Part 45 (1/2)

February 17th.--5:00 A.M. Took 2-1/2 drachms.

5:02. Eructations taste of drug. Goneness in epigastrium. Pulse, 72.

Some rumbling about navel.

5:10. Head heavy; pressure at right frontal eminence, which increases to sharp, penetrating pain, going to root of nose, then to end of nose, where it is most severe. At root of nose, stuffed feeling, as with dry coryza. Pain in nose gets more and more severe; restlessness succeeds; never had such a pain; seems now all in bones of nose and worse on left side. Forehead has ceased to ache. Pain seems to start from supra-orbital foramen now.

5:15. Upper incisors commence to ache. Aching and bursting pain in nose remains; nose feels swollen. Teeth ”on edge.” Epigastric goneness.

5:25. Sharp pain in left upper and lower molars. Pain in nose has ceased. Bursting pain in left frontal eminence. Upper molars tender at sockets.

February 23d.--12:30. Took 6 No. 40 pills saturated with 6x dil. 2:00 P.M. Same dose. 4:20. Same. 5:00. Sharp, aching pain deep in left ear, gradually grows worse.

5:10. Singing and dull aching in right ear.

5:15. Singing and a pus.h.i.+ng out in left ear. Fulness of frontal eminences; thence pains go to root of nose and nose becomes tender to touch. Sharp pain again deep in right ear. Aching of ”bridge” of nose and of upper left molars. Hands feel numb, especially dorsal aspects.

Rumbling in bowels about navel. Pain again at root of nose. Colic deep in pelvis; pains run down back of thigh to knees.

5:15. Pains again in frontal eminences.

5:25. Aching over eyes; feel like closing them; aching pains run up from above left eye-tooth to eye and over face; occurs by starts and stops.

Frontal headache and pains down nose recur at intervals.

5:30. Aching, very severe, at the left side of ”bridge” of nose. Sharp st.i.tch deep in left ear. Throbbing in vertex. Sockets of upper teeth tender. Aching at end of nose, which feels full of blood.

5:45. 6 pellets. All pains continue as above. Brain seems loose, < moving=”” head.=”” front=”” of=”” head=”” feels=””>

6:00. P.M. Stabbing deep in left ear, < by=”” pressing=”” teeth=””>

6:30. Various pains gradually subside.

Pa.s.sIFLORA INCARNATA.

NAT. ORD., Pa.s.sifloraceae.

COMMON NAME, Pa.s.sion flower.

PREPARATION.--The fresh leaves and flowers gathered in May are macerated in two parts by weight of alcohol. A preparation may also be made from the expressed juice of the fresh leaves.

(There has been so much written concerning this unproved remedy that we can only give an abstract of a part of it.

Dr. Lindsay, formerly of Bayou Gras, La., was the first to call attention to it a few weeks before his death. He wrote in answer to an inquiry as follows--Hale's New Remedies):

I have much to say. I am satisfied it is no narcotic. It never stupefies or overpowers the senses. A patient under its full influence may be wakened up, and he will talk to you as rationally as ever he did; leave him a moment and he will soon be off to the Elysian Fields again. I have tried it, my friend, in all sorts of neuralgic affections, and have usually astonished my more enlightened patients with it. Many times I have had them to ask me what in the world it was that had such a sweet influence over them.

(Dr. L. Phares, of Newtonia, Miss., states):

I never saw anything act so promptly in erysipelas. I have used it with advantage in ulcers, neuralgias and teta.n.u.s. I have seen wonderful effects of it in relieving teta.n.u.s, and will mention one case from memory: Some ten years ago I was called to see an old lady, in a distant part of the country, who was reported to be ”having fits.” I found her to be able to be up most of the time, but, while examining her, convulsions came on, affecting mainly the trunkal muscles, and drawing the head back. I gave her instantly a dose of _Pa.s.siflora_. The convulsions subsided, and she has never had one since. I continued the use of the medicine in small doses for a few days. I have used it in treating teta.n.u.s in horses--a disease usually considered as inevitably fatal to that n.o.ble animal. It has never failed to cure the horse. * *

During the late war, my son, Dr. J. H. Phares, had occasion many times to prescribe the _Pa.s.siflora_ for teta.n.u.s in horses, with one invariable result--prompt, perfect, permanent cure. He fortunately saw no case in man. * * * Since the foregoing was written, I have treated with the hydro-alcoholic extract of _Pa.s.siflora_ several cases of neuralgia, and one of sleeplessness, with incessant motion and suicidal mania. With the same extract during the current week, Dr. J. H. Phares has treated, with the most prompt and satisfactory success, a very virulent and hopeless case of teta.n.u.s, with ophisthotonos, trismus and convulsions, in a child two years old. Other most potent remedies, in heroic doses, having failed to produce any effect in this case, he thinks that nothing but the _Pa.s.siflora_ could possibly have saved the child.

(The editor of the _California Medical Journal_ (1889) says):