Scientific American Supplement, No. 275, April 9, 1881
TekstTHE HOTCHKISS REVOLVING GUN
The Hotchkiss revolving gun, already adopted in the French navy and by other leading European nations, has been ordered for use in the German navy by the following decree of the German Emperor, dated January 11 last: "On the report made to me, I approve the adoption of the Hotchkiss revolving cannon as a part of the artillery of my navy; and each of my ships, according to their classification, shall in general be armed with this weapon in such a manner that every point surrounding the vessel may be protected by the fire of at least two guns at a minimum range of 200 meters."
THALLIUM PAPERS AS OZONOMETERS
Schoene has given the results of an extended series of experiments on the use of thallium paper for estimating approximately the oxidizing material in the atmosphere, whether it be hydrogen peroxide alone, or mixed with ozone, or perhaps also with other constituents hitherto unknown. The objection to Schönbein's ozonometer (potassium iodide on starch paper) and to Houzeau's ozonometer (potassium iodide on red litmus paper) lies in the fact that their materials are hygroscopic, and their indications vary widely with the moisture of the air. Since dry ozone does not act on these papers, they must be moistened; and then the amount of moisture varies the result quite as much as the amount of ozone. Indeed, attention has been called to the larger amount of ozone near salt works and waterfalls, and the erroneous opinion advanced that ozone is formed when water is finely divided. And Böttger has stated that ozone is formed when ether is atomized; the fact being that the reaction he observed was due to the H2O2 always present in ether. Direct experiments with the Schönbein ozonometer and the psychrometer gave parallel curves; whence the author regards the former as only a crude hygrometer. These objections do not lie against the thallium paper, the oxidation to brown oxide by either ozone or hydrogen peroxide not requiring the presence of moisture, and the color, therefore, being independent of the hygrometric state of the air. Moreover, when well cared for, the papers undergo no farther change of color and may be preserved indefinitely. The author prepares the thallium paper a few days before use, by dipping strips of Swedish filtering paper in a solution of thallous hydrate, and drying. The solution is prepared by pouring a solution of thallous sulphate into a boiling solution of barium hydrate, equivalent quantities being taken, the resulting solution of thallous hydrate being concentrated in vacuo until 100 c.c. contains 10 grammes Tl(OH). For use the strips are hung in the free air in a close vessel, preferably over caustic lime, for twelve hours. Other papers are used, made with a two per cent. solution. These are exposed for thirty-six hours. The coloration is determined by comparison with a scale having eleven degrees of intensity upon it. Compared with Schönbein's ozonometer, the results are in general directly opposite. The thallium papers show that the greatest effect is in the daytime, the iodide papers that it is at night. Yearly curves show that the former generally indicate a rise when the latter give a fall. The iodide curve follows closely that of relative humidity, clouds, and rain; the thallium curve stands in no relation to it. A table of results for the year 1879 is given in monthly means, of the two thallium papers, the ozonometer, the relative humidity, cloudiness, rain, and velocity of wind.–G. F. B., in Ber. Berl. Chem. Ces.
THE AUDIPHONE IN ENGLAND
The audiphone has been recently tried in the Board School for Deaf and Dumb at Turin street, Bethnal Green, with very satisfactory results–so satisfactory that the report will recommend its adoption in the four schools which the London Board have erected for the education of the deaf and dumb. Some 20 per cent. of the pupils in deaf and dumb schools have sufficient power of hearing when assisted by the audiphone to enable them to take their places in the classes of the ordinary schools.
CONDUCTIVITY OF MOIST AIR
Many physical treatises still assert that moist air conducts electricity, though Silberman and others have proved the contrary. An interesting experiment bearing on this has been described lately by Prof. Marangoni. Over a flame is heated some water in a glass jar, through the stopper of which passes a bent tube to bell-jar (held obliquely), which thus gets filled with aqueous vapor. The upper half of a thin Leyden jar charged is brought into the bell-jar, and held there four or five seconds; it is then found entirely discharged. That the real cause of this, however, is condensation of the vapor on the part of the glass that is not coated with tin foil (the liquid layer acting by conduction) can be proved; for if that part of the jar be passed several times rapidly through the flame, so as to heat it to near 100° C., before inserting in the bell-jar, a different effect will be had; the Leyden jar will give out long sparks after withdrawal. This is because the glass being heated no longer condenses the vapor on its surface, and there is no superficial conduction, as in the previous case.
