In the mildest form, as in a case related by Plenck[439] of a man who swallowed an ounce of the carbonate of potass, the symptoms represent pretty nearly an attack of acute gastritis when followed by recovery,—the effects on man being then analogous to those observed by Bretonneau in animals, when the poison was introduced into the stomach without touching the gullet. But a more common form than either of the preceding is one, similar to the chronic form of poisoning with the mineral acids, in which constant vomiting of food and drink, incessant discharge of fluid, sanguinolent stools, difficulty of swallowing, burning pain from the mouth to the anus, and rapid emaciation, continue for weeks or even months before the patient’s strength is exhausted; and where death is evidently owing to starvation, the alimentary canal being no longer capable of assimilating food. Two characteristic examples of this singular affection have been recorded in the Medical Repository,[440] and a third, of which the event has not been mentioned, but which would in all likelihood end fatally, has been communicated by M. Jules Cloquet to Orfila.[441] Of the two first cases, which were caused by half an ounce of carbonate of potass having been taken in solution by mistake for a laxative salt, one proved fatal in little more than a month, the other three weeks afterwards. In Cloquet’s case, at the end of the sixth week the membrane of the mouth was regenerated; but the gullet continued to discharge pus, and the stools were purulent and bloody.