Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/325

 PUS

PUT

as have been before fubjecT: to hyfteric complaints. And the perfons moft fubjedl of all others to it, are thofe of both fexcs who live at eafe and within doors, and by this means always are fending off the humours to the furface of the body.

Caufes of it. Thefe are-, a bad quality in the air, contagion from perfons who have the difeafe, the driving back of fweats, and even the forcing them too violently by hot medicines; this too often happens to women in child-bed, and to perfons in petechial fevers. To thefe are to be added alfo, the curing the rheumatic and catarrhal diforders by a too cold regimen and method, and an omiffion of habitual bleedings, or by mppreffion of the menfes, or difcharges by the hemorrhoidal veins.

Vrovnoftuks in it. The going back of the eruptions in the white purpura is very often fatal, and in the mildeft circum- ftances is ufually attended with aphthae, alienations of the mind, anil terrible anxieties ; and, if by means of medicines, the eruptions appear again, and yet the fymptoms occafioned by their going in do not d'ifappear, there is great reafon to fufpecr. danger. The white purpura attending the petechial fever is very dangerous when the eruptions appear on the fourth day, but is lefs fo when they appear later. The white purpura, when not attended with a fever, is lefe dangerous than otherwifc ; but it is ufually attended with terrible anxie- ties of mind, and with fpaftic motions.

The red purpura, when the eruptions are ffruck back, is not attended with fuch fudden danger as the white j but people ufually have fome con vu! five motions attending it, and a great languor and debility of motion, and fometimes with inflam- mations of the fauces, and with dangerous quinfeys; fome- times with a dry cough, fometimes with a heat of urine, or with arthritic complaints, or a fpurioHS pleurify, or a hemi- crania j but all thefe fymptoms go off as foon as the eruptions appear again. Met hid of cure. This is to be the fame both in the red and the white purpura, and is not different from that in other in- flammatory fevers, namely, a gentle but continual perfpiratiott mufr. be kept up, and this alone will often cure the difeafe. On the days before the eruption of the fpots, powders are to be given of nitre, diaphoretic antimony, and the abforbents, as crabs-eyes, and the like ; and when the eruptions are out, which ufually happens on the fourth day, the fame powders muff be given interchangeably, with gentle fudorific draughts, from all which, fumitory water, however, is to be carefully excluded. This method is to be continued, only giving the dofes lefs frequently in the decline of the difeafe ; and when it is wholly gone off, gentle purges, with fome mercurial ad- mixture, are to be given, thoroughly to cleanfe the prima? via? ; and the patient is by degrees to be hardened to the air. It is to be obferved, that all irritations of the bowels are as bad in thefe cafes as in the fmall-pox or meafles, and that even the ufe of the moil: gentle clyfters is fcarce to be allowed. Great care is to be taken that no cold air be admitted to the patient during the time the eruptions are out, and he fhould not be removed, nor have the bed made in all that time. People who are often fubjecT: to returns of the red or white purpura, would be right to ufe cupping with fcarification frequently, by way of prevention ; and when the caufe of the difeafe is the fuppreffion of fome habitual evacuation, great care is to be taken to fupply the place of that by bleedings, if it cannot be recalled in the accuftomed way. This is to be done at differ- ent times, to prevent relapfes ; and in general, a method of ufing gentle exercife, fo as to promote a moderate fweat, greatly preferable to the method ufed by fome of cloathing too warm, which rather promotes the difeafe by inviting the hu- mors to the furface. Junker's Confp. Med. p. 329.

PURPURINA, a name ufed by Caneparius, and fome other au- thors, for the auruth mofahum, or aurum mufiuum of the {hops, the prcfent preparation of which differs from that of that author only in the proportions of the ingredients. Pcmherton\ Lond. Difp. p. 221. See Aurum mufivum.

PURPURISSUS, in the antient writers, both Greek and Ro- man, the name of a compound colour or fucus of a fine purplifh red, ufed to paint womens cheeks. It feems by the compofition to have been fomewhat like our rofe-pink, as it is called by the colourmen. It was made of the creta argent aria, or fine white kind of chalk, diffolved in a irrong purple tincture of fome of the roots or woods which dyed red ; and when the coarfer part was fubfided to the bot- tom of the veffel, the liquor, while yet thick, was poured off into another veffel ; and what fubfided from this, which was as fine as flour, was of a beautiful pale purple, and was the purwrijjus faved for ufe.

PURSE (Cycl )— Purse, in the Turkifh dominions, is a term appropriated to a certain fum of money. When the Turks fpeak of large funis, they always count by purfes. In this, however, there is fome difference ; for the purfe in Egypt is twenty-five thoufand medines, and in other parts of Turky it is only twenty thoufand. /Vo^'s Egypt, p. 175.

PUR^LAIN, in botany. SeePoRTULACA.

