perfectly insipid, others decidedly poisonous. They are all so, no doubt, to a certain extent, when taken in large quantities, and for a considerable length of time. Many of them act upon the brain almost in the same manner as ardent spirits, and are actually employed in Russia and other parts of northern Europe, to produce intoxication. It is from the whole class in this manner exciting in the brain a greater or less degree of stimulation, that they were probably first introduced into use, and are still so highly prized as a condiment. Although we are told that the esculent mushroom is perfectly innocent, yet it is confessed on all hands, to be often very difficult to distinguish it by its external appearance, from those which are deleterious; and that when the former is gathered at too late a period after it has sprung up, its juices possess a degree of acrimony. It must be evident, therefore, that the use of mushrooms is, to say the least, always unsafe.

It appears that most fungi or mushrooms, which have a warty cap, more especially fragments of membrane adhering to their upper surface, are poisonous. Of those which grow in woods. and shady places, a few are esculent; but most are unwholesome; and if they are moist on the surface, they should be avoided. All those which grow in tufts or clusters from the stumps or trunks of trees, ought likewise to be shunned. A sure test of a poisonous mushroom, is an astringent styptic taste; and perhaps, also, a disagreeable, but certainly a pungent odour. Those whose substance becomes blue soon after being cut, are represented as invariably poisonous.

When mushrooms prove deleterious, as they often do, if eaten without a very great deal of caution, they occasion a sense of qualmishness, or violent sickness, succeeded by giddiness, palpitation of the heart, and a flushing heat, with more or less redness of the skin. Swelling of the face also occurs, and sometimes a sensation over the whole body, as if a general swelling had taken place. The individual stares in an unusual manner; all objects appear different from what they did previously; a difficulty of breathing ensues, and the mind becomes strangely confused. Delirium and convulsions, are likewise of frequent Occurrence. In other cases, where the symptoms are mild, and do not appear for several hours after the mushrooms have been eaten, the sickness terminates in cholera morbus; on the cessation of which, the patient generally falls into a sound sleep, or into a somewhat comatose condition.

To relieve the foregoing symptoms as speedily as possible, the stomach should be freed, by an emetic, of its noxious contents; after which, the patient should drink freely of water strongly impregnated with either vinegar or lemon juice.

A striking circumstance in respect to the symptoms of poisonVOL. III. 30

ing with the fungi, is the great difference in the interval which elapses, between the time of eating, and that of their commencement. In some cases, their deleterious effects have been displayed in a few minutes; in others, in a day and a half. An interval of twelve hours is common,

.COOKERY.

NOTWITHSTANDING the cravings of ill regulated and depraved taste have converted the cook, too often, into man's enemy, yet it must be admitted that simple cookery is a highly useful art by it, our food being rendered more palatable and digestible, and better adapted to support the strength and health of our bodies. The preparation of food in this manner, is peculiar to man; all other animals partaking of it as presented by the hand of nature. Simple cookery consists in little else than the application, in various ways, of heat, to the nutritive substances; and the addition of a small quantity of salt or pepper, with the view of heightening their flavour; all beyond this, is of doubtful propriety.

Vegetables.-Vegetable differs from animal substances, in being more frequently used as food in a raw state; and in this state they may often be eaten without injury. General consent, however, has preferred the greater number of them being altered by heat; and the advantages which result from the application of the latter, are, their being rendered more soluble in the stomach, and the acrimonious qualities of certain of them being destroyed. Most vegetables are prepared for food, in their fresh and most recent state, and the application of heat is made to them either by steam, or by simply boiling. The first is preferable in all cases where the vegetables are of a succulent or watery nature; and by this means their colour is also more fully preserved. The latter, or boiling, is to be preferred, when the vegetable is of a dry, mealy, or farinaceous nature; and the proper rule in conducting the process is, to carry it so far as to reduce the substance to its softest state. In boiling vegetables, particularly the firm and dense kinds, it is a very common error to boil them too little.

