DISSECTION,
EIGHTEEN HOURS AFTER DEATH.
The countenance continued florid. The inferior extremities were much distended with water, and the cellular membrane abounded in fat.
The right cavity of the pleura contained a moderate quantity of water; the left, scarcely any. The lungs were firm, condensed, and dark coloured, from venous blood. The pleura, on the left side opposite to the pericardium, appeared to have been inflamed, as there was an effusion of coagulated lymph on its surface.
The pericardium was much distended with water. The heart, on the anterior surface of which were some appearances of inflammation, was very much enlarged. Its parietes were thickened; its cavities unnaturally large, and filled with black coagulum. Each of the valves had lost, in some degree, its usual smoothness, and those of the aorta were, in some points, thickened, and partly cartilaginous.
The liver was small, and, when cut, poured out dark blood. Its tunic was whitish, opaque, and corrugated.
CASE V.
A. B. a negro, about thirty-five years of age, had paroxysms of dyspnœa and violent cough, attended with œdema of the extremities and ascites, violent head-ache, dizziness, brightness of the eyes, palpitations of the heart, irregular, intermittent, slow, and soft pulse. These symptoms slowly increased, during three or four years, in which time the dropsical collections were repeatedly dispersed. He gradually and quietly died in the alms-house, in January, 1809.
DISSECTION.
On dissection, the cavities of the pleura were found to contain a considerable quantity of water. The pericardium was filled with water; the heart considerably enlarged; its parietes very thin, and its cavities, especially the right auricle and ventricle, morbidly large[9].