Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/233

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fo the arm, to compleat the cure : take of flour of barley and of bitter vetch, of each two ounces; chamomile flowers and melilot flowers, of each two handfuls ; frefh butter, an ounce and half: boil thefe into a cataplafm with foap fuds, and apply them to the arm till the pain and other bad fymptoms are removed. Heijiers Surg. p. 286.

Phlebotomy in the eyes. I here are feveral ways of perform- ing this operation, but the heft feems to be this. The patient being feated on a chair, and his bead held in a proper pofhire, a franfverfe incifion is to be made, with a fine lancet, upon the turgid finall veins in the corners of the eye, To as to open them or cut them quite afunder. T'he eye-lids rriuft be held apart with one hand, whilft the veins are opened with the other; and fome ulea pair of fine fcilTars for this purpofe, in- ftead of a lancet, and others elevate the veins with a crooked needle before they divide them : but in this operation the bet- ter wdy would be to make the needles with edges, that when the veins were thus elevated, they might divide them without the help of any other inftrument. When the incifion is made, the difchar ,e of blood mttft be p.-omoted by means of fomen- tation, with a fpunge dipped in warm water; and if the dif- charge is not fufficient, the incifion may be repeated two or three times : but few patients can be brought to fuffer this, and there is no pra&ifmg it at all upon infants, becaufe they will not keep the eye fteady. Hei/ier's Surg. p. 577.

PHLEGMASIA, a word ufed by fome of the medical writers for an inflammation. Hippocrates alfo fometimes ufes it to exprefs the violent heat in fevers.

PHLEGMON CCycl.)—l( the proximate caufe of thefe tumors be enquired into, we {hall find it generally rifes from too thick or vifcid a ftate of the blood, fbgnating in the anaftomofes of the fmalleft veins and arteries; fo that the blood being pro- pelled in larger quantities than can pais thro' thole veflels, it muft of confequence excite the fymptoms that are the atten- dants of this tumor, and occafion great diforder at every part where fuch ftagnation is made.

No part of the body, whether external or internal, is perfectly exempt from this fort of tumor, not even the bones them- felves ; but it is more common in the fat and glands than elfe- where.

The caufes of this ftagnation of the blood are either external or internal.

Among the external, are all wounds, fractures, luxations, con- tufions, puu£tures, by thorns and fplinters, with a too great compremon of the vefTels, whether by too Ariel: a bandage, or by other means ; each of which obifrucling the paflage of the blood thro' its minute veflels, either by dividing, bruifing, compreffing or diftorting them, may give rife to this tumor. And to this may be added, burns of all kinds, with too vio- lent cold, the too great motion of the body, the external ap- plication of fharp and fllmulating fubflances to the fkiu, and others, which flop the pores of the fkin, and impede the cir- culation of the blood.

Among the internal caufes, are to he reckoned the too 'oreat acrimony of the blood, as in fcorbutic habits, the blood's abounding in too great quantities, or being of too thick a cunhftence, or, laftly, its circulating in the body with too vio- lent a motion ; fur by this lad means, the grofTer particles of the blood are protruded, and wedged in, as it were, in the fmaller veflels, thro' which they cannot find a pafl"a«e; and this is efpecially the cafe, when a fudden cold is o-iven to the body from a ftate of extreme heat. In fhort, every thing will produce an obftruelion that makes either the particles of the blood too large, or the mouths of the veflels too final] and narrow to receive them.

The refolution or difperfion of a tumor of this kind is only practicable when the tumor is of a milder kind ; when it is in a found habit of body, and when the blood is not yet too vi- fcid, or too violent in its motion : but fuppuration follows when the inflammation is more violent, the circulation more rapid ; but yet the mafs of blood fomewhat temperate and free from acrimony. That is, when the blood becoming more infpifTated, and it; larger particles flicking in the more minute veflels, can find no paffage; but the finall vefTels are burft by the prefTure and impulfe of the obftrucled blood, fo that their contents are extravafated in the fat, flefh, and adjacent parts. Upon this extra vafati on, the more fubtle and fluid parts of the blood putrefy, by means of the great heat, and become fcetid and acrimonious, and corrode the adjacent parts : the fluids thus changed or corrupted, are, by the furgeons, called matter, or pus ; and this is of feveral kinds, according to its confifhmce and colours : it is either white, yellow, greenifh, reddifh, or party-coloured. v

When the fore mentioned fymptoms are much more violent, and the blood at the fame time more acrimonious than it ought to he, this inflammation generally terminates in a gan- grene : for in that cafe, the fmalleft arteries and veins are corrupted, burft, and broke; and hence the adjacent parts are dillolved and corrupted by thefe extravafated acrimonious hu- mors, and particuhirh the fkin is very fubjeel to be filled with puftules, when its cuticle has been feparated, as in burns. The fanies contained in thefe puftules and elfewhere, is ufually termed ichor, and is generally of a pale reddifh caft, and fometimes brown cr livid, which is much worfc ; for unlefs

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the patient In this cafe Is timely affifted, the fvmptoms of in 1 - flammation ail go oft; tie tumor, refifiance, heat, redneft; pam and puliation, gradually difappear, and the limb becomes flaccid and cold ; ,t afterwards turns pale, and becomes dead and inlenlible, and the inflammation creeps to fome other part.

