in the ordinary cases of this kind, there is usually serous effusion under the arachnoid membrane, occasionally minute injection of vessels, commonly more or less general gorging of the larger veins, and especially effusion of serosity to the amount of two or even four ounces in the ventricles.[1]
When delirium tremens proves fatal, effusion is commonly found among the membranes of the brain; and occasionally to a great extent. In one instance, which proved fatal in two or three days, I have seen minute vascularity of the membranes, with effusion of fibrin, and without effusion of serosity; but such cases are rare. There is also, according to Andral, very extensive softening of the mucous coat of the stomach.[2] In an instance mentioned in Rust's Journal, besides effusion into the cerebral membranes, there was found an enormous accumulation of fat in all the cavities, a conversion of the muscular substance into fat, and a nauseous sweet smell from the whole body.[3]
In all cases of rapid poisoning with spirituous liquors some of the poison will be found in the stomach. For when the case is one of pure narcotic poisoning, unaided by the effects of blows, exposure to cold, or the like, and the person dies in a few hours, the poison cannot be all absorbed before death.—Although the spirituous liquors used in Britain have all very powerful odours, the inspector in a case of importance ought not to confine himself to this test alone. He must subject the suspected matter to distillation; and then remove the water from what distils over by repeated agitation with dry carbonate of potass, till he procures the alcohol of the spirit in such a state of purity as to be inflammable.
Alcohol may also be in some circumstances detected in the tissues and secretions of the body. A spirituous odour has been remarked not infrequently in various parts, and especially in the brain. Dr. Cooke mentions a case in which the fluid in the ventricles of the brain had the smell and taste of gin, the liquor which had been taken;[4] Dr. Ogston adverts to an instance, in which after death by drowning during intoxication, he found in the ventricles nearly four ounces of fluid, having a strong odour of whisky;[5] in the case which occurred in the hospital here the odour of whisky was said to have been perceived in the pericardium; and in a man who died of long-continued intoxication from immoderate drinking Dr. Wolffe found that the surface, and still more the ventricles, of the brain had a strong smell of brandy, although the contents of the stomach had not.[6]
The presumption afforded by such facts as these, in favour of the absorption of alcohol and the possibility of detecting it throughout the animal system, has been turned to certainty by the late experimental researches of Dr. Percy; who found that in animals poisoned with