FLOATING PONTOON DOCK
Considerable attention has been given for some years past to the subject of floating pontoon docks by Mr. Robert Turnbull, naval architect, of South Shields, Eng., who has devised the ingenious arrangement which forms the subject of the annexed illustration. The end aimed at and now achieved by Mr. Turnbull was so to construct floating docks or pontoons that they may rise and fall in a berth, and be swung round at one end upon a center post or cylinder–nautically known as a dolphin–projecting from the ground at a slight distance from the berth. The cylinder is in deep water, and, when the pontoon is swung and sunk to the desired depth by letting in the necessary amount of water, a vessel can be floated in and then secured. The pontoon, with the vessel on it, is then raised by pumping out the contained water until she is a little above the level of the berth. The whole is then swung round over the berth, the vessel then being high and dry to enable repairs or other operations to be conducted. For this purpose, one end of the pontoon is so formed as to enable it to fit around the cylinder, and to be held to it as to a center or fulcrum, about which the pontoon can be swung. The pontoon is of special construction, and has air-chambers at the sides placed near the center, so as to balance it. It also has chambers at the ends, which are divided horizontally in order that the operation of submerging within a berth or in shallow water may be conducted without risk, the upper chambers being afterwards supplied with water to sink the pontoon to the full depth before a vessel is hauled in. When the ship is in place, the pontoon with her is then lifted above the level of the berth in which it has to be placed, and then swung round into the berth. In some cases, the pontoon is provided with a cradle, so that, when in berth, the vessel on the cradle can be hauled up a slip with rails arranged as a continuation of the cradle-rails of the pontoon, which can be then furnished with another cradle, and another vessel lifted.
It is this latter arrangement which forms the subject of our illustration, the vessel represented being of the following dimensions: Length between perpendiculars, 350 feet; breadth, moulded, 40 feet; depth, moulded, 32 feet; tons, B. M., 2,600; tons net, 2,000. At A, in fig. 1, is shown in dotted lines a portion of the vessel and pontoon, the ship having just been hauled in and centered over the keel blocks. At B, is shown the pontoon with the ship raised and swung round on to a low level quay. Going a step further in the operation, we see at C, the vessel hauled on to the slipways on the high-level quay. In this case the cylinder is arranged so that the vessel may be delivered on to the rails or slips, which are arranged radially, taking the cylinder as the center. There may be any number of slips so arranged, and one pontoon may be made available for several cylinders at the deep water parts of neighboring repairing or building yards, in which case the recessed portion of the pontoon, when arranged around the cylinder, has stays or retaining bars fitted to prevent it leaving the cylinder when the swinging is taking place, such as might happen in a tideway.
Fig. 1. IMPROVED FLOATING PONTOON DRY DOCK.
The arrangements for delivering vessels on radial slips is seen in plan at fig. 2, where A represents the river or deep water; B is the pontoon with the vessel; C being the cylinder or turning center; D is the low-level quay on to which the pontoon carrying the ship is first swung; E is the high-level quay with the slip-ways; F is an engine running on rails around the radial slips for drawing the vessels with the cradle off the pontoon, and hauling them up on to the high-level quay; and G shows the repairing shops, stores, and sheds. A pontoon attached to a cylinder may be fitted with an ordinary wet dock; and then the pontoon, before or after the vessel is upon it, can be slewed round to suit the slips up which the vessel has to be moved, supposing the slips are arranged radially. In this case, the pivot end of the pontoon would be a fixture, so to speak, to the cylinder.
The pontoon may also be made available for lifting heavy weights, by fitting a pair of compound levers or other apparatus at one end, the lifting power being in the pontoon itself. In some cases, in order to lengthen the pontoon, twenty-five or fifty foot lengths are added at the after end. When not thus engaged, those lengths form short pontoons suitable for small vessels.–Iron.
