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lesser blood-vessels of the part which produces an ecchymosis, or extravasation of blood into the cellular membrane.

• Even in this simplest kind of wound, there are circumstances which a careless observer may neglect. To the full effect of a blow it is necessary that the resistance should be equal to the velocity of the impelled instrument; but where the parts yield, the shock is diminished, and the injury less considerable. Now, the integuments being soft and elastic, while the bone is firm and resisting, the injury sometimes falls upon the surface of the bones; or at least the soft parts immediately attached to the bone, are more injured than the elastic and yielding parts which lie more upon the surface. The consequence of this is that sometimes concealed suppuration arises from bruises of fleshy parts, in which there appears little outward mark of injury.

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I have said, that in a contusion the nerves are injured. This also requires some further illustration. This injury of the nerves gives a degree of dullness to the sensation, which immediately succeeds the accident; but afterwards it is the chief cause of the inflammation and pain. Further, the most inexperienced man has seen the effect of what is termed a concussion of the brain, and knows that this injury of the substance of the brain is followed by an interruption of its function. Precisely in the same way does it happen, though in a less degree, in the concussion of the nervous system of a limb. Thus, large stones thrown with great force, spent cannon balls, the beam of machinery in full motion, striking a limb are sometimes attended with little pain, swelling, or discolouration and even gangrene precedes high action. It is the same effect which we every day see when a man lies with a bad concussion of the brain and bruise of the scalp. The low state of the system, proceeding from the injury of the brain, prevents the inflammation or swelling from rising sufficiently to shew us the place of the injury.

If our patient has suffered contusion by falling, the first effect is a shock to the whole body; and there is sickness, languor, faintness, and debility: then succeeds pain, stiffness, and fever. The part injured swells slowly, and from the ecchymosis there is marbled, black and purple colour. Towards the fourth and fifth day, there is softness in the centre, and around it there arises a hardened ring of inflammation. This softness in the centre might be mistaken for suppuration, and a collection of pus: but it is not: and if it be punctured, the wound will not heal kindly.

The patient in this stage should be strictly attended to; for either there is an absorption of the extravasated fluid, and gradual diminution of the inflammation, or there is suppuration. If the injury is not very severe; if no parts are deadened by the bruise, and the extravasation is not too great then the vessels throw out a serous effusion, which, diluting the extravasated blood, both are re-absorbed. This liquid state of the effusion resembles the effect of suppuration.

If the excitement of the vessels be continued after this exudation of serum, the secretion from them changes to purulent matter, and the centre of the cellular membrane, with the skin above it, is absorbed. This stage is marked by the swelling, heat, redness, throbbing, fever, and pointing or rising of the centre of the abscess.

'Sometimes the shreds of cellular membrane are deadened by the bruise, or the high inflammatory action terminates in the death of some part of

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it. Then a slough is seen in the centre of the abscess when it bursts. This slough is not to be taken away, unless it confines the matter or is likely to become putrid; the living parts will be excited by the contact of the dead. The living part will consolidate, ulcerate, and forming granulations, push off the slough.

When the skin is bruised, and the blood extravasated under it, the parts will sometimes mortify: but this mortification is of a less dangerous kind than that kind of gangrene which I shall presently explain.' pp. 1-6.

Correctness of definition is, in every work of science, of so much importance, that we cannot avoid noticing the defective definition of a wound, which, according to Mr. Bell," is an injury inflicted on the body by external violence;" is every injury inflicted on the body by external violence, a "wound?" The remaining observations in this part of the work, on carbuncle, abscess, sinus, and fistula, gunshot wounds, and the stopping of hemorrhages, are adapted to render valuable assistance to the student. We were however sorry to find the important subject of carbuncle, passed over in such a slight and unsatisfactory manner; nothing but the description of the disease is given, though so much useful information might have been furnished on the management of the system, and the treatment of the part. The short notices regarding the stopping of hæmorrhages contain many very useful directions, which should be strongly impressed on the mind of every practitioner. Of the great benefit with which the simple bandages described by Mr. Bell may be employed, with the graduated compress, there can be no question; but we are rather surprised that he has not noticed the utility of the forceps, while mentioning the modes of securing a wounded artery.

