CHLOROFORM.

Lyttelton Times, Volume III, Issue 153, 10 December 1853, Page 9

CHLOROFORM.

In a recent number of Benlley's Miscellany there is a good deal of curious information upon the subject of Chloroform. The following1 is said to be a faithful description of an incident witnessed by the writer, at one of our country hospitals to which he is attached. The man in question was a hard drinker, and a dose of chloroform which would have placed most persons in deep sleep deprived him of sensation, but went no further than exciting the phantasms of a dunken dream. The scene occurs in the operating theatre; —a strong1, surly-looking, bull-headed, " navvy," whose leg had been smashed by a railway accident, is borne in, and gently placed on the table. His face is damp and pale, he casts an anxious eager look around, then with a shudder, closes his eyes, and lies down on his back. The chloroform apparatus is now applied to his mouth, and a dead silence marks the general expectancy. The man's face flushes—he struggles, and some muffled exclamations are heard. In a minute or two more the gentleman who lias charge of the chloroform examines his eyes, touches the eye-ball—the lids wink not, the operator steps forward, and in a trice the limb is transfixed with the long bistoury. Some intelligence now animates the patient's face, which bears a look of drunken jollity. "Ha ! ha! ha !'' " Capital ! " he shouts, evidently in imagination with his boon companions ;" a jolly good song, and jolly well sung! I always know'd Jem was a good un to chaunt! I sing! dash my wig if I ain't as husky as a broken winded 'os. Wei!, if I must, I must, so here goes." By this time the bone has been bared, and the operator saws, while the patient shouts ",'Tis my delight o' a moonlight night— Whose that a treading on my toe ? None o' your tricks, Jem ! Hold your jaw, will you ? Who can sing when you are making such a blessed row ? Tol-de-rol-1011. Come, gi'e us a drop, will ye ? What ! drunk it all ? Ye greedy beggars! I'll fight the best man among ye for half a farden ! " and straightway he endeavours to hit out, narrowly missing the spectacles of a gentleman in a white cravat, who steps hastily back, and exclaims, " hold him fast! " The leg being now separated is placed under the table, and the arteries are tied, -with some little difficulty, on account of the unsteadiness of the patient, who, besides his pugnacity in general, has a quarrel with an imaginary bull-do<r, which he finds it necessary to kick out of the room. He, however, recovers his good humour whilst the dressings are being applied, and is borne out of the theatre shouting,* singing, and anathematising in a most stentorian voice. When in bed, however, he falls asleep, and in twenty minutes awakes very subdued, in utter ignorance that any operation had been performed, and with only a dim recollection of being taking into the theatre breathing something, and feeling " werry queer," as he expresses it. It sometimes happens that the patient feels no pain under a very cruel cutting, but is perfectly conscious of everything within reach of his observation." "We have seen a. patient following the operator with her eyes most intelligently and watchfully as he shifted his place near her, lifted his knife, and proceeded to use it —wincing not at all during its use ; answering questions by gestures very readily and plainly, and after the operation was over, narrating every event as it occurred, declaring that she knew and saw all; stating that she knew and felt that she was being cut, and yet

that she felt no pain whatever. Patients have said quietly, ' You are sawing now,' during the use of the saw in amputation; and afterwards they have declared most solemnly that though quite conscious of that part of the operation they felt no pain." The disposition to sing is by no means uncommon during the stage of excitement :—We well remember the painful astonishment of a grave elderly abstinent divine, who, on .being told after an operation that he had sang, exclaimed. " Good gracious, is it possible ! Why, my dear sir, I never sang a song in my life, and is it possible I could have so committed myself—but what could I have sung!" A little badinage took place, it being insinuated that the song was of a rather Tom-Mooreish character, till his horror becaiue so great that it was necessary to relieve his mind by telling him that" Hallelujah" was the burden of his chaunt. According to the experience of the writer in Bentlei/i chloroform is by no means disagreeable: " Circumstances led to our taking it, and, as far as we remember*, our feelings were nearly as follows: the nervousness which the anticipation of the chloroform and the expected operation had excited, gradually passed away after a few inhalations, and was succeeded by a pleasant champagny exhilaration; a seconds more and a rather unpleasant oppression of the chest led to an endeavour to express discomfort, but whilst still doing so, or rather supposing we were doing so, we were informed that the operation was over. Utterly incredulous, we sought for proof, soon found it, and then our emotions of joy were almost overwhelming. In truth we had been insensible full five minutes; but one of the peculiarities of chloroformic unconsciousness being the obliteration of memory, the mind is impressed, from the last event before the full effect of the chloroform, to the return of consciousness, with one and the same current of ideas."