and in different parts of the same stomach, but in relative proportion in such different parts.

Mr. HUNTER, in his valuable paper on digestion after death, makes some observations relative to the great end of the stomach, to which, as being intimately connected with the subject of this paper, it is necessary that I should advert.

"There are few dead bodies," he remarks, "in which the stomach, at its great end, is not in some degree digested; and one who is acquainted with dissections, will easily trace these gradations. To be sensible of this effect, nothing more is necessary than to compare the inner surface of the great end of the stomach, with any other part of its inner surface; the sound portions will appear soft, spongy, and granulated, and without distinct blood vessels, opake and thick; while the others will appear smooth, thin, and more transparent; and the vessels will be seen, ramifying in its substance; and upon squeezing the blood which they contain, from the larger branches to the smaller, it will be found to pass out at the digested ends of the vessels, and to appear like drops on the inner surface."* These effects, he attributes to digestion, by the gastric juice, in the ducts of the glands which secrete it.

With every respect for the high authority of a gentleman to whom the professional world is so much indebted, I shall state to the society, the circumstances in which my own observations have not agreed with those of Mr. HUNTER, as to some of the points mentioned in the quotation just given.

The great end of the stomach certainly appears, in general, to be smoother, thinner, and more transparent than the other parts; but its thinness does not apply to the villous coat alone; there is also, (as I have already shewn) a very great thinness of the muscular coat, at this place, which may equal, and sometimes exceed that of the former.

The instances which I have mentioned above, afford striking examples of thinness in the coats of the stomach at its

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great end; but that this thinness originated in erosion of the villous coat by the gastric juice, appears to me to be very doubtful; because it is difficult to conceive, how this effect could occur, without being accompanied by an erosion of the ends of the arteries, and consequent extravasation on attempting to inject them: but yet, in the cases which I have stated, where the substance of the stomach was in the extreme of thinness, no extravasation took place when the arteries were injected. In those cases likewise, the venous blood, on forcing it backwards, filled minute vessels, but was not extravasated.

I can hardly indeed conceive, that if the great end of the stomach were, in ordinary circumstances, eroded by the powers of the gastric juice, we should be able, with any degree of certainty (as we assuredly are), to fill its vessels by injection; unless we could suppose, that the vessels were left unaffected in the solvent operation. Mr. HUNTER was quite aware that the gastric juice, in diminishing the thickness of the villous coat, must digest the ends of vessels; for he gives as a proof of digestion of the stomach taking place, that blood, when forced from larger branches into smaller ones, passed out at the digested ends of vessels, and appeared like drops on the inner surface. Such a degree of digestion, however, must, I venture to suggest, be very rare; for in the many trials which I have made as to this point, particularly where the stomach was exceedingly thin, it has never happened to me to be able to do more, than fill the minute extremities of the veins, (in the way which I have already mentioned) by pressing the blood backwards in the larger branches. These minute extremities are easily ruptured, in injecting the veins; and if a sufficient body of blood could be forced back from the trunks into them, (which can scarcely be the case) it is most likely that the same effect would follow.

Mr. HUNTER seems to refer the vascular appearance, seen in the inner surface of the stomach, to thinness of the villous coat; meaning, I presume, to imply, that the vessels are generally in a state to be visible, provided a certain portion of the

villous surface by which they are covered, or in which they are imbedded, were removed from them. This, however, does not appear to me to be the case; for the visibility of vessels, as far as I am able to judge, arises, in a considerable degree, from the accidental circumstance of blood being contained in them, without which, they would be difficultly seen at all*; and the possession of blood, seems to me to be in a great degree independent of the state of the coats as to thickness.

It by no means follows, because large veins are frequently seen ramifying under the villous coat of the great end of the stomach, (when this is thin, and therefore admits them to be seen through it) that a similar vascular appearance will be seen in other parts of that viscus, by dissecting off the whole, or a part only of the mucous coat which lines it.

The nature of that vascularity which is so generally seen in the villous coat of the stomach, seems to have been very much misunderstood among authors, even of high eminence.

HOFFMAN has a chapter entitled, "de inflammatione ventriculi frequentissima," in which he expresses his surprise, that a complaint so common, as he found inflammation of the stomach to be, should have been so little observed; and he points out as indications of this disease, appearances very similar to such as are mentioned in this paper, to be of usual occurrence. He admits the existence of similar appearances,

* The term vessels, employed by Mr. HUNTER, can only apply to veins, the arteries being always empty, except perhaps in a portion of their trunks. If blood is not contained in the veins of the stomach, even the trunks of those veins are discovered with very great difficulty. The arteries may generally be traced by their size, while they run between the peritoneal and muscular coats, which is the first part of their course in the stomach; but in the small branches, they are seldom, in their usual state, to be seen or felt.

"In corporibus dissectis, ventriculus valde rubicundus, variis modo rubris, modo nigris maculis distinctus, vasaque sanguinea et capillaria multo sanguine turgida reperiuntur; quandoque orificium sinistrum macula lata nigra notatum visitur."-"Non totus vero ventriculus semper, sed pars saltem, maximè vero fundus, inflammatur." HOFFMANNI Opera, tom. 6. p.