In the directions for performing the operation of bleeding, and that for aneurism in the ham or arm, there is no particular occasion for comment. Mr. Bell appears to have appreciated very fairly the two modes recommended by Mr. Home and Mr. Whately in strictures of the urethra; and has endeavoured to assign the proper cases to each mode of practice. In the observations on hernia, the young surgeon will find some very valuable observations. Connected with these, there are some strictures on Mr. Astley Cooper's doctrine and prac-... tice relative to the same disease, with which we are by no means satisfied. Whether through a defect of precision, or through some misapprehension, that gentleman's opinions are neither correctly stated, we think, nor fairly combated. We have no room to enter into the controversy, which will bably find an equitable tribunal in some publication appropriated to medical disquisitions. Ample and particular directions are given for the general treatment of hernia, and for per VOL. IV.

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forming the operation which they sometimes require. this succeed directions for the performance of various important operations, including the several kinds of lithotomy, amputation of limbs, and the application of the trepan, which will reward the attention of the student with the most beneficial information.

The instructions are generally accompanied by copious and judicious illustrations in the text and in the numerous excellent plates; and they are confirmed by rational deductions from the anatomy of the parts.

Art VIII. A Letter to John Scott Waring, Esq.; in Refutation of his "Observations on the present State of the East India Company, with prefatory Remarks on the (pretended) alarming Intelligence lately received from Madras, of the (assumed) general Dissatisfaction among the Natives, &c." With Strictures on his illiberal and unjust Conduct towards the Missionaries in India. 8vo. pp. 82. Price 2s. Hatchard. 1808.

Art. IX. An Apology for the late Christian Missions to India: comprising an Address to the Chairman of the Eaat India Company, in Answer to Mr. Twining; and Strictures on the Preface of a Pamphlet by Major Scott Waring; with an Appendix, containing Authorities, principally taken from the Reports of the Society for promoting Christian Knowledge. By Andrew Fuller, Secretary to the Baptist Missionary Society. 8vo. pp. 119. Price 2s. 6d. Burditt, Button, Williams and Smith. 1808.

Art. X. A Letter to the Rev. John Owen, A. M. in Reply to the Brief Strictures on the "Preface to Observations on the present State of the East India Company." To which is added a Postscript, containing Remarks on a Note printed in the Christian Observer, for December, 1807. By Major Scott Waring. 8vo. pp. 118. Price 2s. 6d. Ridgway. 1808.

As far as we know, these three pamphlets were published

in the order in which we have placed them, and in which we shall make a very few remarks on each, combined with some of the most appropriate quotations.

The anonymous author of the first informs us, that he has spent more than twenty years in various situations in India, with an extensive scope of observation. His knowledge of the subjects connected with the curious question at present before the public, does not appear to be the result of a systematic study of any of them, nor to have been acquired with a view to a literary or religious application. As a man of sense and seriousness, however, he could not be in India, without giving some attention to the character and institutions of the inhabitants, nor in England without acquainting himself with the Christian religion; nor could he, as a resi