PUS (Cy.l )~ A very fmall portion of pus abforbed into the blood- veiiels, raifes a putrid fever as certainly as yeft does a fermen- tation in wort, This fever is not owing to its ftimtdating, the folids to quicker and greater vibrations, but to its ujcreafino

the interline motion and accelerating the animal procefs, nifted* ing the change of the juices to that fubtle acrid ftate which renders them unfit to be retained in the bodv, and difpofeS them to run off in colliquative evacuations, fuch as fweating and purging, which conftantly attend thefe putrid or he r *ic fevers, or rifing to internal ulcers. Med. Eff. Edirib. Vol V. art. 77. See PutS.efaCt.tdn.

When pus is laudable and mild, it is one of the moft powerful digefters, fuppurants, arid incarntrrs's when it Magnates too long, or when the liquors and veffels are faulty; it may be- come an acrid, Simulating, eroding fanj.es j when" abforbed into the blood, it affetts alt the liquors, ftimulates the veffels, and is capable of producing violent diforders. PUSHERS, a name given to Canary birds when new flown;,

See Branch er, Canary, and Passeres Cana>l n fes. PUSILLATUM, a word ufed by fome medical writers to ex- prefs a coarfc powder, or any medicinal fubflance, beat into fmall pieces for infufion, or the like purpofes. PUSU, in botany, the name of a famous plant growing in Chi- na, and greatly efteemed there. This and the ginfeng thefe people a long time kept to themfelves; but at length it was ' discovered, that the one was efteemed a certain prolonger of life, and the other a prefervative againftal! difeafes. They, in their manner of fpeaking, fay, that the p&fu gives immortality : we have not been fo happy to obtain any of '.his famous plant for the trial, but trie gmfeng having been brought over, and found not to poffefs thofe great virtue; they afenbe to it, and the people in China, who are poffeffed of .the ptfu, dying, as well as thofe who have it not, we find, that the virtues of both are fo greatly exaggerated by the Eaitcni dialedt, that there is not much to be expected from them. Red't's Exper. PUT, in the manege, called in French mettte, is Ufed for the breaking or managing of a horfe : thus,

To put a horfe to corvets, or caprioles, is to teach him thofe patts of the manege.

To put a horfe upun his haunches, called in French affeoir, is to make him bend them handfomely in galloping in the ma- nege, or upon a flop See Haunches. To put a horfe to the walk, trot, or gallop, is to make him walk, trot, or gallop.

To put a horfe upon the button. See Button. PU 1 EAL, among the Romans, a fmall kind of edifice, raifed in the place where a thunder-bolt had fallen. Mem. Acad. Infcript. Vol. HI. p. 85, feq. See Bidental. PUTICULI, among the Romans, ditches or holes in the earth, a little without the Efquiline gate, in which the poorer fort of people were buried. Pitifc. in voc. PUTC RIUS, in zoology, 'the name by which authors call the polecat; a creature of the weafel kind, but larger than the common weafel, and of a blackiih colour, and remarkable for its {linking fmell,

1 he whole circumference of the face is white, at the extre- mity of the angles of the mouth then- begins a broad line of a yellowifh hue, which furrounds the head, and is white i fe- veral parts. Its long hairs are black, its fhort pnes yellowtfj ; and the throat, the feet, and the tail, arc blacker than, any other part of the body. The upper jaws ; ; rid out a little be- ( yond the lower. The ears are broad and fhort, and are fringed, as it were, with white. Its ftink is occafioned by an extremely fetid matter, fecreted by two glands-, which u has in common with all the creatures of this ki [j within the anus.

It feeds on flefh, frequently Healing hens and other poultry^ and fometimes contenting itfelf with their eggs, /•' ./s Syn. Quad. p. 199.

utorius fe'-pens, in zoology, a name given by fome to that fpecies of ferpent called by others dryinus. SeeDRYi- u :. PUTREFACTION (Cycl.)— In putrefaction there is a great in- terline motion ; when carried to a height, and when the putre- fying fubflance is much compreffed, it is accompanied with heat and fmoke, and fometimes flame. Air is rieceflary to it; and the vifible texture of the putriflng mafs is changed. Putrefaction is the moft fubtle of all diffolvents. It effectually disjoins and feparates all the component parts of putr'fying bodies, except fea-falt. In this powerful folution, the interline action of the minute particles of bodies creates, collects, or is By fome way or other the caufe and means of heat. The fluids of the human body are much difpofed to putrefac- tion, and out of the body become highly putrid, even in cool air, and without any ftirring or agitation j and our blood and fome of our juices, out of the circulation, but within the body, change to putrid matter.

The changes wrought in bodies by putrefaction, are no where more remarkable than in the putrefaction of vegetable fub- ftances, which by means of this change are brought nearly into the condition and nature of animal mhftances. To prove this by an ealy experiment, take a large quantity of cabbage-leaves, and prefs them hard down with weights in an open tub, with holes bored in its fide ; fet them in a warm place, and the leaves will foon conceive a heat in the middle, and at length the whole, or nearly the whole, will be con-

I verted into a foft pappy fubflance. This fubflance diflillcd in a glafs retort, yields the fame kind of volatile fait and oil as 2 ani*