Produced by Bryan Ness, Jeannie Howse and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print project.) * * * * * +--------------------------------------------------------+ | Transcriber's Note: | | | | Inconsistent hyphenation and archaic spelling in | | the original document has been preserved. | | | | Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. | | For a complete list, please see the end of this | | document. | | | +--------------------------------------------------------+ * * * * * ON THE LUNAR CAUSTIC. AN ESSAY ON THE APPLICATION OF THE LUNAR CAUSTIC, IN THE _CURE OF CERTAIN_ WOUNDS AND ULCERS. BY JOHN HIGGINBOTTOM, _NOTTINGHAM_, MEMBER OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEONS OF LONDON. LONDON: PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, REES, ORME, BROWN, AND GREEN, _PATER-NOSTER ROW_. 1826. T. WHEELHOUSE, PRINTER, NOTTINGHAM. TO MY BROTHER-IN-LAW, MARSHALL HALL, M.D. F.R.S.E. &c. &c. THIS LITTLE WORK IS INSCRIBED WITH GREAT AFFECTION. _Nottingham, Jan. 6, 1826._ PREFACE. The following pages are presented to the medical public with very humble pretensions. It is chiefly with the minor accidents or diseases that they have to do; but I shall not consider that I have laboured in vain, if I am enabled to mitigate even these little evils of human life. In these prefatory observations, however, I would suggest the question whether the caustic may not be employed with benefit even in some of the severer diseases to which the human frame is liable. Indeed I consider the investigation as only just begun, and many other uses of the lunar caustic, besides those detailed in the following pages, have suggested themselves to me. May not the caustic, for instance, be of greater efficacy, because of greater power and of quicker operation, than ordinary blisters, in some internal diseases? It is repeatedly stated hereafter, that the application of the lunar caustic is a means, in certain circumstances, of subduing external inflammation. Might it not, on this principle, be of service in the treatment of some of the internal phlegmasiae? It may be observed, that the lunar caustic may be regarded, almost without further trial, as an effectual preventive of those cases of irritative fever which arise from local injuries, and probably of the effects of poisoned wounds in general. I would not, however, in the latter cases, fail to render "sure doubly sure" by free excision.