It is possible that this accident may be attributed to the escape of hydrogen gas; the presence of this inflammable body in animals is evident, and it is also proved that it is liable to ignite. Morton saw flames coming from the body of a pig. Bonami and Ruysh, with a lighted candle, set fire to the vapour arising from the stomach of a woman whom they were opening. In the Memoirs of the Academy of Science of Paris, of 1751, we find the case of a butcher, who, on opening the body of an ox that had died after a malady which had swollen him considerably, was severely burnt by an explosion and a flame which rose to the height of about five feet. Sturm, Bartholini, and Gaubius record fiery eructations in which, no doubt, phosphurated hydrogen had been generated in the stomach, from some combination of alcohol and animal substances, and inflamed upon coming into contact with atmospheric air; the fetid odour which invariably accompanies these combustions appears to warrant the conclusion. Fodere remarks that hydrogen gas is developed in certain cases of disease even in the living body, and he agrees with Mere in attributing spontaneous combustion to the united action of hydrogen and electricity. The case of a Bohemian peasant is narrated, who lost his life in consequence of ignited inflammable air issuing from his mouth which could not be extinguished. It seems evident that this accident only occurs under certain conditions of the body; generally in aged persons upwards of sixty years old; more frequently in women than in men, and chiefly when of indolent habits, a debilitated frame, and intemperate in their mode of living. That the body has been usually consumed long before the head and the extremities is evident, since these parts have been more commonly found than the trunk. It also has been ascertained by observation that this strange accident seldom occurs in summer, but principally during severe cold and frosty weather. It appears that some experiments have been recently made in the United States, when the blood flowing from the arm of a man addicted to spirituous liquors actually took fire, being placed in contact with a lighted taper!