Question.—“Sir B. Brodie tells us that while paroxysms of tetanic convulsion last there is no difference between those that arise from strychnia and those from tetanus properly so called, but only in the course the symptoms take. What do you say is the difference?”
Answer.—“The hands are less violently contracted; the effect of the spasm is less in ordinary tetanus; the convulsion, too, never entirely passes away. I have stated that tetanus is a disease of days, strychnia of hours and minutes; that convulsive twitchings are in strychnia the first symptoms, the last in tetanus; that in tetanus the hands, feet, and legs are usually the last affected, while in strychnia they are the first. I gave that opinion after the symptoms in the case of the lady at Leeds which were described by the witness Witham, and I still adhere to it. I never said that Cook’s was a case of idiopathic tetanus in any sense of the word. It differed from the course of tetanus from strychnine in the particulars I have already mentioned.”
The Attorney-General.—“Repeat them.”
Answer.—“There was a sudden accession of the convulsions.”
Question.—“Sudden—after what?”
Answer.—“After the rousing by Jones. There was also the power of talking.”
Question.—“Don’t you know that Mrs. Smyth talked and retained her consciousness to the end: that her last words were, ‘Turn me over’?”
Answer.—“She did say something of that kind. No doubt those were the words she used. I believe that in poison tetanus the symptoms are first observed in the legs and feet. In the animals upon which I have experimented twitchings in the ears and difficulty of breathing have been premonitory symptoms.”
Question.—“When Cook felt a stiffness and difficulty of breathing, and said that he should be suffocated on the first night, what were they but premonitory symptoms?” (question evaded).
Answer.—“Well, he asked to be rubbed; but as far as my experience goes with regard to animals——.”