[9]
ence between the effects of the matter, whether it be taken in its watery or purulent state. The puncture should not be larger than is sufficient to draw one drop of blood, but it should always be made by a sharp lancet, for the sudden inflammation and suppuration, excited by a dull lancet, sometimes throw off the matter so as to prevent its infecting the body[1]. No plaster or bandage should be applied over the puncture. It should be made in the left arm of all subjects. The objections to inoculating in the leg are too obvious to be mentioned. I have heard of the disease being communicated by rubbing the dry skin with the matter. My own observations upon this subject give me reason to suspect the facts that are contained in books relative to this mode of infecting the body. I have bound large pieces of lint dipt in fresh matter for twenty-four hours upon the arm, without producing the disorder. A practitioner of physic in New-Jersey informed me that he once gave a considerable quantity of fresh variolous matter in a dose of physic without infecting his patient. I suspect the matter that produces the disease is of the same nature with certain poisons,
- ↑ I am disposed to believe that the external applications which are used by the Indians for the cure of the bite of poisonous snakes, act only by exciting inflammation and suppuration, which discharge the poison from the wound before it is absorbed. All their external remedies are of a stimulating nature.
