6. The segment raised on a level with the lambdoidal suture, the integuments are to be united by methodical suture, and the same is to be done for the abdomen and thorax.
The seam on the scalp was not visible, because it was covered by the hair, with which the head was yet abundantly covered. The trunk was not deformed.
7. Application of the bandages.—Previously to applying the bandages, a coat of varnish is given to the whole body, with the exception of the face, and immediately upon this varnish are placed layers of lead; it is then only, that methodical bandages are made to cover all the parts, from the fingers and toes to the head; each turn of bandage was fixed by a point of suture, then covered again with another layer of varnish, with new plates of lead, and finally, with a new bandage applied with the same care as the first.
The face, until now remaining free, was submitted to the same applications, but so arranged that it could be uncovered at any time, without disturbing the rest of the bandages.
The body was then covered with a cloth, surrounded with a mantel of satin, and deposited in a leaden coffin: it was left exposed to the air for more than twenty-four hours, without exhaling any other odour than that of the aromatics employed.
The operation which had commenced at ten o’clock in the morning, was not terminated until after two in the morning.
The operation was very painful on account of the gas, particularly the chlorine, which was freely exhaled towards the latter part of the process, fatiguing the assistants, who were all tormented with a very violent irritating cough.
Such are the details of this embalming, which had been announced as constituting the perfection of the interesting necropsy described in one of the late numbers of the Bulletin Clinique.
A. Loreau,
E. Chanut.
What strange naivetè on the part of the embalmer! he had just stated that the operation was very painful on account of the gas, particularly of the chlorine, which was freely exhaled during the latter part of the process, very much fatiguing the assistants. Ought you not to have anticipated this, you who were charged with such preparations? Ought you not to have known even the inutility of such an incoherent mixture of substances?