the fuperincumbent integuments, in twenty-four hours was dilated beyond the edges of the wound, which it completely filled up. On preffing the dilatation with my finger, the propulfive force of the heart felt incredibly strong, and required a forcible and fteady preffure to refift the impulfe. In this precarious state of circumstances it seem→ ed difficult to determine what courie was moft eligible; whether to remove the limb, chance of preferving the limb, to involve the for a certain prefervation of life, or, for the

cafe in all the difficulties refulting from an i tercepted and diverted circulation.

"After no little hesitation, and finding the patient decidedly averse to amputation, I refolved on making a compreffion of the dilated artery that would approximate the fides of the veffel at that part, fo as to induce an union, and confequent deftruction of its continuity. This I was farther encouraged to attempt, from conceiving that the probably inflamed ftate of the arterial coats, in confe quence of the accident, increafed under the irritation of the necellary preffure, might in fure a coalefcence on the principle of adhe five inflammation. In conformity to this idea,, I made a compreffion with an oblong button tourniquet, fo applied as to make particular and concentered preffure. The dilatation. yielded to the force employed, and remained quiet under the fuppreffion. The obstacle given to the circulation was evinced by an immediate and total lofs of pulfation in the ham. To co-operate in the intention of cure, I made a gentle preffure on the artery, from the part it was dilated, nearly as high up as where the profunda goes off.

"The effects of obftructed circulation now began to appear in their ufual terrific form. The part of the thigh above the compreffion became much fwollen, inflamed, and extremely painful; feeling, to ufe the patient's own expreffion, as it the thigh was rending afunder. The part of the extremity below the compreffion fuffered a diminution of its natural heat, with a torpid feel, and was

foon loaded with cedematous tumefaction. The fyftem, in general, alfo partook of the irritation, the functions of the body becoming deranged, and head-ach, bleeding at the nofe, frequent fickness, and occafional vomiting, being excited.

"After two days fcarcely unvaried continuance of this deplorable fituation, the pulfe became palpable in the ham, and a fenfation of glowing warmth was now felt diffufing through the interior part of the extremity; the fwelling above the compreffion, together with the preternatural heat and pain, began fenfibly to decreafe; and the edges of the wound appeared tumid and digefting. This was on the third day from the application of the compreffion, which I judged to be too early a period either for the flackening or removal of the comprefs. I therefore allow ed it to remain on for five days longer; during which time every thing continued progreffively in a favourable train, without any for midable interruption.

"On removing the comprefs, incarnation was obfervable in the wound, without the fmallest appearance of an arterial tube. For fecurity, a comprefs, moderately tight, was continued for a month, when the wound was clofed with an indented cicatrix. The patient has ever fince (now nearly three months) followed the daily labour of an hufbandman, without any other inconveniences than thofe of a more obtufe feeling in the leg and foot than is natural; an unusual fenfe of cold; and finding that, after long standing, the leg and foot become a little oedematous. The fwelling, however, goes entirely down by the morning, after he has lain a few hours in bed. But thefe are obvious effects of a

want of arterial vigour in the extremity, and will, I should fuppofe, be furmounted when the collateral branches are rendered more capaciously pervious.

This cafe may ferve as an admonition to furgeons not to think indifcriminately of the danger of arterial dilatations, but always to connect them with their caufes; for certain ly a very obvious difference exits, in the degree of hazard, between a dilatation enfuing a recent external accident, and one originat ing from a lofs of power or offific inaction in the coats of an artery. In the former, the dilatation refults from mechanical circumitances, the artery, confidered abftractedly, remaining found; in the latter, it is the confequence of weakness, or altered ftructure, the extent of which cannot be defined. mode of treatment, therefore, which may be applicable to the former of these cafes, and which, in the inftance I have related, was fuccefsful, would, in the latter, be of very dubious efficacy, as the artery, if compreffed at the dilatation, would, from its deficient power, most probably yield to the additional impulfe in another part, and fruftrate the cure. This view of the fabject clearly explains a diffimilarity that at once thews the

The

propriety of this mode of treatment in the one cafe, and as clearly elucidates the ex treme incertitude and probable infufficiency of its employment in the other. Should the event of the cafe I have related tend to enforce an imitation of the practice in fimilar circumftances, and be productive of as happy an effect, the fuccefs will be not lefs creditable to furgery than congenial with the feelings of humanity, in fuperfeding the truly horrid alternative-amputation. ROBERT KING LAKE. Chipping Norton, O. 13, 1787."

(To be continued.)

8. The English Orator. Books the Second and Third. By the Rev. Richard Polwhele, Tranflator of "Theocritus," c. 41.

THERE is, perhaps, no fpecies of poetry which requires a more exuberant coincidence of genius and erudition than the didactic. To engage continued attention to precepts, however just and falutary, they thould be delivered with every grace of which language is fufceptible;-in a style at once nervous and harmonious, correct and elegant, figurative and perfpicuous. Epifodes fhould alfo be introduced, that affect and intereft, naturally refulting from the fubject of the poem, and leading, with the happieft addrefs, to the refuming of it. Bold perfonifications and apt allufions fhould likewife be interfperfed. In a word, to give celebrity to a work of this nature, with all the energy and graces of poetry, must be blended a fund of various information, the refult of extenfive reading, and acute obferva tion, both phyfical and moral. In an attempt fo arduous, not wholly to fail, confers a tide to fome praife; to fuc ceed, deferves much: and, in our opinion, much is due to Mr. Polwhele. His inftructions evince an intimate ac. quaintance with his fubject, and no mall knowledge of the diftinguishing excellences of thofe whom he recommends as models in the oratory of the bar and the fenate. At the head of the former he places Mr. Erskine, to which gentleman he dedicates his ÍId Book, and whom he defcribes as

"adorn'd "With laurels that outvie the Grecian palm, "Victor in British eloquence!" At the head of the latter, Mr. Pitt; to whom the Illd Book is infcribed. Yet,

though thefe ftand prominent, he is by no means a niggard of his praise to others: he mentions, as eminent in forenfic eloquence and learning, Mr.

*See our vol. LV. p. 548. Bearcroft,