corrupts the fluids, soon after death the belly becomes Of Death black and swelled; black or livid spots appear on the limbs and back, the eyes become hollow and soft, and discharge a puriform fluid; the eyelids grow yellow; the mouth opens, because the lower jaw is relaxed; the skin gets soft, the muscles flaccid; and, lastly, the whole body exhales a putrid odour. All these phenomena united, constitute an infallible proof of real death* (N).” * Ibid. The changes which the animal body undergoes in consequence of death, and during putrefaction, have been amply detailed and explained under CHEMISTRY, chap. xix. sect. 2.

Of Death. especially at the temples. These last appearances constitute the marks of what has been called facies Hippocratica. They are all signs of a loss of activity and power in the circulating and nervous systems. Under these bodily circumstances, the powers of the mind seem to decline, generally with an equal pace with those of the body; and when the medium through which the activity of the soul is manifested can no longer act, we cannot expect to find any further traces even of its existence. Yet at the period of its separation, we are told of brilliant mental exertions of powers of intellect, not equalled in the best portion of existence. It has not been our fortune to see such intellectual animation. At the moment of death, anxiety for those we have loved will sometimes occasion apparently disproportioned exertions; and as they were unexpected, they have been exaggerated. But in no instance could we ever detect the activity of mind independent of the body. To this temporary prison the soul is confined, till, by the destruction of the machine, its animating principle is emancipated, soaring probably in higher, and, we trust, in more blissful, regions *.

* New

actual

death.

Lond. Med. A few cases have occurred, in which persons, who Dict. vol. i. were thought dead, have recovered from what was real p. 534. 370 ly a state of suspended animation; and there is reason Signs or to believe, that some unhappy beings have been buried criterion of while in this seemingly lifeless state. It becomes, therefore, a matter of the highest importance to ascertain, with certainty, whether or not death has actually taken place. The ordinary signs of death, as enumerated by one of the latest writers on this subject, are as follows: 1. The suspension of respiration. 2. The rigidity of the limbs. 3. The loss of sensation and motion. 4. The want of pulsation in the heart and arteries. 5. The spontaneous discharge of feces. 6. The collapse, opacity, and want of lustre in the eyes. 7. The coldness of the body. 8. The paleness or lividity of the countenance. 9. The relaxation of the lower jaw. 10. The regurgitation of liquids to the mouth. 11. The insensibility of the pituitary membrane of the nose. 12. The collapse, softness, and wrinkling of the lips. 13. The hollowness of the temples, and Davis thinness and contraction of the nose. 14. Putrefaction. Reglement Most of these signs singly have been shown to be fallaconcernant les décés, cious; and none of them, except the last, are to be depended on with implicit confidence. Dr Davis recommends the following mode of procedure. "As soon as the evident signs of life cease, let us place the body in a warm or dry bed, give a proper temperature to the air of the apartment, and employ every means for restoring it to life. If we judge, from the nature of the disease which preceded the death, that these means are useless, we may content ourselves with keeping the body, until its decomposition become manifest; but let us never abandon an unfortunate person, who, perhaps by perseverance in the proper means, may be restored to life should he recover, he will be a living monument of unexpected resurrection, and of the unceasing efforts of humanity. If a person die of malignant fever, scurvy, internal inflammation, or any other disease which

part ii.

371

In treating of the general phenomena of life in the Comparafirst chapter of this article, we made a few observations tive perti nacity of on the degree of vitality that appears in various tribes life. of organized beings. There is scarcely a more curious part of the physiology of death than the consideration of the greater or less difficulty with which it is produced in different animals. Some, as the heiring and the whiting, die almost instantly on being removed from the situation in which they usually live. Some are killed by a slight blow on the nose or the neck; this is the case with the seal, the rat, the hare, and the rabbit. Others again retain life with great pertinacity. Among the mammalia, the cat is proverbial for being difficult to kill; the sloth has been known to live for above 40 days clinging to a pole, and entirely without food; and Dr Sparrman assures us, that the ratel, or honey weazel (viverra mellivora), is so hardy that it is almost impossible to kill it; the colonists and Hottentots both assert, says he, that it is almost impossible to kill this creature, without giving it a great number of violent blows on the nose; and it is remarkable that such a number of hounds as are able collectively to tear in pieces a lion of moderate size, are sometimes obliged to leave the ratel only apparently dead T. Some fishes Sparr man's Voylive for a long time after being removed from the water, and even after being gutted and cut in pieces, as the carp, the flounder and the cel. It is among the reptiles, mollusca, and zoophytes, however, that we find the most remarkable instances of pertinacity of life. Referring the reader to the article ERPETOLOGY for these instances in reptiles, and to HELMINTHOLOGY for those in zoophytes, we shall here only mention two among mollusca. The sea marigold (actinia calendula) is destroyed with such difficulty, that after drilling the holes of the rock from which they appear, with an iron instrument, they have been known to rise again in the same places, and become as numerous as before in the course of a few weeks ‡. Snails whose remarkable Hughes's suspended animation we have already recorded, may be of Barbecrushed beneath the foot, and will yet survive, and re-does. pair the breaches in their shelly covering; nay, they are capable of passing the ordeal of boiling water, as we learn from the relation of a lady who, wanting some snail shells for a piece of grotto work, attempted to kill the animals by repeatedly pouring over them boiling water; but to her horror and astonishment, she observed them next day crawling about the edges of the vessel 3 U 2

in

age.

