Page:Treatise on poisons in relation to medical jurisprudence, physiology, and the practice of physic (IA treatiseonpoison00chriuoft).pdf/369

 noticed during life, the skin was very yellow after death.—In some instances it would appear that narcotic symptoms form the commencement and irritant symptoms the termination of the poisoning. This unusual relation occurs in a case of recovery related by M. Julia-Fontenelle, and also, though less remarkably, in a fatal case mentioned by Wibmer. The subject of the former was a man who intentionally took a solution of copper in vinegar, prepared by keeping several sous-pieces seven days in that fluid. In three hours he was found in a state of insensibility, with the jaws locked, the muscles rigid and frequently convulsed, the breathing interrupted, and the pulse small and slow. In half an hour he was so far roused that he could tell what he had done; and soon after taking white of eggs the convulsions ceased: but next day the belly was hard and tender, and the repeated application of leeches was required to subdue the abdominal irritation that ensued. In the fatal case by Wibmer, that of a girl of 18, who was poisoned by a dish of beans having been cooked in a copper vessel, sickness, pain of the belly and vomiting speedily arose, but were soon followed by convulsions and loss of consciousness. Next day there was little pain, but extraordinary paralytic weakness of the arms and legs: the abdomen afterwards became distended and painful; and death took place in seventy-eight hours. —A case where convulsions were produced by two drachms of blue vitriol is mentioned by Dr. Percival. —In other instances it would appear that no nervous affection occurs at all, as in the case of a young lady related by Percival, who, when poisoned with pickled samphire containing copper, suffered chiefly from pains in the stomach, an eruption over the breast, general shooting pains, thirst, a frequent small pulse, vomiting, hiccup, and purging. Death occurred on the ninth day, without stupor or convulsions.

Besides these effects when introduced in considerable doses and in the form of soluble salts, copper is said to produce other disorders when applied to the body for a long time in minute quantities and in its metallic or oxidized state. Among those artisans who work much with copper various affections are thought to be gradually engendered by merely handling the metal. Patissier in his treatise on the diseases of artisans says, that copper-workers have a peculiar appearance which distinguishes them from other tradesmen,—that they have a greenish complexion,—that the same colour tinges their eyes, tongue, and hair, their excretions, and even their clothes through the medium of the perspiration,—that they are spare, short in stature, bent, their offspring ricketty, and they themselves old and even decrepit at their fourtieth or fiftieth year. Mérat also asserts that they are liable to the painters' colic, that peculiar