POPULAR ERRORS.
A popular error of the most fatal kind was the idea formerly prevalent
that a drowned person, being overpowered by the quantity of water he had
swallowed, was susceptible of restoration by suspending him with the head
downwards, so as to force him to disgorge it. More persons owed their
death to this stupid operation, than to the suspended respiration it was
intended to restore. It is only during the present century that the
experiments of the faculty all over the world have pointed out that the
only course to pursue with persons taken insensible out of the water, is
to restore circulation by warmth and friction of the extremities; and
respiration, by the introduction of air into the lungs.
An equally strange legislative abuse connected with this subject,
prevailed in Paris till within the last few years. A reward of twelve
francs, or ten shillings was given to any person who saved another from
drowning by extricating his body from the Seine, while a reward of
six-and-thirty francs, or three times as much, was given to the person who
rescued a dead body from the water! This was evidently conceived in the
hygienic interests of a city, where the river water is in such extensive
use for baths and drinking; but it was in point of fact offering a premium
for murder: the morality of navigatory populations being in most countries
at a low ebb.
Another French delusion fatal to human preservation, is the idea that the
person who cuts down the body of another found hanging, legally involves
himself in an accusation of murder; and nothing can be more injudicious
than the harshness with which the proceedings of an inquest are often
pursued; as if to justify the poltroonery of those whose first impulse on
discovering a body is to go in search of witnesses of the circumstances
attending the discovery, instead of lending immediate aid.
A more innocent, but not less groundless popular prejudice is, that which
attaches itself to that most useful of domestic animals, the ass--the
war-horse of the poor. In all countries, this sure-footed and faithful
animal is adopted as an emblem of stupidity, from the patience with which
it submits to punishment and endures privation. A pair of ass's ears is
inflicted upon a child in reproof of his duncehood; and through life we
hear every blockhead of our acquaintance called an ass. Whereas the ass
is a beast of great intelligence; and we often owe our safety to its sure
and unerring foot beside the perilous precipice, where the steps of the
man of science would have faltered.
The Fathers of the Church, and the Disciples of the Sorbonne, persuaded of
the universal influence of the Christian faith, believed the dark cross on
the back of the ass to date only from the day on which our Saviour made
his entry into Jerusalem. The ass of the desart was an animal of great
price. Pliny mentions that the Senator Arius paid for one the sum of four
hundred thousand sesterces. Naturalists have frequently remarked the
extraordinary dimensions of an ass's heart, which is thought an indication
of courage; and it is the custom of the peasantry of some countries to
make their children wear a piece of ass's skin about their person. The
ass's skin is peculiarly valuable, both for the manufacture of
writing-tablets and drums; which may be the reason why a dead ass is so
rarely seen. It is too valuable to be left on the highway. In many places,
the ass serves as a barometer. If he roll in the dust, fine weather may be
expected; but if he erect his ears, rain is certain. Why should not
animals experience the same atmospheric influences as man? Are we not
light-hearted in the sunshine, and depressed in a heavy atmosphere.
Louis XI., of France, was a great patron of the ass. His astrologers
having failed in their predictions concerning the weather, he dismissed
them, and substituted an ass in their place, as being more weather-wise.
Certain physicians consider the emanations from the ass's body to possess
beneficial medical properties; while, in former days, the blood of the
bull was considered poisonous.
The credulous Plutarch declared that Themistocles poisoned himself with
bullock's blood, upon the authority of the priests of Egina, who are also
cited by Pliny; and this same bullock's blood, esteemed poisonous, was
also considered a moral purification;--sins being expiated by the
sprinkling of the human body with the blood of the bull. On solemn
occasions, when the criminal was a man of wealth and distinction, so that
a bull was dedicated to his use, the blood was made to fall in a
perforated vessel, and the criminal standing beneath, received the sacred
aspersion upon his face and attire. The Emperor Julian submitted to this
act of expiation. Bullock's blood is now known to be as innocuous as that
of other animals; and is extensively used in more than one manufacture.
During the Middle Ages, ground glass was supposed to act as an infallible
poison; and was long known by the name of "Succession Powder." Montfleury
speaks of it in one of his comedies. One of the personages, showing a
packet of it, observes: "Here is the making of many an heir!"
Portal, and several other French physicians, have asserted in their works,
that ground glass is fatal to the swallower; and it is frequently used by
the poor as ratsbane, mixed up with the compositions intended for the
extermination of vermin. Jugglers were the first to controvert this error,
by publicly swallowing it with impunity, a feat which Dr. Franck having
witnessed, he immediately experimentalized on himself, and published the
results as conclusive against the received opinion.
