[36] Can it be called curing a limb to take it off altogether?
[37] It has been known long since, that this concussion, or what may
be called a general contusion, is one of the principal causes of the
danger arising from gunshot wounds, and more or less from those of all
kinds of fire arms; but at present I do not recollect to have seen the
mechanism of this effect so well explained as in this performance.
The rapidity with which the air strikes, compensates what it wants in
density: Those who love to reduce every thing to calculation, will
be able exactly to determine this effect by the rule of proportion:
Supposing on one hand, a stream of air, which has acquired, by the
motion of the ball, a given velocity, and which acts upon a man with
this degree of velocity; supposing on the other hand, a man falling
upon a floor, likewise with a given degree of velocity, the effect
will be equal, if the velocity of air, is to the man who falls, as
the density of the board is to that of the air; or, more briefly, if
the contusing bodies be in an inverse ratio of their densities. I am
even induced to believe, that when the velocity is augmented to a
certain degree, its effect is augmented in a greater proportion than
its increase; or, to speak algebraically, that its effects ought to be
expressed by some quality of its degrees; thus the effect of a velocity
of 150 degrees, would be to the effect of a velocity of 125, not as
150 : 125 or as 6 : 5 but as the square, or perhaps some other quality
of 150, to the square or the correspondent quality of 125.
There are physical reasons that induce us to believe that the case
is so, and there are several observations which seem to confirm it.
Those who have served in time of war, have all been witnesses of some
singular instance or other of the effects of the percussion of the
air; there are instances of people killed on the field, without being
touched by the ball. I was told by officers, men of veracity, that at
the battle of Fontanoy, a ball broke the thigh bone of a soldier in the
Dutch army, without touching him; another saw a man who was rendered
paralytic on one side, by a ball whizing past him. Curious observers
know, that nothing so greatly fatigues an army as a high wind, even
the centinels are tired, without marching; the reason is, that a high
wind occasions a kind of general contusion, which of course produces
weariness. I do not know but some of the effects of lightening may be
imputed to the same cause. I shall add nothing to what Mr. Bilguer says
concerning the effects of a contusion; he is sufficiently explicit on
this head; and as I have already treated the subject pretty largely in
my book termed _Advice to the People_, I shall only observe, that in
the wounds made by musket-ball, the effect of the general concussion
is not very considerable, but the danger, in such cases, proceeds from
the topical contusion accompanying the wound, the small quantity of
blood commonly discharged from it; and lastly, as Mr. Le Dran remarks,
because the instant a man receives a gunshot wound, he is struck with a
sudden dread he cannot possibly resist. There seems to me to be three
reasons for this dread, of which even the wounded person himself is not
altogether conscious; in the first place, the idea that gunshot wounds
are dangerous; secondly, because the degree of the hurt is not known;
thirdly, the instantaneous effect of the concussion, which renders
a man much more susceptible of fear. There is a point of time when
courage is useless. I shall beg leave, in this place, to insert a case
I had from the eye-witnesses, and which demonstrates the bad effect
of apprehension on wounded patients. Two officers, in the service of
France, were wounded in the last campaign but one; one of them very
dangerously, the other, who had been a prisoner a little time before,
and had been extremely ill used, but very slightly; they were carried
to the same place, and lodged in the same apartment; the first expected
to die, but nevertheless recovered in a short time; the second hoped
to be cured very quickly, and his wound, a superficial one in the leg,
did not discover the least sign of danger. The place they were in was
surprized, and they were informed they were made prisoners; the idea of
what he had suffered, made so strong an impression on the latter, that
he instantly found himself indisposed; the following dressing the wound
appeared mortified, every remedy proved useless, and he died in a few
days. TISSOT.
[38] The troublesome symptoms which I have here enumerated, happen
seldomer when the limb is entirely carried off by the ball, although
the concussion caused by the compression of the air must be greater in
this case, than when the ball has only grazed; a circumstance which
might induce one to call in question the justness of my remarks in
this section. But these doubts will vanish, when we reflect, that
in a contusion there is no discharge of blood, whereas it is very
considerable in cases where the limb is intirely carried off; and thus,
the remedy is here a consequence of the accident itself, since this
hemorrhage effects what we would wish to effect by artificial bleeding;
in contusions, where there is no discharge of blood, it removes
obstructions, and disperses the extravasated humours, which are the
consequences of concussion.