Medical reports, on the effects of water, cold and warm, as a remedy in fever and other diseases : whether applied to the surface of the body, or used internally / by James Currie, M.D.

  • Currie, James, 1756-1805.
Date:
1808
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical reports, on the effects of water, cold and warm, as a remedy in fever and other diseases : whether applied to the surface of the body, or used internally / by James Currie, M.D. 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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    pafs by which Cilicia muft be entered. In defcending from the immenfe elevation he had reached, he was fti- mulated by the defire of faving the city of Tarfus, the capital of the province, which the Perfians threatened to confume by fire. In both of thefe enterprifes Alex- ander was fuccefsful. It was at the clofe of this extra- ordinary march, according to the teftimony of all the hiftorians, that the conquerer, advancing into Tarfus at the head of his troops, covered with duft and fweat, and exhaufted with long continued toil, dripped himfelf in the fight of his army, and plunged into the pure and cold waters of the Cydnus, which ran through the city. The fymptoms that followed, are defcribed with fuf- ficient minutenefs and precifion. Vixque ingrejfi Jubito borrore art us rigere cosperunl: pallor deinde Juffujus ejl, et totum propemodum corpus vitalis calor reliquU. Ex- Jpirantijimilem minijlri manu excipiunt, nee /atis compo- tem mentis in tabernaculum deferunt. j^. Curtii, lib. iii. cap. v. From the length and difficulty of the march, it is natural to fuppofe, that Alexander muft have been cooled, as well as debilitated, by excefiive perfpiration and fatigue, and under fuch circumftances, immerfion in the cold and rapid Cydnus, was followed by the confequences which we mould expect from the principles already laid down.* * If an objection be urged againftour laying much weight on a relation taken from a period of hiftory fo remote, I reply, that I am far from reft- ing any part of my conclufions upon it, having the firmer foundation of actual obfervation. But as this adventure of Alexander is mentioned by almoft every writer on the effects of cold on the living fyftem, to exemplify the danger of its being applied when the body is pieternaturally heated, it feemed proper to fhew, that it is capable of a more juft and natural ex- planation. In regard however to tlte fact itfclf, of Alexander having fuffei ed from bathing in the Cydnus, it might be ealily (hewn, that we cannot reject it without relifting entirely the weight of hiftorical evidence, i, This ex- ploit was performed before thoufands of witnefles, by fomc of whom it is recorded, and it is mentioned by all the hiftorians. z, The circumftances that preceded it, and the confequences that followed it, are alfo recorded with great minutenefs, and form a natural chain of events. 3, The ait itfelf of ftripping before his army, and fpringing into the Cydnus, may