Address in refutation of the Thomsonian system of medical practice : delivered in the lecture room of the Chester Co. Cabinet of Natural Science, West Chester, Pa., on December 31, 1836 / by Sumner Stebbins.

  • Stebbins, Sumner.
Date:
1837
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Address in refutation of the Thomsonian system of medical practice : delivered in the lecture room of the Chester Co. Cabinet of Natural Science, West Chester, Pa., on December 31, 1836 / by Sumner Stebbins. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    accusation. But I will read you Thompson's own report of the charge- He (the Judge) stated: That the dependent was completely justified in calling me a murderer, for if I was not guilty of wil- ful murder, it was barbarous ignorant murder, and he even abused my lawyers for taking up for me/saying that they ought to be paid in screw augers, ana^bull dogs,'1 [meaning LobelTa.] The jerry brought in their verdict of justification on the part of the defendent, and throw^d the whole costs or. me, which amounted to about two thsusandjdollars. The next case to which I shall call your attention, is Thomson's celebrated rat case ; or the case of a man bitten by kia rat su/ifiosed to be mad. ''Not long since I was sent for to attend a man who had been bitten on one of his eyebrows by a rat supposed to be mad.— The|wound healled in a few days, then turned purple found it, as though the blood had settled, and turned more black, until he was blind. He was sick at the stomach and had a high fever. 1 carried him through a course of the medicine, with but Utile advantage. The swelling and dark colour progressed :11 he was about the colour of a black-berry pie. These ap- pearances led me to suspect that the madness of the rat was caused by eating Tats-bane, and communicated this poison to the man by the bite, as he appeared the same as a person I had once seen, who had been killed by taking that poison. I then washed his face with a strong tea of No. 1 and 2, and gave the same inward, with No. 3, carried him through another course of medicine, keeping a cloth on his face, wet with the tea as be- fore, to keep the air out when under the operation of the medi- cine, to sweat his face and throw the poison out. 1 kept him in a sweat for several days, occasionally with his face secured from the air, which method had the desired effect by bringing the poison out. By continually keeping up the perspiration, the swelling abated ; but whenever this was not well attended to, so as to keep the determining powers to the surface, the spasms would increase to such a degree that his life was fre- quently despaired of. He was carefully attended in this man- ner about one month, before I could determine in my own mind, whether the disease or nature, would gain the victory; after which time he began gradually to gain his health, and in about six months ho appeared to be clear of the poison; This man was sixty years of age ; and the accident happening in the fail ef the year, it was much more difficult to conquer this cold and deadily poison, than it would have been in warm weather.— This case convinced me that the cause of mad rats and mad cats, is owing to the rats having been poisoned by ratsbane, the