WEIRLEIGH, BRENCHLEY, KENT
Some few years since, Mr. Harrison Weir (whose drawings of natural history are known probably to a wider circle of the general public than the works of most artists), wishing to pursue his favorite study of animals and horticulture, erected on the steep hillside of the road leading from Paddock Wood to Brenchley, a small "cottage ornée" with detached studio. Afterward desiring more accommodation, he carried out the buildings shown in our illustrations. Advantage has been taken of the slope of the hill on one side, and the rising ground in the rear on the other, to increase the effect of the buildings and meet the difficulty of the levels. The two portions–old, etched, and new, shown as black–are connected together by a handsome staircase, which is carried up in the tower, and affords access to the various levels. The materials are red brick, with Bathstone dressings, and weather-tiling on the upper floors. Black walnut, pitch pine, and sequoias have been used in the staircase, and joiner's work to the principal rooms. The principal stoves are of Godstone stone only, no iron or metal work being used. The architects are Messrs. Wadmore & Baker, of 35 Great St. Helens, E.C.; the builders, Messrs. Penn Brothers, of Pembury, Kent.–Building News.
ARTISTS HOMES
NO 11
"WEIRLEIGH"
BRENCHLEY, KENT.
THE RESIDENCE OF HARRISON WEIR ESQ'RE
WADMORE & BAKER ARCHITECTS
RAPID BREATHING AS A PAIN OBTUNDER IN MINOR SURGERY, OBSTETRICS, THE GENERAL PRACTICE OF MEDICINE AND OF DENTISTRY.3
Through the kind invitation of your directors, I am present to give you the history of "rapid breathing" as an analgesic agent, as well as my experience therein since I first discovered it. It is with no little feeling of modesty that I appear before such a learned and honorable body of physicians and surgeons, and I accept the privilege as a high compliment. I trust the same liberal spirit which prompted you to call this subject to the light of investigation will not forsake you when you have heard all I have to say and you sit in judgment thereon. Sufficient time has now elapsed since the first promulgation of the subject for the shafts of ridicule to be well nigh spent (which is the common logic used to crush out all new ideas), and it is to be expected that gentlemen will look upon it with all the charity of a learned body, and not be too hasty to condemn what they have had but little chance to investigate; and, of course, have not practiced with that success which can only come from an intelligent understanding of its application and modus operandi.
Knowing the history of past discoveries, I was well prepared for the crucible. I could not hope to be an exception. But, so far, the medical profession have extended me more favor than I have received at the hands of the dental profession.
My first conception of the analgesic property of a pain obtunder in contradistinction to its anaesthetic effect, which finally led to the discovery of the inhalation of common air by "rapid breathing," was in 1855 or 1856, while performing upon my own teeth certain operations which gave me intense pain (and I could not afford to hurt myself) without a resort to ether and chloroform. These agents had been known so short a time that no one was specially familiar with their action. Without knowing whether I could take chloroform administered by myself, and at the same time perform with skill the excavation of extremely sensitive dentine or tooth-bone, as if no anaesthetic had been taken, and not be conscious of pain, was more than the experience of medical men at that time could assure me. But, having a love for investigation of the unknown, I prepared myself for the ordeal. By degrees I took the chloroform until I began to feel very plainly its primary effects, and knowing that I must soon be unconscious, I applied the excavator to the carious tooth, and, to my surprise, found no pain whatever, but the sense of touch and hearing were marvelously intensified. The small cavity seemed as large as a half bushel; the excavator more the size of an ax; and the sound was equally magnified. That I might not be mistaken, I repeated the operation until I was confident that anaesthetics possessed a power not hitherto known–that of analgesia. To be doubly certain, I gave it in my practice, in many cases with the same happy results, which saved me from the risks incident to the secondary effects of anaesthetics, and which answered for all the purposes of extracting from one to four teeth. Not satisfied with any advance longer than I could find a better plan, I experimented with the galvanic current (to and fro) by so applying the poles that I substituted a stronger impression by electricity from the nerve centers or ganglia to the peripheries than was made from the periphery to the brain. This was so much of a success that I threw aside chloroform and ether in removing the living nerve of a tooth with instruments instead of using arsenic; and for excavating sensitive caries in teeth, preparatory to filling, as well as many teeth extracted by it. But this was short-lived, for it led to another step. Sometimes I would inflict severe pain in cases of congested pulps or from its hasty application, or pushing it to do too much, when my patient invariably would draw or inhale the breath very forcibly and rapidly. I was struck with the repeated coincidence, and was led to exclaim: "Nature's anaesthetic." This then reminded me of boyhood's bruises. The involuntary action of every one who has a finger hurt is to place it to the mouth and draw violently in the air and hold it for an instant, and again repeat it until the pain is subdued. The same action of the lungs occurs, except more powerfully, in young children who take to crying when hurt. It will be noticed they breathe very rapidly while furiously crying, which soon allays the irritation, and sleep comes as the sequel. Witness also when one is suddenly startled, how violently the breath is taken, which gives relief. The same thing occurs in the lower animals when pain is being inflicted at the hand of man.
