The influence of sewer emanations / by T. Herbert Barker.

  • Barker, T. Herbert (Thomas Herbert), 1814-1865.
Date:
1858
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The influence of sewer emanations / by T. Herbert Barker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    On the tenth day his appetite was better, but he vomited and had diarrhoea in the evening. On the eleventh day he was very restless, and had but little appetite ; and on the twelfth, the symptoms being much the same, he was removed to his kennel. He walked feebly ; but soon after his liberation ate heartily of food. He continued very thin and weak for six weeks after his removal from the cesspool air. Having thus ascertained in some measure what was the effect of long exposure to the vitiated air of the cesspool, I instituted another series of experiments. In lieu of exposing animals to this vitiated air, I subjected them, in the same chamber, to certain percentages of such of the individual gases as I had found at various times emanating from the cesspool. By com- paring any results that might thus be obtained, with those which had already been obtained, I hoped to obtain a clue to the agent which, in the compound cesspool air, gave rise to the symptoms described. Sulphuretted Hydrogen. I placed a puppy in the box as before, and introduced 100 cubic inches of sulphuretted hy- drogen, or 1714 per cent. The breathing became instantly laboured. In two minutes the animal fell insensible on his side, and in another half minute he was dead without a struggle. An hour after death, the right side of the heart was found filled with fluid blood to distension. In the left side the blood was partly coagulated. The fluid blood coagulated quickly when received into a glass. The corpuscles of the blood were natural. The lungs were congested in the lower lobes and posteriorly. Above, they were pale and free from congestion. The stomach and abdominal viscera were healthy. The vessels on the surface of the brain were slightly congested. I placed a puppy in the box as before, and drove in twenty-