CASE V. A. G., aged 52 at his death. He was a collier from his boyhood, and wrought during the greater part of his life at Penston colliery in the parish of Gladsmuir. He was a short-set robust man, and while labouring at Penston, he enjoyed usually good health, free from cough or any affection of the chest. When he had attained the age of 48 years, (1833), he removed from the Penston to the Pencaitland coal-work, and about six months after making this change, he began to experience a slight difficulty of breathing, accompanied by a troublesome cough and feverish nights. The pulse was 84. Various soothing remedies were administered, which relieved for a little the pectoral symptoms; and as he felt no decided physical debility, he continued as usual at underground work. In 1835 I saw him often, and found that his pulmonary symptoms were becoming more marked; his cough was excessively annoying in the morning and when going to bed; his expectoration was frothy mucus, with dyspepsia, palpitation, and occasional headach. The resonance of the chest on percussion was very slightly impaired, and the respiratory murmur was variable, being occasionally louder at one time than another, and often much obscured, from the mucous secretion. Labouring under this chest affection he still continued his daily employment till the spring of 1836, when he was entirely laid aside, being unable to go below ground, or to take the slightest fatigue, for the smallest exertion produced a fit of coughing; and during a paroxysm of this kind, he expectorated a few black sputa, which in a few days disappeared, and gave place to the usual frothy mucous expectoration. This bronchial discharge was accompanied by considerable relief to the cough and dyspnoea. By this time, (June 1836), on applying the ear to the chest, the resonance is dull, and respiratory murmur obscure. The action of the heart was slow when compared to its former state. The pulse not beyond 45 in the minute. By the end of this year he appeared in a half dead state,--but a mere shadow in regard to flesh. He was expectorating at intervals of some weeks, when the cough became more severe, a few carbonaceous sputa, and suffering severely from gastric irritation.[13] During the last week of his life, he expectorated considerable quantities of black fluid, and died exhausted, January 1837.