Island of Lemnos.” He died on the 15th of July 1788. A monument to his memory was erected by his fellow-students in the church of Santa Maria in the Via Lata.
DROUET, JEAN BAPTISTE (1763–1824), French Revolutionist, chiefly noted for the part he played in the arrest of Louis XVI. at Varennes, was born at Sainte-Menehould. He served for seven years in the army, and afterwards assisted his father, who was post-master of his native town. The carriages conveying the royal family on their flight to the frontier stopped at his door on the evening of the 21st of June 1791; and the passengers, travelling under assumed names, were recognized by Drouet, who immediately took steps which led to their arrest and detection on reaching Varennes. For this service the Assembly awarded him 30,000 francs, but he appears to have declined the reward. In September 1792 he was elected deputy to the Convention, and took his place with the most violent party. He voted the death of the king without appeal, showed implacable hostility to the Girondins, and proposed the slaughter of all English residents in France. Sent as commissioner to the army of the north, he was captured at the siege of Maubeuge and imprisoned at Spielberg till the close of 1795. He then became a member of the Council of Five Hundred, and was named secretary. Drouet was implicated in the conspiracy of Babeuf, and was imprisoned; but he made his escape into Switzerland, and thence to Teneriffe. There he took part in the successful resistance to the attempt of Nelson on the island, in 1797, and later visited India. The first empire found in him a docile sub-prefect of Sainte-Menehould. After the second Restoration he was compelled to quit France. Returning secretly he settled at Macon, under the name of Merger and a guise of piety, and preserved his incognito till his death on the 11th of April 1824.
See G. Lenotre, Le Drame de Varennes (Paris, 1905).
DROWNING AND LIFE SAVING. To “drown” (a verb used both transitively and intransitively, of which the origin, though traced to earlier forms, is unknown) is to suffer or inflict death by submersion in water, or figuratively to submerge entirely in water or some other liquid. As a form of ancient capital punishment, the method of drowning is referred to at the end of this article, but the interest of the subject is mainly associated with rescue-work in cases of accident.
Death from drowning is the result of asphyxia, due to the stoppage of a supply of fresh air to the lungs. There is a certain amount of stationary air in the lungs, and into this is diffused oxygen from the fresh air taken in, while the carbonic acid which it has taken from the blood through the walls of the capillaries is driven out. This process of exchange is ever proceeding, the whole of it being regulated from the nervous centre at the base of the brain. When a person gets under water and cannot swim, there is a natural tendency to struggle, and in the efforts to respire water is drawn into the windpipe and cough is brought on. This expels the air from the lungs with the water which threatened to suffocate him, and as further efforts are made to respire more water is taken in and has to be swallowed. Meanwhile, the oxygen in the lungs is gradually diminishing, the quantity of carbonic acid is increasing, and at length the air in the lungs becomes too impure to effect an exchange with the blood. Then the blood passing into the heart becomes venous and the heart begins to send out venous instead of arterial blood to all parts of the body. Immediately a dull, sickening pain becomes apparent at the base of the neck, and insensibility rapidly ensues. This arises from the affection of the respiratory nerve centre. In a short space of time the face becomes dark and congested through the veins being gorged with blood, and the heart ultimately ceases to beat.
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| Fig. 1.—1st Release Method. |
When a person unable to swim falls into the water, he usually rises to the surface, throws up his arms and calls for help. This, with the water swallowed, will make him sink, and if the arms are moved above the head when under water, he will, as a natural consequence, sink still lower. The struggle will be prolonged a few seconds, and then probably cease for a time, allowing him to rise again, though perhaps not sufficiently high to enable him to get another breath of air. If still conscious, he will renew his struggle, more feebly perhaps, but with the same result. As soon as insensibility occurs, the body sinks altogether, owing to the loss of air and the filling of the stomach with water. There is a general belief that a drowning person must rise three times before he finally sinks, but this is a fallacy. The question whether he rises at all, or how often he does so, entirely depends upon circumstances. A man may get entangled among weeds, which prevent his coming to the surface, or he may die through heart failure from the shock or fright of entering the water.
On seeing a person struggling in the water in danger of drowning, no time should be lost in going to his assistance, for he may sink at once, and then there is danger of missing the body when searching under water for it, or it may get entangled among weeds and then the rescuer’s task is rendered doubly dangerous. Before diving in to the rescue the boots and heavy clothing should be discarded if possible, and in cases where a leap has to be made from a height, such as a bridge, high embankment, vessel or pier, or where the depth of the water is not known, it is best to drop in feet first. Where weeds abound there is always danger of entanglement, and therefore progress should be made in the direction of the stream. When approaching a drowning man there is always the danger of being clutched, but a swimmer who knows the right way to deal with a man in the water can easily avoid this; but if through some mistake he finds himself seized by the drowning person, a necessary thing for the swimmer to do is to take advantage of his knowledge of the water and keep uppermost, as this weakens the drowning person and makes the effort of effecting a release much easier than would otherwise be the case. To the Royal Life Saving Society in England is due the credit of disseminating, throughout the entire world, the ideas of swimmers, based on practical experience, as to the safest methods which should be adopted for release and rescue, and their methods, as well as the approved ones for resuscitation, are now taught in almost every school and college.
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| Fig. 2.—2nd Release Method. |
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| Fig. 3.—3rd Release Method. |
If the rescuer be held by the wrists, he must turn both arms simultaneously against the drowning person’s thumbs, and bring his arms at right angles to the body, thus dislocating the thumbs of the drowning person if he does not leave go (fig. 1). If he be clutched round the neck he must take a deep breath and lean well over the drowning person, at the same time placing one hand in the small of his back, then raise the other arm in line with the shoulder, and pass it over the drowning person’s arm, then pinch the nostrils close with the fingers, and at the same time place the palm of the hand on the chin and push away with all possible force. By the firm holding of the nose the drowning person is made to open his mouth for breathing, and as he will then be under water, choking ensues and he gives way to the rescuer, who then gains complete control (fig. 2). One of
