Page:A treatise on Asiatic cholera.djvu/18

 2

HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF CHOLERA.

pression of urine, and profuse perspiration. The skin is inelastic, and that of the liands and feet shrivelled and dusky ; the eyes are sunk, and the features pinched ; cramps are felt in the Hmbs ; there is diffi- culty of breathing, intense thirst, excessive restless- ness, rapid and ^mall pulse, and suppressed voice. The external temperature of the body sinks below 98° F., and a pecuHar sweetish sickly odour (fishy) is exhaled from the body, breath, and dejections.

If left to nature, about one half of those attacked with cholera recover of themselves, reaction super- vening, and often being accompanied with fever, and not unfrequently with suppression of urine and various other complications : or the disease may terminate, within a few hours from its commencement, in fatal collapse.

Section II. — Historical Account of Cholera.

Earliest records of cholera. — The early Sanskrit writers rank among the most ancient authorities on the science of medicine. Of these Chararka is beheved by the Hindus to have derived his knowledge from a mythological personage known as Dhawantari, coin- ciding in character with Esculapius. Chararka's works are inc?omplete ; but in the Nidan of his dis- ciple 'Susruta, we meet with the following description of a form of " Vishuka." The patient is attacked with "vomiting, purging, faintness, thirst, pam m the abdomen, yawning, forgetfulness, burning heat in the stomach, duskiness of the surface of the body, pain in the head and heart." The worst symptoms are " blueness of the gums, lips, and nails, diminution