Nat. Hist.

Of Death.

It is to violent or accidental death that Bichat principally confines his discussions, and in order to determine with precision the phenomena that take place in the three species, he examines at great length the relations that subsist among the three functions of circulation, respiration and sensation, as they are affected by the death of the heart, the lungs, or the brain. He first considers those cases of sudden death that commence with the death of the heart; then those originating in the lungs and lastly those originating in the brain. He shows how, one of these functions ceasing, the others successively stop; he points out the mechanism, by which the death of all the parts follows that of the organ first affected; and he determines, according to his own principles, the nature of the several diseases by which the life Recher- of the heart, the lungs, or the brain, is extinguished *. ches, part ii. We consider this as the most interesting part of his art. i valuable work, and it well deserves the attentive perusal of every medical man. We regret that we cannot do more than extract from it the view given by the author of the successive phenomena produced by the influence which the death of each of the vital organs exerts on the general death of the body.

376

Progress of Whenever the heart ceases to act, says Bichat, genedeath com-ral death comes on in the following manner. The acmencing in tion of the brain ceases for want of excitation; and from the heart. the same defect, the sensation, locomotion and speech, which immediately depend on the general sensorium, are interrupted. Besides, for want of the excitation of part of the blood, the organs of these functions would cease to act, even though the brain were supposed capable of exerting on them its usual influence. The whole of the animal life, then, is suddenly arrested. The man, from the moment that his heart dies, ceases to exist with respect to surrounding objects.

The interruption of organic life, which has commenced through the circulation, operates at the same time through the respiration. The mechanical actions of the lungs no longer proceed when the brain ceases to act, since on this organ depends the action of the diaphragm and intercostal muscles. The chemical changes can no longer take place, when the heart can neither receive nor convey the materials necessary for their developement. In short, general death continues to proceed in a gradual manner, by the interruption of secretion, exhalation, and nutrition. These are the effects produced when death is the consequence of a wound of the heart or large blood† Id. art. 5. vessels, a rupture of the heart, or similar accidents +. The series of phenomena that take place in death, as commencing in the lungs, is different according as the mencing in mechanical or the chemical action of these organs is first the lungs. arrested. I. In the former case, as when death is produced by an extensive wound or laceration of the diaphragm, by the fracture of a great many ribs at the same time, &c. they proceed as follows: 1. Cessation of the mechanical action; 2. Cessation of the chemical phenomena, for want of the air which supported them; 3. Cessation of the brain's action for want of the red

377 Progress of

death com

blood by which it was excited; 4. Interruption of ani- Of Death. mal life, of sensation, locomotion, and speech, from the loss of the exciting powers of the brain and the red blood on the organs of those functions; 5. Stoppage of the general circulation; 6. Stoppage of the circulation in the capillaries, of secretion, absorption, exhalation, for want of the excitation exerted on their organs by the red blood; 7. Cessation of digestion, for want of secretion, and of excitation of the digestive organs. II. When the chemical action of the lungs is interrupted, as when an animal is confined in a vacuum; in cases of strangulation, suffocation, drowning, &c. the phenomena of death proceed in the following order: 1. Interruption of the chemical phenomena; 2. Consequent suspension of action in the brain; 3. Cessation of sensation, voluntary motion, voice, and the mechanical functions of respiration; 4. Stoppage of the heart's action; and of the general circulation: 5. Termination of the capillary circulation, of secretion, exhalation, and absorption, and, by consequence, of digestion ; 6. Cessation of animal heat, which, being the result of all the funcId. art. tions, must cease when all these are terminated ‡. 378 The phenomena of general death commencing in the Progress of brain come on in the following series: 1. Cessation of death comthe brain's action; 2. Sudden interruption of sensation mencing in and voluntary motion; 3. Simultaneous paralysis of the the brain. diaphragm, and intercostal muscles; 4. Interruption of the mechanical phenomena of respiration, and, by consequence of voice; 5. Cessation of the chemical phenomena; 6. Passage of the black blood into the system of red blood; 7. Impeded circulation, from the action of the black blood on the heart and arteries, and from the immobility of all the parts, especially the organs of the chest; 8. Death of the heart, and stoppage of the general circulation; 9. Simultaneous interruption of organic life, especially in the parts that are usually penetrated by red blood; 10. Abolition of animal heat §. We have now gone through the series of physiologi Conclusion. cal enquiries, into which we proposed to enter in this article. In forming an estimate of the merit due to our labours, we request that our readers will consider the article in a great measure supplemental to many that have preceded it in the course of the present work. It has been our principal object to fill up blanks and supply deficiencies, especially with respect to Comparative Physiology; and to form, with those preceding articles which have a reference to the animal economy, particularly ANATOMY, MEDICINE, MIDWIFERY, CHEMTSTRY, MAN, one connected, if not uniform whole. The difficulty of the task we had undertaken will probably be admitted as some apology for the imperfect execution of it; while the variety and interesting nature of the subjects which we have treated, with the numerous references to the most respectable sources of information, will, we trust, render this article acceptable both to the general and the scientific reader. See ANATOMY, ANIMAL, COMPARATIVE and VEGETABLE, SUPPLE

MENT.

EXPLANATION

§Id. art. 13

379