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in plague and various fevers; but in the former, he attributes their occurrence to a species of poisonous miasma, inhaled by the breath, which produces spasm, and by this means, inflammation of the stomach.

DE HAEN* and STOLL† give examples of what they regard to be inflammation of the stomach, terminating in gangrene, without having exhibited any of the usual symptoms of gastritis; and the former recommends this occurrence, as a very remarkable and puzzling one, to be added to his chapter of Problemata et Difficultates.

SELLE, in his Pyretologia‡, refers to DE HAEN, as affording a modification of the usual definitions of gastritis; and CULLEN seems also to have depended on the authority of the same author, when he states, "that it appears from dissections, that the stomach has often been affected with inflammation, when neither pain nor pyrexia had before given any notice of it."§

PORTAL, in speaking of the great vascularity of the stomach, says, that by means of the slightest turgescence of the vessels of the stomach, particularly the veins, the villous coat becomes dark; an effect so common, that this black colour ought to be regarded as a mark of inflammation, rather than poison.||

"Nec minus mirabilis ventriculi, et obstructi, et perquam inflammati, et gangrænosi, contemplatio, ubi ad mortem ferè usque, nec signa febris, aut gangrænæ in pulsu, nec signa doloris in hoc viscere, nec signa alicujus in ejusdem functione defectus, apparuerint." DE HAEN's Ratio Medendi, pars 6, cap. 12, § 2.

t-"ventriculus ingens" cujus posterior facies longè latèque ex inflammatione"-" rubebat”- -"En hic quoque ventriculum inflammatum, absque consuetis et manifestioribus inflammationis signis. Intestina livida, vel absque prægressa inflammatione fuerunt, vel prægressa est inflammatio absque ejusdem signis." STOLL'S Ratio Medendi, tom. 3. p. 380.

SELLE'S Rudimenta Pyretologiæ Methodicæ, p. 139.

S CULLEN'S First Lines of the Practice of Physic, vol. i. p. 420.

PORTAL'S Cours d'Anatomie Medicale, tom. 5. p. 164. He adds, "Dans quelques cadavres, on ne trouve ce viscere inflammé, que dans quelques points, comme vers le cardia, vers le pylore, souvent dans la grande courbure de

FRANK states frequency of inflammation of the stomach, and enumerates its symptoms: but he admits, that in many instances, where inflammation was found in the stomach after death, most of those symptoms were absent; in others, where the greater part of the symptoms were present, that no mark of inflammation was to be discovered on dissection; and in others, that a similar train of symptoms was removed, by. means which were adverse to inflammatory complaints.*—I am likewise inclined to think, that vascularity of, and extravasation into, the villous coat of the stomach, as well as external vascularity of the intestines, particularly when these appearances are dark-coloured, have been occasionally described as inflammation or gangrene, even by MORGAGNI and LIEUTAUD, two of the highest authorities in pathology.t

ce viscere, ou ailleurs; d'autrefois les parois de l'estomac sont inflammées dans toute leur etendue." Tom. 5. p. 194.

"Non infrequens stomachi humani morbus est gastritis, aut ejusdem inflammatio; cujus quidem signa principalia in febre acuta, in epigastrii tensione, ardore, dolore, in vomituritione, anxietate, singultu, ab assumptis quibusvis mox, et cum subitanea istorum rejectione, adauctis consistunt: sed in multis, qui ventriculi post mortem phlogosin obtulere, nunc plurima ex istis defuerunt; nunc, cum pars major symptomatum in ægrotante comparuisset, vel in cadavere inflammationis ad ventriculum in vanum quærebantur vestigia; vel ab aliis causis dictorum effectuum pependerat cohors, ac a medendi methodo, inflammationis certe contraria, potuit dissipari.”— FRANK (J. P.) De curandis hominum morbis epitome, lib. 2. p. 253.

"Ventriculi fundus atro colore;" "ventriculus intus inflammatus, minimisque vasculis multum sanguine turgentibus;" "ex atro (ilii partes) rubebant, sanguiferis vasis, non secus ac post injectam coloratam ceram, manifestissimis," are examples of the mode of description frequent in Morgagni's valuable work.-In one instance, (epist. 29. art 29.) the absence of pain in inflammation of the bowels, is attributed to a paralytic affection, which took off the sensibility of the parts; and from other cases MORGAGNI deduces the inference, that pain and fever are not necessary for the existence of inflammation of the intestines. His words are, (epist. 35. art. 21.) "Nec tamen, siquando alterum vel utrumque horum" (nempe vehementem dolorem, vel acutam febrem) "aut abesse, aut vix esse invenies, continuò putabis, aut nullam esse inflammationem, aut levem, aut gangrænam et sphacelum in eorum esse intestinis non posse, in quibus duo illa præcessisse non videris."