Animal food.-Few kinds of animal food are used in their natural or raw state, if we except some of the shell fish. They all require to be kept for some time after being killed, to allow the fibres to lose, in some degree, their firmness and tension, or they will not become tender when cooked. This is particularly the case with the flesh of old animals, and that which possesses but little fat. But it should never be kept so long as to allow putrefaction to take place, or its wholesomeness as well as its nu

tritive properties, will be destroyed. Heat is applied to animal food, either in a humid or dry form. The first includes boiling and stewing; the latter, roasting, broiling, baking, and frying. Moderate boiling renders the food more soluble in the stomach, without, if it be properly performed, destroying, to any extent, its nutritious qualities. Excessive boiling, however, impairs its digestibility, and renders it less nutritive. The fluid in which the meat is boiled, extracts from it every thing capable of solution, and reduces it to an insipid, dense mass, unfit for food. By converting the water in which meat has been well boiled, into soup, by the addition of vegetables, we obtain at once an economical and nutritive aliment. Boiling is better adapted to the flesh of old than of young animals. Meat cooked in this way, is, upon the whole, less digestible and nutritious, than that prepared by either roasting or broiling. It is an error, therefore, to suppose it better adapted to weak stomachs.

Roasting. This is an admirable method of rendering meat wholesome and nourishing; as, without greatly changing its chemical properties, it renders it more tender, sapid, and high flavoured, while there is not so great a loss of its nutritive juices as in baking, boiling, and some other processes. It is, however, rendered more stimulating than by the process of boiling. The perfection of roasting, consists in doing the meat, neither too slowly, so as to dry it up, nor so rapidly as to burn it.

Broiling is a still better mode of dressing animal food. Meat cooked in this manner is equally soluble, while it retains a greater amount of its nutritive principles, than that which has been either boiled or roasted. It is hence more juicy and sapid, and, generally speaking, to a healthy stomach, more wholesome. For restoring the strength of the invalid, if not commenced with too early, it is the best mode in which animal food can be dressed. It is highly nutritive, without being too stimulating; and the juices having undergone but little change, they are quickly converted, without any undue effort on the part of the stomach, into good chyle, and healthy blood. It is proper to remark, in regard to both roasted and broiled meat, that the external brown crust is the less digestible part, and should be eaten only by those in vigorous health.

Stewing-consists in a more moderate application of heat than in boiling; and in continuing the application of it, also, for a much longer period. Although it is not a mode of cookery which is to be preferred to either of the two last, yet the texture of the meat being rendered by it sufficiently tender, without an entire extraction of its soluble parts, it may be allowed as an occasional change; though food cooked in this manner is less easy of digestion than that which has been properly boiled, yet it is equally nourishing; particularly, as the fluid in which the stew

ing is performed, which contains a considerable amount of the animal extract, is generally taken with the meat.

Baking-is a mode of cookery far inferior to either of the foregoing. It differs from roasting, inasmuch as the watery parts of the meat are retained. There is a retention, also, to a greater extent, of the oleaginous juices of the meat, which are generally in a burnt empyreumatic state; and render the food thus cooked highly irritating to the stomach, as well as less digestible and nutritious. With proper care, however, baking may be so conducted as to render the meat thus cooked little inferior, in any point of view, to that which has been roasted.

Frying-is the least proper of all the simple methods of cookery. The fat in which it is performed being burned in the process, forms on the outside of the meat, a hard, dry, and totally indigestible crust. Fried meat is of so indigestible and irritative a nature, as to disorder the stomachs of all who are not in the enjoyment of uncommon health and vigour. Heart burn, acrid eructations, sick head-ache, disturbed sleep, and other uneasy sensations often result from its use by the weak and delicate.

HOMICIDE AND SUICIDE.*

THERE are two cases, one of probable homicide, the other of probable suicide, which, as they engaged the attention of all England at the several periods of their occurrence, we cannot quit this subject without noticing. We allude to the deaths of the Earl of Essex, and Sellis, the servant of the Duke of Cumberland. The nobleman was easily exonerated from the charge of self-destruction, because public opinion ran strongly in his favour; because it is equally hostile to the Prince, dark suspicions are still entertained by many ignorant and well-meaning persons, in defiance of evidence irresistibly demonstrating their absurdity. We shall give both cases without

comment.

