canal, and more particularly of the rectum; to which may also be added, though not properly a morbid phenomenon, certain appearances put on by the arsenic which remains undischarged.
Redness of the throat and gullet is not common, at least it does not often occur in the descriptions of cases. Jaeger, however, says that in his experiments he usually found redness at the upper and purplish stripes at the lower end of the gullet:[1] and Dr. Campbell likewise found the gullet red in animals,[2] Similar appearances have also been remarked in man. In the case of a man who lived eight days, Dr. Murray found the gullet very red;[3] in that of a woman who lived scarce seven hours, Dr. Booth observed the gullet inflamed downwards very nearly to the cardia;[4] and Wildberg has reported two cases of the same nature, in one of which it is worthy of remark that the poisoning lasted only six hours.[5] On the whole, it appears probable that inflammation of the throat and gullet would be found more frequently in the reports of cases, if it was more carefully looked for.
Redness of the inner coat of the stomach is a pretty constant effect of arsenic, when the case is not very rapid. All the varieties of redness, formerly mentioned among the effects of the irritant poisons generally, may be produced by arsenic. There is nothing, however, in the redness caused by this poison, any more than in the redness of inflammation generally, by which it is to be distinguished from the pseudo-morbid varieties. (See p. 110.)
It is singular, that, however severe the inflammation of the inner membrane of the stomach may be, inflammatory redness of the peritonæal coat is seldom found. Yet inflammatory vascularity does occur sometimes on the peritonæal coat. Sproegel found it in animals;[6] and it was present in the case of the girl Warden, whose death gave rise to the trial of Mrs. Smith.[7] Dr. Nissen, a Danish physician, has related another case in which the external coat of the stomach appeared as if minutely injected with wax. But the patient had been attacked with incarcerated hernia during the progress of his illness, and the whole peritonæal membrane was in consequence inflamed.[8] A common appearance when the internal inflammation is well marked, and one often unwarily put down as inflammation of the peritonæum, is turgescence of the external veins, sometimes so great as to make the stomach look livid.
Blackness of the villous coat from effusion of altered blood into its texture is sometimes met with. When the colour is brownish-black, or grayish-black, not merely reddish-black, when the inner membrane is elevated into firm knots or ridges by the effusion, and the black spots are surrounded by vascularity or other signs of reaction,
- ↑ Diss. Inaug. Tubingæ, 1808, de Effectibus Arsenici in varios organismos, p. 39.
- ↑ Diss. Inaug. Edin. 1813, de Venen. Mineralibus, pp. 5, 6, 12.
- ↑ Edin. Med. and Surg. Journal, xviii. 171.
- ↑ London Medical Gazette, xiv. 62.
- ↑ Praktisches Handbuch, iii. 232 and 304.
- ↑ Dissert. Exp. 36.
- ↑ Edin. Med. and Surg. Journal, xxvii. 453.
- ↑ Nordisches Archiv, i. 334.