This was advance No. 3, and so sure was I of this new discovery, that I at once made an application while removing decay from an extremely sensitive tooth. To be successful, I found I must make the patient take the start, and I would follow with a thrust from the excavator, which move would be accomplished before the lungs could be inflated. This was repeated for at least a minute, until the operation was completed, I always following immediately or synchronously with the inhalation.
This led to step No. 4, which resulted in its application to the extracting of teeth and other operations in minor surgery.
Up to this time I had believed the sole effect of the rapid inhalation was due to mere diversion of the will, and this was the only way nature could so violently exert herself–that of controlling the involuntary action of the lungs to her uses by the safety valve, or the voluntary movement.
The constant breathing of the patient for thirty seconds to a minute left him in a condition of body and mind resembling the effects of ether and chloroform in their primary stages. I could but argue that the prolonged breathing each time had done it; and, if so, then there must be some specific effect over and above the mere diversion by the will. To what could it be due? To the air alone, which went in excess into the lungs in the course of a minute! Why did I not then immediately grasp the idea of its broader application as now claimed for it? It was too much, gentlemen, for that hour. Enough had been done in this fourth step of conception to rest in the womb of time, until by evolution a higher step could be made at the maturity of the child. Being self-satisfied with my own baby, I watched and caressed it until it could take care of itself, and my mind was again free for another conception.
The births at first seemed to come at very short intervals; but see how long it was between the fourth and the fifth birth. It was soon after that my mind became involved in inventions–a hereditary outgrowth–and the electric mallet and then the dental engine, the parent of your surgical engine, to be found in the principal hospitals of this city, took such possession of my whole soul, that my air analgesic was left slumbering. It was not until August, 1875–nineteen years after–that it again came up in full force, without any previous warning.
This time it was no law of association that revived it; but it seemed the whispering of some one in the air–some ethereal spirit, if you please–which instituted it, and advanced the following problem: "Nitrous oxide gas is composed of the same elements as ordinary air, with a larger equivalent of oxygen, except it is a chemical compound, not a mechanical mixture, and its anaesthetic effects are said to be due to the excess of oxygen. If this be a fact, then why can you not produce a similar effect by rapid breathing for a minute, more or less, by which a larger quantity of oxygen is presented in the lungs for absorption by the blood?"
This query was soon answered by asking myself another: "If the rapid inhalation of air into the lungs does not increase the heart's action and cause it to drive the blood in exact ratio to the inhalations, then I can produce partial anaesthesia from this excess of oxygen brought about by the voluntary movements over their ordinary involuntary action of the lungs." The next question was: Will my heart be affected by this excess of air in the lungs to such an extent that there will be a full reciprocity between them? Without making any trial of it, I argued that, while there is no other muscular movement than that of the chest as under the control of the will, and as nature has given to the will the perfect control over the lungs to supply more or less air, as is demanded by the pneumogastric nerve for the immediate wants of the economy, when the involuntary action is not sufficient; and the heart not being under the control of the will, and its action never accelerated or diminished except by a specific poison, or from the general activity of the person in violent running or working, the blood is forced into the heart faster and must get rid of it, when a larger supply of oxygen is demanded and rapid breathing must occur, or asphyxia result. I was not long in deciding that the heart would not be accelerated but a trifle–say a tenth–and, under the circumstances, I said: "The air is an anaesthetic."