1

The Earl of Essex, committed to the Tower in July, 1683, on a charge of high treason, was found in his closet, a few days after, with his throat cut. The jury (who, by the way, on desiring to see the clothes, were told, that on the body not the clothes, they were to sit,) gave their verdict, "That with a razor the Earl of Essex gave himself one mortal wound, cut from one jugular to the other, and by the aspera arteria, and the windpipe to the vertebræ of the neck, both the jugulars being thoroughly divided, and of this he died." Burnet, in endeavouring to prove the suicide, directly contradicts this. "Both the jugulars and gullet were cut," says he, "a little above the aspera arteria; and when his body was brought home to his own house, and the wound was examined by his own surgeon, he told me it was impossible the wound could be as it was, if given by any other hand but his own: for except he had cast his head back, and stretched up his neck all he could, the aspera arteria must have been cut." The reader, with ourselves, will incline rather to believe the jury than the bishop, and it may be observed that cutting the gullet above the aspera arteria is nearly impossible. Several skilful members of the faculty, on examination before the Lords' committee, stated,

*The Law Magazine.

"that they would not positively say it was impossible for my Lord to cut his throat through each jugular vein, the aspera arteria, and gullet to the neck bone, and even behind each jugular vein on each side of the neck, as some judicious surgeons who viewed the throat, had reported it to be cut; but this they would be very positive in, viz. that they never saw any man's throat so cut, that had been cut by himself; and they did believe that when any man had cut through one of his jugular veins, and the gullet and windpipe, and to the very neck-bone, nature would be thereby so much weakened by the great effusions of blood and animal spirits, that the felo-de-se would not have strength sufficient to cut through the other jugular." Further, it may be mentioned, that there was no blood higher than the floor of the closet in which the body lay, although only three feet two inches wide; the razor was of such shape, that it must have been held by the blade, which much increases the difficulty of inflicting so large a wound. It lay on the left side, although Lord Essex was right-handed; and two witnesses swore that his cravat was cut in three pieces, and that there were five cuts on his right hand.

The evidence of Sir Everard Home, indicating that Sellis committed suicide after attempting the life of the Duke of Cumberland, has been frequently before the public. We give it in his own words. "I visited the Duke upon his being wounded, and found my way from the great hall to his apartment by the traces of blood which were left on the passages and staircase. I found him on the bed, still bleeding, his shirt deluged with blood, and the coloured drapery above the pillows sprinkled with blood from a wounded artery, which puts on an appearance that cannot be mistaken by those who have seen it. This could not have happened, had not the head been lying on the pillow when it was wounded. The night ribbon which was wadded, the cap, scalp, and scull, were obliquely divided, so that the pulsations of the arteries of the brain could be distinguished. While dressing these wounds, a report came that Sellis was dead; I went to his apartment, found the body lying on his side on the bed, without the coat or neckloth-the throat cut so effectually, that he could not have survived a minute or two. The length and direction of the wound was such as left no doubt of its being given by his own hand; any struggle would have made it irregular. He had not even changed his position-his hands lay as they do in a person who has fainted; they had no marks of violence upon them-his coat hung upon a chair out of the reach of blood from the bed-the sleeve from the wrist to the shoulder was sprinkled with blood quite dry, evidently from a wounded artery, and from such kind of sprinkling the arm of the assassin of the Duke of Cumberland could not escape." Unless, says Dr. Gordon Smith, the veracity of this statement be impeached, what can be more conclusive than the inferences that naturally present themselves? This question ought, indeed, to be set at rest by Sir E. Home's declaration; and an admirable lesson is thus furnished on the importance of medical investigation in cases of difficulty and doubt.

ATTENDANCE OUGHT NOT TO BE GRATUITOUS.*

Heu, mihi! me malus abstulit error-amor pecuniæ.

THE daily occupation of the medical man is at once the work of public humanity, and of personal profit. His task and duty is to do good, to stand by the sick, to cheer the conscious sufferer from vicious indulgence, and to administer solace to the mind, and ease to the body. In the day of battle, the medical man endeavours to save the life of the soldier; and when

*We copy this article, with some slight verbal alterations, chiefly in the person speaking, from the London Medical Gazette.