2. _The lungs may have been artificially inflated._—It is so generally known, observes _Dr. Hunter_, that a child born apparently dead may be brought to life by inflating its lungs, that the mother herself, or some other person, might have tried the experiment. It might even have been done with a most diabolical intention of bringing about the condemnation of the mother. There exists not a doubt but that such an operation would impart buoyancy to the lungs, although the fact has been doubted. _Camper_, _Jager_, _Schmitt_, and _Buttner_ decided the question by numerous experiments. 3. _The lungs may float, in consequence of putrefaction._—We have stated on a former occasion that the buoyancy of the human body is materially influenced by the putrefactive process, (_vol._ ii, _p._ 40.) _Haller_ procured the lungs of a child that died before its birth. They were of a dark red colour, and both when entire, and when cut in pieces, sank in water. A portion being left to putrefy in water, the colour became brighter, it was covered with air bubbles, ascended gradually as the process of putrefaction advanced, and at length reached the surface, where it continued to float. But in answer to the objection which such a fact would seem to oppose to the validity of the _hydrostatic test_, let it be remembered that the lungs are particularly unsusceptible of the putrefactive process, and resist it longer than any of the soft parts. So that the body must be very far advanced in decomposition before the lungs are found to participate in it. _Camper_ instituted a number of experiments upon infants, at Amsterdam, by exposing their bodies to the action of water, as well as to that of air, and his results fully confirm the fact we have just stated. _Ballard_ was called upon to examine a child, the muscles of whose face were reduced to “_boulli_”—were in a state of solution—and in which putrefaction had advanced so far as even to prevent discrimination of the sex, notwithstanding which the lungs immediately sunk. If we make incisions into these organs, when in a state of advanced putrefaction, we shall observe air bubbles of a considerable size, and running in lines along the fissures, between the component _lobuli_ of the lungs; where such phenomena present themselves we may be assured, says _Dr. Hunter_, that the air is emphysematous, and not that which has been introduced by respiration; for, in this latter case, the air bubbles will be hardly visible to the naked eye. But there still remains another mode by which we may determine whether the gas diffused in the texture of the pulmonary organs be the effect of respiration, or decomposition. It consists in pressing portions of the lungs between the fingers, or twisting them in a folded cloth, with all the force we can command; when, should the gas have arisen from putrefaction, the portions thus treated will sink in water; a change which no force, however powerful,