From this rapid course of argument, I was so profoundly convinced of its truth, that without having first tried it upon my own person, I would have sat where I was, upon the curbstone, and had a tooth removed with the perfect expectation of absence of pain and of still being conscious of touch. While yet walking with my children, I commenced to breathe as rapidly as possible, and, as anticipated, found my steps growing shorter and shorter, until I came to a stand, showing to my mind clearly that my argument in advance was right, so far as locomotion was concerned; and, upon referring to my pulse, I found but little acceleration.
To what other conclusion could I arrive from this argument, with the foundation laid nineteen years before, when I established on my own person by experiment the fact of analgesia as induced from chloroform, with the many experiments in rapid respiration on tooth bone?
From this moment until its first application to the extraction of a tooth you can well imagine my suspense. That I might not fail in the very first attempt, I compelled myself and others in my household to breathe rapidly to investigate the phenomenon. This gave me some idea as to the proper method of proceeding in its administering.
The first case soon appeared, and was a perfect success, going far beyond my anticipations, for the effect was such as to produce a partial paralysis of the hands and arms to the elbow. Again and again I tried it in every case of extraction and many other experiments, doubting my own senses for a long time at a result so anomalous and paradoxical. I was reminded just here of a phenomenon which gave me additional proof–that of blowing a dull fire to revive it. For a minute or so one blows and blows in rapid succession until, rising from the effort, a sense of giddiness for a few moments so overcomes that the upright position is with difficulty maintained. In this condition you are fitted for having a tooth extracted or an abscess lanced.
Believing that I had something new to offer which might be of use to suffering humanity, I read the first article upon it Nov. 17, 1875, before the Franklin Institute. Shortly after I was invited before the Northern Medical Society of this city to address them thereon. A number of medical gentlemen have been using it in their practice, while the bulk of them have spurned it as "negative" and preposterous, without an effort at trying it, which I can now very well understand.
Unless one is aware of the fact that in the use of any agent which has the power to suspend the volition, it can be taken to that point where he is still conscious of touch and hearing, and at the same time not cognizant of pain inflicted, the action of rapid breathing could not be understood. And I regret to say that of three-fourths of the medical men I have talked with on the subject they had not been aware of such a possibility from ether and chloroform. Until this analgesic state could be established in their minds it was impossible to convince them that the excess of oxygen, as obtained by rapid breathing, could be made to produce a similar effect. I should have been as reluctant as any one to believe it, had I not personally experienced the effect while performing an operation which would otherwise have been very painful. Such a result could not well be reached by any course of reasoning.
Has it proven in my practice what has been claimed for it–a substitute for the powerful anaesthetics in minor operations in surgery? Most emphatically, yes! So completely has it fulfilled its humble mission in my office, that I can safely assert there has not been more than five per cent. of failures. I have given it under all circumstances of diseased organs, and have seen no other than the happiest results in its after effects. It may well be asked just here: Why has it not been more generally and widely used by the dental profession as well as the medical, if it is really what is claimed for it? The most satisfactory and charitable answer to be given is, the failure upon their part to comprehend the fact as existing in chloroform and ether that there is such a state as analgesia; or, in other words, that the animal economy is so organized, while the sense of touch is not destroyed, but rather increased, the mind of the subject fails to perceive a sense of pain when anaesthetics are given, and the effects are manifested in the primary stage. As I before intimated, such is the knowledge possessed by most of those who administer ether and chloroform. This was enough to cause nearly every one to look upon it as a bubble or air castle. Many gentlemen told me they tried it upon themselves, and, while it affected them very seriously by giddiness, they still retained consciousness; and, such being the case, no effect could be produced for obtunding pain. Others told me they were afraid to continue the breathing alarmed at the vertigo induced. And the practitioner who has adopted it more effectively than any other laughed at me when I first told him of the discovery; but his intimate association with me changed his views after much explanation and argument between us.
