remission of the fevers, as persons having these symptoms are in
danger of dying; when, therefore, you perceive these symptoms,
announce this prognostic, if you shall judge proper, after making
the suitable observations. When, in fevers, any dangerous symptom
appears on the fifth day, when watery discharges suddenly take place
from the bowels, when deliquium animi occurs, or the patient is
attacked with loss of speech, convulsions, or hiccup, under such
circumstances he is likely to be affected with nausea, and sweats
break out under the nose and forehead, or on the back part of the neck
and head, and patients with such symptoms shortly die, from stoppage
of the respiration. When, in fevers, abscesses form about the legs,
and, getting into a chronic state, are not concocted while the fever
persists, and if one is seized with a sense of suffocation in the
throat, while the fauces are not swelled, and if it do not come to
maturation, but is repressed, in such a case there is apt to be a flow
of blood from the nose; if this, then, be copious, it indicates a
resolution of the disease, but if not, a prolongation of the
complaint; and the less the discharge, so much worse the symptoms, and
the more protracted the disease; but if the other symptoms are very
favorable, expect in such a case that pains will fall upon the feet;
if then they attack the feet, and if these continue long in a very
painful, and inflamed state, and if there be no resolution, the
pains will extend by degrees to the neck, to the clavicle, shoulder,
breast, or to some articulation, in which an inflammatory tumor will
necessarily form. When these are reduced, if the hands are contracted,
and become trembling, convulsion and delirium seize such a person; but
blisters break out on the eyebrow, erythema takes place, the one
eyelid being tumefied overtops the other, a hard inflammation sets in,
the eye become strongly swelled, and the delirium increases much,
but makes its attacks rather at night than by day. These symptoms more
frequently occur on odd than on even days, but, whether on the one
or the other, they are of a fatal character. Should you determine to
give purgative medicines in such cases, at the commencement, you
should do so before the fifth day, if there be borborygmi in the
bowels, or, if not, you should omit the medicines altogether. If there
be borborygmi, with bilious stools, purge moderately with scammony;
but with regard to the treatment otherwise, administer as few drinks
and draughts as until there be some amendment, and the disease is past
the fourteenth day. When loss of speech seizes a person, on the
fourteenth day of a fever, there is not usually a speedy resolution,
nor any removal of the disease, for this symptom indicates a
protracted disease; and when it appears on that day, it will be
still more prolonged. When, on the fourth day of a fever, the tongue
articulates confusedly, and when there are watery and bilious
discharges from the bowels, such a patient is apt to fall into a state
of delirium; the physician ought, therefore, to watch him, and
attend to whatever symptoms may turn up. In the season of summer and
autumn an epistaxis, suddenly occurring in acute diseases, indicates
vehemence of the attack, and inflammation in the course of the
veins, and on the day following, the discharge of thin urine; and if
the patient be in the prime of life, and if his body be strong from
exercise, and brawny, or of a melancholic temperament, or if from
drinking has trembling hands, it may be well to announce beforehand
either delirium or convulsion; and if these symptoms occur on even
days, so much the better; but on critical days, they are of a deadly
character. If, then, a copious discharge of blood procure an issue
to the fullness thereof about the nose, or what is collected about the
anus, there will be an abscess, or pains in the hypochondrium, or
testicles, or in the limbs; and when these are resolved, there will be
a discharge of thick sputa, and of smooth, thin urine. In fever
attended with singultus, give asafoetida, oxymel, and carrot,
triturated together, in a draught; or galbanum in honey, and cumin
in a linctus, or the juice of ptisan. Such a person cannot escape,
unless critical sweats and gentle sleep supervene, and thick and acrid