About the year 1810, a physician of Caen, named Sauvage, confirmed the
opinion of Franck. A young lady under his care swallowed a quantity of
powdered glass for the purpose of self-destruction without experiencing
the least injury; upon which Sauvage tried experiments on various animals,
administering ground glass to cats, dogs, and rats, on opening the bodies
of which, he could not detect the smallest effect. Many similar
experiments produced the same results. Dr. Cayol, in presence of his
colleagues, swallowed a quantity of irregular fragments of glass. So,
also, did Sauvage, without producing the smallest derangement of the
digestive organs.
It is worthy of remark, that mountebanks often clear the way for the
march of science; a proof that the most trivial observations may be the
origin of the grandest results. Some students of Oxford, on visiting
Newton, found him blowing bubbles from a straw, and considered the
occupation childish. The philosopher was studying the theory of light.
Since we have alluded to mountebanks, let us devote a few more words to
them. Jugglers have been known to swallow, not only pounded glass, but
stones and knife blades. A celebrated Spaniard, accused by the
Inquisition, proved his innocence by swallowing fiery coals without
injury; and the savage found in the woods at Aveyron, devoured all sorts
of fowls with their feathers. But these exploits will not bear comparison
with those of the Molucca savage, of whom we read an account in a volume
entitled: "The Testament of Jerome Sharp," printed in 1786.
"I entered," says the narrator, "with one of my friends, and found a man
resembling an ourang-outang crouched upon a stool in the manner of a
tailor. His complexion announced a distant climate, and his keeper stated
that he found him in the island of Molucca. His body was bare to the hips,
having a chain round the waist, seven or eight feet long, was fastened to
a pillar, and permitted him to circulate out of the reach of the
spectators. His looks and gesticulations were frightful. His jaws never
ceased snapping, except when sending forth discordant cries, which were
said to be indicative of hunger. He swallowed flints when thrown to him,
but preferred raw meat, which he rushed behind his pillar to devour. He
groaned fearfully during his repast, and continued groaning until fully
satiated. When unable to procure more meat, he would swallow stones with
frightful avidity; which, upon examination of those which he accidentally
dropped, proved to be partly dissolved by the acrid quality of his saliva.
In jumping about, the undigested stones were heard rattling in his
stomach."
The men of science quickly set to work to account for these feats, so
completely at variance with the laws of nature. But before they had hit
upon a theory, the pretended Molucca savage proved to be a peasant from
the neighbourhood of Besançon, who chose to turn to account his natural
deformities. When staining his face for the purpose, in the dread of
hurting his eyes, he left the eyelids unstained, which completely puzzled
the naturalists. By a clever sleight of hand, the raw meat was left behind
the pillar, and cooked meat substituted in its place. Some asserted his
passion for eating behind the pillar to be a proof of his savage origin;
most polite persons, and more especially Kings, being addicted to feeding
in public. The stones swallowed by the pretended savage were taken from a
vessel left purposely in the room full of them; small round stones,
encrusted with plaster, which afterwards gave them the appearance of
having been masticated in the mouth. Before the discovery of all this, the
impostor had contrived to reap a plentiful harvest.
Some time afterwards, a woman was exhibited near the Louvre, who devoured
flints and slate with the utmost avidity. But the scientific world,
forewarned by its former credulity, took no note of her peculiarities of
appetite.
It is recorded in the Gazette of Health, that the Abbé Monnier, of St.
Jean d'Angély, used in his youth to grind between his teeth fragments of
stone for recreation, and even in his declining age, continued the custom.
He would swallow a spoonfull during the day, and did not consider his
dinner complete without them. He was always pale and emaciated, which was
attributed to his singular diet. But his brother, who did not feed upon
stones, was precisely of the same temperament and appearance. The Abbé
lived till the age of ninety-eight. Diseased persons have been known to
devour without injury, earth, stones, chalk, and plaster; and an eminent
physician used to eat small lumps of plaster-of-Paris, as others swallow
sugar-plums.
In the anatomical inquiries of Menelaus Winsemius, a Dutch physician, he
relates that in his time, a peasant of Friesland was in the habit of
swallowing flints, wood, glass, and live fish. In Wurtemberg, there was
also a miller, who for money would swallow birds, mice, lizards,
caterpillars, or fragments of glass and stone. He one day swallowed an
inkstandish, with all its appurtenances. These feats were publicly
attested by the Senate of Wurtemberg; after which, the man lived nineteen
years, subsisting upon twelve pounds of food per diem. There is scarcely a
fair throughout Europe at which such feats are not exhibited on a minor
scale.