Vegetating Excrescences in the Ear
(By F. J. J. Rigot.)
Productions of this kind, which he had the opportunity of observing only once, are sometimes united in masses, and completely close the auditive canal. The surface is granulated and black, and there escapes from it an unctuous fetid discharge. On both sides the animal is exceedingly susceptible of pain, and the excrescences bleed if the slightest pressure is brought to bear upon them.
He thought it right to cut away these excrescences bodily, which he found to be composed of a strong dense tissue, permitting much blood to escape through an innumerable quantity of vascular openings. They were reproduced with extreme promptitude after they had been cut off or cauterized. Some of them appeared no more after being destroyed by the nitrate of mercury.
Sometimes, however, twenty-four hours after a simple incision, not followed by cauterization, these productions acquire an almost incredible size. It seemed, in M. Rigot's case, to be impossible to conquer the evil, and the patient was destroyed.
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