dent of the east, have been contemporary with so large a portion of the events affecting the connexion between the two countries, without having many important facts of the history distinctly in his memory. Thus far prepared for the controversy, he meets with the Major's pamphlet, and, perhaps in rather too much haste, composes a refutation, which, as coming from an advocate more versed in general topics connected with the subject, than qualified for a special pleading, might be expected to involve, with its useful statements, some inaccuracies relative to various particular points of the question. The author seems not to have been informed of there being more than three missionaries in Bengal, or of a missionary having been actually sent to Buenos Ayres, or that the title of British and Foreign Bible Society means but one society. His opinion of the facility of inducing great numbers of Hindoos to embrace the Christian faith, and of the general candour, attention, and encouragement, with which zealous missionaries will be received among them, would seem to indicate his not having had opportunity or time to read the Periodical Accounts of the Baptist Mission, in which it is not dissembled that the conversion of those pagans is a work of immense difficulty, and that the Christian agents must expect to meet with just as much inattention, perverseness, or malice, as among other heathens. Indeed we are compelled, by very many concurrent testimonies, to adopt a much less favourable idea of the Hindoo character, than that entertained by our author. Near the beginning of the pamphlet, a series of observations on the Madras Proclamation, is so negligently and indistinctly expressed, that we are not sure we comprehend their object. In another part, the pretence of the worthy junto who have brought this question before the public, that the Hindoos must all hear of the printing of so many bibles in their language, and must necessarily be alarmed at hearing of it, is answered by the fanciful and far-fetched suggestion, that they might conceive that these bibles were chiefly intended for the assistance of the Europeans in learning the language of the country. In accounting for the mutiny at Vellore, we think he makes too light of the effect which, even had there been no predisposing causes, would have been the natural consequence of the violent provocation offered to the native troops in the military orders; at the same time he presents in a very strong light those general causes, which were imperfectly unfolded by Major S. W. himself.

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You, Sir, resided in India, if I am not misinformed, upwards of twenty years; and so have I; and during that period we have had suf

ficient opportunities to study the character and disposition of the natives. We have contemplated the great and astonishing changes and revolutions that have been effected there within the last twenty years. In this general convulsion, in which the events that I am about to enumerate, followed each other with so much rapidity as to defy the distinction of dates, the Rajah of Tanjore was deposed, and his successor delivered up his country to the Company; the kingdom of Mysore was conquered, and became subject to the rule of the Company; the Carnatic was revolutionized, and its government is now administered by the Company; the Mahrattas submitted to our arms, and a large, portion of their territories now yield obedience to the government of the Company; the Rajah of Travancore, the Nizam, and many other princes of different note and power, ceded certain districts of their respective dominions, for defraying the expences of subsidiary troops that reside among them, belonging to the army of the Company.

In these vicissitudes, the subjects of the states affected by them_participated; and their miseries were equalled only by their sorrows. They viewed the thrones of their sovereigns totally divested of their ancient splendour, and the power that supported them humbled to the dust; and they looked upon themselves deprived of their natural protectors, and ruined in their fortunes, as the slaves of Europeans, and subjected to all the violence of their passions. Hope no longer afforded them consolation, and they ruminated on the gloomy prospects offered them by despair. Let Britons, whose bosoms glow with loyalty toward their king, and those who have lived long enough in India to know the character and feelings of the natives, say whether I have exceeded probability in what I have premised. And did not the idea at any time present itself to your reflections, that such calamities, and such impressions, were of themselves sufficient to excite alarms and jealousies of the "most serious nature," throughout Hindostan? And did it never reach your information, that amongst other outrages, not possible to be prevented in Asiatic warfare, "the laws, religion, and customs" of the natives were often violated, and their temples plundered and polluted. And did your imagination, which is "tremblingly alive" to other considerations, sink into a profound apathy while regarding those deplorable occurrences? or did it gently hint that they were calculated to rouse the indignation of the natives, and excite them to plots and stratagems for our destruction? that the Vellore mutiny was a component part of one of those plots, and that it had prematurely discovered itself? 'I will take up the subject where you left it. By these revolutions and changes in the different native governments, the nobles, and others who held high offices under them, and men of rank and fortune in private life, were deprived of all their honours, and reduced to penury and want. The generals and commanders of armies were dismissed, and the armies themselves disbanded. As to the lower orders of the people, their wretchedness, produced by the disorders and tumults that surrounded them, and the plunder and rapine that raged among them, need not be described.

The great body of the soldiery, and vast numbers of every other description, who could no longer exist in their own country, sought amongst foreigners the means of subsistence; and they carried with them the deepest hatred against the Company, whom they considered as the

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