Whenever tormina and straining returned worse than ordinary, a cathartic was given in the morning, followed by a large dose of opium, or an anodyne diaphoretic at night.

By these means, aided by perfect quietude, repose, and low diet, the pyrexia soon disappeared, and nothing remained but debility and irregularity of the bowels, which were to be removed by the mistur. cret. c. opio, the infus. quassiæ excels., or the mistur. cinchon., given thrice or four times a-day, and a gentle laxative once in three or four days.

Many of the earlier and milder cases yielded to this treatment, but those of a severer sort required measures less inert. In these malignant forms of the disease, I began by giving a strong saline or lubricating cathartic. Blood-letting also was practised when the patients were young and robust, or, indeed, whenever the force of the pulse and pyrexia seemed, on gene. ral principles, to justify it. I never saw cause to repent of this evacuation. Practised with prudence, it often moderated local pain of the abdomen, and did not perceptibly increase the subsequent debility. These preliminary steps being taken, I immediately commenced the use of calomel, and pushed on boldly to salivation, from the belief, which seems to be well founded, of an occult connection betwixt dysentery and a morbid condition of the liver.*

The doses I gave were regulated by the constitution of the patients, and the actual state of the symptoms; but one scruple night and morning was the most usual prescription, seldom less than ten grains thrice a-day. I have given a scruple night and morning so often, that I have long ceased to be at all anxious about hypercatharsis. It certainly seldom, in any case, increases the tormina and tenesmus, but generally lessens both very materially, and produces five or six large motions, voided with less straining, and less tinged with blood. I have in this

* A work has lately appeared, by Mr. Johnson, surgeon, Royal Navy, wherein this connection is earnestly maintained, and, I think, proved. Notwithstanding some assumed notions about the "Portal circle," rather hyperbolically extended, the work is really one of great ingenuity and utility. Perhaps its greatest fault is, the imposing air of novelty and exclusive improvement with which he promulgates his practice in dysentery,—a practice long known to his brethren in the navy who have served in tropical climates. VOL. VI. 3 I No. 24.

way given 16, 18, or 20 scruples of calomel in the course of half as many days, before the mouth became affected. When the gums were fairly sore, with some ptyalism, the calomel was omitted, the tormina and tenesmus disappeared as a matter of course, and the bowels gradually returned to their natural state. Some tonic or stomachic was prescribed during the days of convalescence; and, generally, as soon as the mouth was well the patients were fit for duty.

Calomel was often thus given alone and uncombined; but often I thought it preferable, on account of occasional symptoms, to conjoin with it two grains of opium, or to give at noon (in the interval betwixt the doses) twelve or fifteen grains of the Pulv. ipecac. compos. This was done to lessen the irritability of the bowels, and to support the cuticular discharge. Under such management, every case recovered where no visceral obstructions existed, or where the coexistent disease of the liver was not irretrievable.

Opium is one of those remedies of doubtful utility in dysentery, which has been by some violently decried, and by others sparingly used, from its alleged tendency to check the natural secretions, especially that of the skin. Candour obliges me to say, that I have used it largely, and that I never noticed any of the unfavourable effects urged against it; but, on the contrary, can bear witness, with Dr. John Hunter, to its beneficial power. Given after purgatives, it can never be unsafe; and if it does no more, it procures a temporary truce from the disease. How important a cessation from suffering is in every illness, but more especially in so endless and harassing a complaint as dysentery, I need not say. Prejudices, probably illusory and theoretical, ought to give way to an advantage so solid.

Almost the whole body of the profession have concurred in praising injections in this disease. I of course defer to the

This is a more frequent occurrence, even in our own climate, than, I believe, is generally expected; but, of those who have lived for any length of time within the tropics, it will be found, that four-fifths have one viscus or other in the abdomen, more or less altered by morbid action. This opinion is deduced from a very considerable number of dissections of such subjects

experience of others, while I detail my own. Having found them almost uniformly hurtful, I entirely laid them aside. The irritation produced by introducing the pipe, more than counterbalances the soothing effects of the injection. Besides the unpalateableness of this species of remedy to the good old English habits of delicacy, I have always seen that, were the enema ever so bland, or ever so small in volume, it could not be retained beyond a very few minutes, and always occasioned more straining and tenesmus in the sequel. As a commodious substitute for injections, I have directed patients to insinuate into the anus a small crumb or two of opium, softened betwixt their fingers for the purpose; or have caused warm fomentations to be used to the parts, and bladders of hot water to be applied to the hypogastric region. These are wont to succeed so well, that the patients speak in strong terms of the relief afforded.