It was hardly to be expected that without this knowledge of analgesia, and without any explanation from me as to the modus operandi of rapid breathing, other than a few suggestions or directions as to how the effect was induced, even the most liberal of medical men should be able to make it effective, or have the least disposition to give it a preliminary trial upon themselves, and, of course, would not attempt it upon a patient. Notwithstanding, it found a few adherents, but only among my personal medical friends, with whom I had an opportunity to explain what I believed its physiological action, and the cases of success in my own practice. To this I have submitted as among the inevitable in the calendar of discoveries of all grades.
My own profession have attempted to ridicule it out of its birthright and possible existence, which style of argument is not resorted to by true logicians.
To all this I can truly say I have not for one moment faltered. I could afford to wait. The liberality of this society alone fully compensates for the seeming indisposition of the past, believing that it is proper that every advance should be confronted, and, if in time found worthy, give it God speed.
From its first conception I have diligently labored to solve its modus operandi, and the doubt in my own mind as to whether I could be mistaken in my observations. I asked the opinion of our best chemical teachers if air could have such effect. One attributed it to oxygen stimulation, and the other to nitrogen. Another gentleman told me the medical profession had come to the conclusion that it was possible for me to thus extract teeth, but it was due solely to my strong personal magnetism (which power I was not before aware I possessed).
Now, from what I have related of the successive and natural steps which finally culminated in this process or plan of analgesia induced by an excess of ordinary air taken forcibly into the lungs above what is necessary for life, and from what I shall state as to the apparently anomalous or paradoxical effects, with its physiological action, and the simple tests made upon each of my patients, I shall trust to so convince you of its plausibility and possibility that it will be made use of in hundreds of minor operations where ether and chloroform are now used.
Aside from my assertion and that of its friends, that the effects can be produced by air alone, you must have some light shed upon the causes of its physiological action, which will appeal to your medical reason.
To assign an action to any drug is difficult, and in the cases of ether and the other anaesthetics a quarter of a century still finds many conflicting opinions. This being true, you will deal leniently with me for the opinion I hold as to their analgesic action. Of course it will be objected to, for the unseen is, to a great extent, unknowable. Enough for my argument, however; it seems to suit the case very well without looking for another; and while it was based on the phenomenon resulting from many trials, and not the trials upon it as a previous theory, I shall be content with it until a better one can be found.
What is it I claim as a new discovery, and the facts and its philosophy?
I have asserted that I can produce, from rapidly breathing common air at the rate of a hundred respirations a minute, a similar effect to that from ether, chloroform, and nitrous oxide gas, in their primary stages; and I can in this way render patients sufficiently insensible to acute pain from any operation where the time consumed is not over twenty to thirty seconds. While the special senses are in partial action, the sense of pain is obtunded, and in many cases completely annulled, consciousness and general sensibility being preserved.
To accomplish this, each patient must be instructed how to act and what to expect. As simple as it may seem, there is a proper and consistent plan to enable you to reach full success. Before the patient commences to inhale he is informed of the fact that, while he will be unconscious of pain, he will know full, or partially well, every touch upon the person; that the inhalation must be vigorously kept up during the whole operation without for an instant stopping; that the more energetically and steadily he breathes, the more perfect the effect, and that if he cease breathing during the operation, pain will be felt. Fully impress them with this idea, for the very good reason that they may stop when in the midst of an operation, and the fullest effects be lost. It is obligatory to do so on account of its evanescent effects, which demand that the patient be pushed by the operator's own energetic appeals to "go on." It is very difficult for any person to respire more than one hundred times to the minute, as he will become by that time so exhausted as not to be able to breathe at all, as is evidenced by all who have thus followed my directions. For the next minute following the completion of the operation the subject will not breathe more than once or twice. Very few have force enough left to raise hand or foot. The voluntary muscles have nearly all been subjugated and overcome by the undue effort at forced inhalation of one hundred over seventeen, the normal standard. It will be more fully understood further on in my argument why I force patients, and am constantly speaking to them to go on.