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White

age and youth, the guilty and the just,
Oh, seemingly severe ! promiscuous fall.
Reason, whose daring eye in vain explores
The fearful Providence, confused, subdued
To silence and amazement, with due praise
Acknowledges th' Almighty, and adores
His will unerring, wisest, justest, best.

MALLET.

CONVERSATION XLI.

Medical Electricity.

TUTOR. If you stand on the stool with glass legs, and hold the chain from the conductor while I work the machine a few minutes, your pulse will be increased, that is, it will beat more frequently than it did before. From this circumstances physicians have applied electricity to the cure of many disorders: in some of which their endeavours have been unavailing, in others the success has been very complete.

Charles. Did they do nothing more than this?

Tutor. Yes, in some cases they took sparks from their patients, in others they gave them shocks.

James. This would be no pleasant method of cure, if the shocks were strong.

Tutor. You know, by means of Lane's electrometer, described in our thirty fourth Conversation, (Plate v11. Fig. 10.) the shock may be given as slightly as you please.

Charles. But how are shocks conveyed through any part of the body?

Tutor. There are machines and apparatus made purposely for medical purposes, but every end may be answered by the instrument just referred to. Suppose the electrometer to be fixed to a Leyden phial, and the knob at a to touch the conductor, and the knob B to be so far off as you mean the shocks to be weak or strong, a chain or wire of sufficient length is to be fixed to the ring c of the electrometer, and another wire or chain to the outside coating: the other ends of these two wires are to be fastened to the two knobs of the discharging-rod. VOL. III.

E e

James. What next is to be done if I wish to electrify my knee, for instance?

Tutor. All you have to do is to bring the balls of the discharging-rod close to your knee, one on the one side, and the other on the opposite side.

Charles. And at every discharge of the Leyden jar, the superabundant electricity from withinside will pass from the knob at A to the knob B, and will pass through the wire and the knee, in its way to the outside of the jar, to restore to both sides an equilibrium.

James. But if it happen that a part of the body, as an arm, is to be electrified, how is it to be done, because in that case I cannot use both my hands in conducting the wires?

Tutor. Then you may seek the assistance of a friend, who will, by means of two instruments, called directors, be able to conduct the fluid to any part of the body whatever.

Charles. What are directors?

Tutor. A director consists of a knob

bed brass wire, which, by means of a brass cap, is cemented to a glass handle. So the operator holding these directors by the extremities of the glass handle, brings the balls, to which the wires or chains are attached, into contact with the extremities of that part of the body of the patient through which the shock is to be sent. If I feel rheumatic pains between my elbow and wrist, and a person hold one director at the elbow and another about the wrist, the shocks will pass through, and probably will be found useful in removing the complaint.

James. Is it necessary to stand on the glass-footed stool to have this operation performed?

Tutor. By no means: when shocks are administered, the person who receives them may stand as he pleases, either on the stool, or on the ground; the electric fluid taking the nearest passage, will always find the other knob of the other director, which leads to the outside of the jar.

Charles. Is it necessary to make the body bare?

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