The advanced guard of the army was disembarked on the 24th of December, and took up a position on the only road to New-Orleans, there to wait the landing of the remainder. This body was fired upon, in the night, by an armed vessel from the river (which had dropped down with the current after dark), and by the American army on their right and front. With such unequal numbers, the conflict was obstinate, but very glorious to our troops, who put the enemy to the rout, and drove them "l'epee dans les reins," a considerable distance along the road. There is little doubt, but that for the profound darkness, and the small number of our troops yet landed, the Americans, in their confused flight, would have been followed into New-Orleans, and the town thus taken by a coup-de-main.

Instructed by this sharp and unexpected lesson, the enemy forthwith turned his attention to strengthen his commanding position, at a narrow part of the road, and every hour rendered it more formidable.

Meanwhile, our whole force had landed, but could not advance till batteries had been erected to destroy the armed ves

sel, whose fire raked the left bank of the river, and flanked any forward movement of the troops. When this desirable object was accomplished, an attempt was made to cannonade the enemy's works, but it did not succeed.

At last the fatal morning of the 8th of January arrived. Before day-light, the whole of our army advanced in columns to storm the American lines;

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Quis cladem illius noctis, quis funera fando

Explicet? aut possit lachrymis æquare labores."-VIRGIL, Æneid.

The works were defended by a broad ditch filled with water, as also a palisade, and a wall mounted with numerous pieces of cannon. The enemy, apprised of our intended invasion, had drawn these lines quite across the only road to NewOrleans. They were absolutely inaccessible at their flanks, as their right touched the Mississippi, and their left rested on an impassable wood and morass. This was the spot which the laws of Nature, as well as the rules of art, had concurred to strengthen; this was the strait which the Americans would fain compare to the immortal pass of Thermopyla.

The attempt to storm failed. In this instance "fortune did not favour the brave;" our columns were beat back at every point with a loss, I believe, of more than five hundred killed, and fully twelve hundred wounded!

The main object of the expedition having thus failed of success, the troops were once more collected on board the fleet, and proceeded off Mobile river, to attack the town of that name. Fort Bowyer, which defends the harbour's mouth, being quickly and regularly invested, was captured on the 11th of February; but the ulterior operations were suspended by the arrival from England of the news of the peace of Ghent. The troops were disembarked on a sandy uninhabited spot, called Dauphin island, there to await the ratification of the treaty, and the arrival of such supplies of provisions as would enable them to prosecute the voyage homeward.

It is worthy of remark, that, notwithstanding the almost unexampled fatigues and privations of all sorts to which the army and navy had been exposed while before New-Orleans,

sickness of any kind, up to the 8th of January, had made comparatively little progress amongst them. The bowel-complaints, though numerous, were for the most part easily removed; and no other disease of any consequer.ce prevailed. It is a remarkable fact, in the medical history of fleets and armies, that, during the fatigues and sufferings of a hot campaign, or the active progress of warlike operations, the men are very little subject to illness of any sort; as if the elation of hope, and the other great passions with which they are agitated, had the virtue to steel the constitution against the most powerful causes of disease. This circumstance, no less curious than true, proudly proves the ætherial origin of our nature, and goes far to assert the omnipotence of mind over matter. No sooner, however, does a great failure, and the dejection it draws after it,-a cessation of operation, and a return to the "vita mollis," allow the spirit of enterprise to flag, than the previous fatigues and exposures begin to tell upon the constitution by their usual results-disease. Like a machine wound up beyond its pitch, the excitement of accumulated motives once withdrawn,-the human frame rapidly runs down, and yields with a facility almost as unexpected as its former resistance. Hence, after a campaign, diseases of all sorts are prone to a type of debility and aggravation, and the proportion of deaths is unusually numerous.

Accordingly, in the instance before us, the pressure of ill success began to be severely felt after the failure of the 8th, and the consequent reimbarkation of the army. By this time unremitted fatigues, poor living, and that at short allowance, with the total want of fresh beef and succulent vegetables, not only altered for the worse the character of the bowelcomplaints, and produced a fatal relapse in some recently cured, but also introduced scurvy, with its multifarious train of perplexing symptoms. Exposure to marsh miasmata, also, produced many cases of intermittent fever. By this time, too, the weather was getting warmer (the thermometer generally ranging from 60 to 70 degrees), accompanied with more sudden vicissitudes, and a greater proportion of rain.

Dysentery now put on that exasperated form in which it