If this cafe be treated with medicines too hot, too aftrino-entj cooling, fat, acrimonious, or narcotic ; or if the parts be bound too tight, the flefh quite dies, its palenefs turns to a li- vid lead colour ; and the inclofed fanies Sliding ho vent, be- comes more acrimonious, and fo greatly corrodes the adjacent parts, as to deftroy all fenfe and motion, and brings on an en- tire fpharelation of the whole limb. But if the inflamed part be full of glands, and the blood very thick, glutinous, and tough, the final! veflels are then ftrongly fluffed up with it, and impacted together; and the parts lofing their fenfatiorij become changed into a hard tumor, called a fcirrhus. The cure of fbkgimmi is by difperfion or fuppuration : the methods for bringing on ihefe, fee under the heads Dispersion and Suppuration'. Heiflir's Surg. p. 178.

PHLEOS, in botany. See the article Pheos.

PHLEUM, in the Linnaean fyftem of botany, a grafs called ft- pbiilea, or cat's-t.iil grafs by Scheuhzer, which makes, with this author, a diflinct genus of plants, the charaflers of which are : that the cup is a glume, containing one Sower; it is bi- valve, oblong, ridged, and compreffed, and opens into a double-pointed fummit; the valves are erea, hollowed, com- preffed, equal in fize, and bearded ; the flower is 1 ompofed of two valves, (hotter than that of thofe of the cup, the outer one, which is the larger, furrounding the inner or fmaller one ; the ftamina are three capillary filaments, longer than the cup ; the anthene are oblong, and divided into two at the ends ; the germen of the piftil is roundifh ; the ftyles are two iri number, finall, and bent; and the ftigmata are plumofe; the cup and flower inclofe the feed, which is fingle, and of a roundifh form. Linnai Gen. Plant, p. 14.

PHLOGIDAUGIA, in natural hiflory, the name of a clafs of inflammable foffils, of a pure texture, and in fome decree tranfparent. D

Of this clafs are the fulphurs, orpiments, zornics, and amber. They are by this name diftinguifhej from the phlogifcitrtaj or inflammable foffils, of a coarfe texture, and opake ; inch as the ambergreafe,jet. and afphaka, and the ampelites and common coal. ^ Hill's Hift. of Foff p. 399.

PHLOGINOS, the name of a ftone found in iEgypt, and called by fome cbnfttis, from its colour, refembling gold. Pliny defcribes it as refembling the Attic oifter, as the paffage is ufually printed ; and hence Agricola and fome others have fuppofed he only meant the cjlracitcs, or foflile oifter- fhell, by this name, tho' the other name, cbnftti;, could not well be applied to that body. Sahnafius has' very well explained the paffage, by obferving, that as the antients have no where mentioned the Attic oifter, the words probably were originally Attic ochre ; the fenfe is then plain, and the ftone is only faid to be of a fine yellow, like gold ; or the Attic, that is the brighteft yellow o.hrc. It probably was an agate of the cera- chatcs kind.

PHLOGiSCIERIA, in natural hiftorv, the name of a clafs of foffils, the charaflers of which are, that the bodies contained in it are inflammable, of a coarfe and impure texture, and not pellucid.

The word is derived from the Greek y>Jr,n°s. inflammable, and raiifs,- opake. The bodies of this clafs are divided into two general orders, and under thofe, into five genera. Thofe of the firft order, are fuch as are found Ioofe, and in detached mafles : thofe of the fecond, fuch as are found conftitilting whole ftrata. The genera of the firft order are, ambergreafe^ jet, and the afphalta ; and thofe of the fecond, cannel and com- mon coal. iS/ftsHift.'Fofl". p. 411. See Ambergrease, Gagates,Asphalta, Ampelites, and Lith anthrax.

FHLOGITES, in natural hiftory, a name given by Pliny and other authors to a ftone, which, they fay, had the appearance of flames of fire, bubbling up and rifing to feveral points within it. It is fometimes called alfo pb.'eginites. Some have fuppofed that the antients meant no more by this diftinflion, than to exprefs a fire colour lodged in the ftone, and have meant it as a name for the opal ; but as the Ger- mans have at this time an odd ftone among them, which they commonly call petrified flames of fire, it is pofuble the antients might have had the fame ftone, and called it by this name. The abfurdity of petrified fire is too grofs to need refutation, but the whole that is meant by the name, feems to be, that the ftone had fome ftrait and erect rays, of fire colour. Pliny ranks the pbhg : tcs among the gems, but Sabinus and others place it among the larger ftones : and we have from fome parts of Germany, a fpar, with radiations of a fiery red in a white ground, which looks as like flames as any thing one could expect in a ftone ; but whether this, or fome other, be the ftone called petrified flames of fire by the colleflors of that nation, we are not affined ; the name only having as yet come to us. without the fuhftance itfelf.

PHLOGONM, in natural hiftory, the name of a clafs of fof- fils, ufually included by authors with many others of a very different kind, tinder the general name fyritx. Thefe are de- fined