Encyclopaedia Britannica, or, a Dictionary of arts, sciences, and miscellaneous literature : enlarged and improved. Illustrated with nearly six hundred engravings > Volume 13, MAT-MIC

appendix. IM E O
D,ie»fes of ing, efpecially at the jugular, will frequently be necefla-
Children. ry here, as well as in all other inflammatory cafes; and
v 1 the belly fhould be opened from time to time by emol¬
lient, oily, or mucilaginous clyfters. But, on the
contrary, if the child be low, funk, and much weaken¬
ed, repeated dofes of the fpirit of hartfhorn, and the
like reviving medicines, ought to be preferibed. Blif-
ters applied to the back, or behind the ears, will often
be proper in both cafes. A prudent adminiftration of
opiates, w hen their ufe is not forbid by coltivenefs or
otherwife, is fometimes of great fervice in difficult
teething, as, by mitigating pain, they have a tendency
to prevent its bad effects, fuch as a fever, convullions,
or other violent fymptoms •, and often they are abfolutely
necciTary, along with the teftaceous powders, for check¬
ing: an immoderate diarrhoea.
O # t
When cathartics are neceflary, if the child feems too
tender and weak to bear their immediate operation,
they Ihould be given to the nurfe ; in w'hich cafe they
will communicate fo much of their active powders to the
milk as will be fufficient to purge the infant. This at
leaf! certainly holds with regard to fome cathartics ;
fuch, for example, as the infulion of fenna, particular¬
ly if a very weak infulion be employed, and not ufed
to fuch an extent as to operate as a purgative to the
nurfe.
As molt young children, if in health, naturally lleep
much, and pretty foundly, wre may always be apt to
lufpeft that fomething is amifs when they begin to be
1 abject to watching and frights $ fymptoms which fel-
dom or never occur but either in. confequence of fome
prefent diforder not perceived, or as the certain fore¬
runners of an approaching indifpofition. We Ihould
immediately, therefore, endeavour to find out the caufe
of watchfulnefs, that we may ufe every poffible means
to remove or prevent it; otherwife the want of natural
reft, which is fo very prejudicial to perfons of all ages,
will foon reduce the infant to a low and emaciated
ftate, which may be followed by a hedtic fever, diar¬
rhoea, and all the other confequences of weaknefs.
Thefe fymptoms, being abvays the effedts of irritation
and pain, may proceed, in very young infants, from
crudities or other affedlions of the primes vice producing
flatulencies or gripes ; about the fixth or feventh month,
they may be owing to that uneafinefs which commonly
accompanies the breeding of the teeth •, and after a
child is weaned, and begins to ufe a different kind of
food, worms become frequently an additional caufe of
watchings and difturbed fleep. Hence, to give the ne-
ceffary relief on thefe occafions, the original complaint
muft firft be afeertained from the child’s ape and other
concomitant circumftances, and afterwards treated ac¬
cording to the nature of the cafe. Women and nurfes
are too apt to have recourfe to opiates in the w'atchings
of children, efpecially when their own reft happens
to be much difturbed by their continual noife and cla¬
mour. But this practice is often prejudicial, and never
ought to have place when the belly is in the leaft ob-
Itrufted.
There is no complaint more frequent among children
than that of worms, the general fymptoms of which
have been already enumerated \ but it muft be obferved,
that all the fymptoms commonly attributed to worms,
may be produced by a foulnefs of the bowels. Hence
practitioners ought never to reft fatisfied with admini-
I C I N E.
477
ftering to their patients fuch medicines as arc poffeffed
only of an anthelmintic quality, but to join them with
thofe which are particularly adapted for cleanfing the
primee vice ; as it is uncertain whether a foulnefs of the
bowels may not be the eaufe of all the complaints. This
practice is ftill the more advifable, on account of vifeid
humours in the inteftlnes affording lodgement to the ova
of worms } which, without the convenience of fuch a
receptacle, would be more fpeedily difeharged from the
body.
The difficulty of curing what is called a worm fever,
arxfee, according to Dr Mufgrave, from its being fre¬
quently attributed to worms, when the caufe of the
diforder is of a quite different nature. Pie does not
mean to deny that worms do fometimes abound in the
Difeafes of
Children.
human body, nor that the irritation caufed by them
docs fometimes produce a fever ; but he apprehends
thefe cafes to be much more uncommon than is gene¬
rally imagined, and that great mifehief is done by treat¬
ing fome of the diforders of children as worm cafes,
which are really not fo. Dr Hunter is of the fame
opinion on this point. He has, we are told, diffefted
great numbers of children who have been fuppofed to
die of worm fevers, and whofe complaints were of courfe
treated as proceeding from worms, in whom, however,
there appeared, upon diffeffion, to be not only no
worms, but evident proofs of the diforder’s having been
of a very different nature.
The fpunous worm fever, as Dr Mufgrave terms it,,
has, in all the inftances he has feen of it, arifen evi¬
dently from the children having been indulged with
too great quantities of fruit. Every fort of fruit eaten
in excefs will probably produce it} but an immoderate
ufe of cherries feems to be the molt common caufe of it.
The approach of this diforder has a different appear¬
ance, according as it arifes from a habit of eating fruit
in rather too large quantities, or from an exccffive
quantity eaten at one time. In the former cafe, the
patient gradually grows weak and languid : his colour
becomes pale and livid ; his belly fwells and grows
hard ; his appetite and digeftion are deftroyed ; his
nights grow reftlefs, or at leaft his fleep is much di¬
fturbed with ftartings, and then the fever foon follows,
in the progrefs of which, the patient grows comatofe,
and at times convulfed ; hr which ftate, when it takes
place to a high degree, he often dies. The pulfe at
the wrift, though quick, is never ftrong or hard ; the
carotids, however, beat with great violence, and ele¬
vate the fkin fo as to be diftinftly feen at a diftance.
The heat is at times confiderable, efpecially in the
trunk ; though at other times, when the brain is much
eppreffed, it is little more than natural. It is fome¬
times accompanied by a violent pain of the epigaftric
region, though more commonly the pain is flight, and
terminates in a coma •, fome degree of pain, however,
feems to be infeparable from it, fo as dearly to diftin-
guiffi this diforder from oilier comatofe affeftions.
When a large quantity of fruit has been eaten at
once, the attack of the diforder is inftantaneous, and
its progrefs rapid ; the patient often palling, in the
fpace of a few hours, from apparently perftd health,
to a ftupid, comatofe, and almoft dying ftate. The
fymptoms of the fever, when formed, are in both cafes
nearly the fame; except that, in this latter fort, a little
purulent matter is fometimes difeharged, both by vo¬
mit