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ELEMENTS OF MATERIA MEDIC A.

examined tlie effects of calomel on dogs, horses, and pigs, but withoutany remarkable results. Yiborg gave half an ounce, with six pounds ofwater, to a horse: the effects were cough, heaving of the flanks, quickpulse, enfeebled appetite, and in twenty-four hours loose stools. Annesleyasserts, from his experiments on dogs, that large doses of calomel diminishthe vascularity of tlie gastro-intestinal membrane.

(b.) On man. — Calomel may be ranked among the mild preparationsof mercury ; for although, in its local action, it is somewhat more power-ful than the oxide, or than those preparations which contain mercury ina finely divided state (as blue pill), yet it is much milder than any of theother salts of mercury. In small doses, as a few grains, it occasionallyexcites no obvious effects, though more commonly it acts as a purgative ;and in very susceptible persons, especially females, it sometimes producesnausea, griping, and great faintness. It appears, from the experience ofmost practitioners, that adults are more susceptible of the influence ofcalomel than children. When given to the latter, it frequently producesgreen stools, (the so-called calomel stools of Kraus),—an effect which ismore frequently observed in suckling infants, and which is usually sup-posed to arise from the action of calomel on the liver; though Zeller(quoted by Kraus) thinks it depends on alterations produced in the con-dition of the blood ; and Kraus ( Heilmittellehre , 161) is disposed to referit to the operation of calomel on the milk contained in the alimentarycanal. ( On the Effects of Calomel in producing Slimy Stools, consult Lond.Med. and Surg. Journ. Apr. 1829,344). Like other mercurials, it increasesthe action of the secreting organs, and thus promotes the secretion of bileand of intestinal mucus; and we also presume it has a similar in-fluence over the secretion of the pancreatic fluid. Neumann (Grate andWalther’s Journal, Bd. ii. II. 3. S. 432, quoted by G. A. Richter,Ausf’uhr. Arzneim. v. 492) states, that a man took two, then three, and'subsequently four grains of calomel, daily, for the space of two months,without inducing salivation; but that three months afterwards he becameaffected with chronic vomiting, the consequence of a scirrhous pancreas,of which he died in four months. From the manner in which the case isrelated, it is clear the narrator attributed the disease of the pancreas tothe use of mercury; whether justly or not, however, is impossible todetermine.

The repeated and continued use of calomel, in small doses, is attendedwith the constitutional effects of mercurial preparations generally, beforedescribed.

In large doses, it has been regarded as an irritant poison; and, judgingfrom the fatal effects ascribed to it by several writers, not without reason.Thus Hellweg (Wibmer, op. cit. iii. 71) has reported a case in which afew grains of calomel, taken as a laxative, caused death ; Vagnitius(Wibmer, op. cit.) saw fifteen grains prove fatal; and Ledelius {ibid.),half an ounce. Fr. Hoffmann has also related two fatal cases [ibid.)

“ Wliytt, Odier, Quin, Wilmer, Leib, and others,” says Golis ( Treatiseon the Hydrocephalus Acutus, by Dr. Gooch), “ gave calomel internallyin far larger doses ; as two, three, and more grains at a time; and con-tinued its use many days in the same dose, without considering the manyevacuations from the alimentary canal, or the violent colic pains; andthey affirm that they have never remarked, from the effect of this agentgiven in these large doses, any bad consequences in the abdomen.