The generation of gas in the body, with all its consequences, was thoroughly understood when M. Fontenelle wrote, but whatever could weaken his case is systematically suppressed. Nor is there in the whole of his book one single case bearing out his position that is attested by a name of the slightest reputation, or for which much better authority could be found than the Greek manuscript in the handwriting of Solomon, found by a peasant while digging potatoes at the foot of Mount Lebanon. It is no unreasonable scepticism to assume that the majority of the persons revived had never even lived. turned in their coffins, and the grave-clothes | a direct effect in determining a flow of blood disarranged. But what was ascribed, with from the wound, where it chanced that the seeming reason, to the throes of vitality, is current, by the impulse of the gas, was now known to be due to the agency of nearly ready to break forth. A latitude corruption. A gas is developed in the de- would not fail to be allowed to the expericaying body which mimics by its mechanical ment. If at any time afterward the body force many of the movements of life. So sweated or bled, it would never have been powerful is this gas in corpses which have doubted that it was prompted by the preslain long in the water, that M. Devergie, ence of the murderer, though the manifestthe physician to the Morgue at Paris, and ation was delayed. One success bears out the author of a text-book on legal medicine, many failures, for failures imply the absence says that unless secured to the table they of notable incidents, and having nothing to are often heaved up and thrown to the arrest attention are quickly forgotten, while ground. Frequently strangers, seeing the the wonders of a success take hold of the motions of the limbs, run to the keeper of mind and live in the memory. the Morgue, and announce with horror that a person is alive. All bodies, sooner or later, generate the gas in the grave, and it constantly twists about the corpse, blows out the skin till it rends with the distention, and sometimes bursts the coffin itself. When the gas explodes with a noise, imagination has converted it into an outcry or groan; the grave has been re-opened; the position of the body has confirmed the suspicion, and the laceration been taken for evidence that the wretch had gnawed his flesh in the frenzy of despair. So many are the circumstances which will occasionally concur to support a conclusion that is more unsubstantial than the fabric of a dream. Violent and painful diseases, which kill speedily, are favorable to the rapid formation of the gas; may then exist two or three hours after death, and agitating the limbs gives rise to the idea that the dormant life is rousing itself up to another effort. Not infrequently the food in the stomach is forced out through the mouth, and blood poured from the nose, or the opening in a vein where a victim of apoplexy has been attempted to be bled. Extreme mental distress has resulted from these fallacious symptoms, for where they occur it is commonly supposed that the former appearance of death was deceitful, and that recovery was possible if attendance had been at hand. it The old superstition, that a murdered body would send forth a bloody sweat in the murderer's presence, or bleed from the wound at his touch, must have had its origin in the same cause. The sweat, which has been repeatedly observed, is produced by the struggling gas driving out the fluids at the pores of the skin. Through a rare coincidence, it may possibly have occurred during the period that the assassin was confronted with the corpse; and the ordeal of the touch, in compressing the veins, would have Yet not only is this book still in vogue, but the French newspapers annually multiply these tales to an extent which would be frightful if they were not refuted by their very number. An English country editor, in want of a paragraph, proclaims that a bird of passage has been shot out of season, that an apple-tree has blossomed in October, or that a poor woman has added to her family from three to half a dozen children at a birth, and by the latest advices was doing well. But we are tame and prosaic in our insular tastes. Our agreeable neighbors require a stronger stimulus, and therefore endless changes are rung upon the theme of living men buried, and dead men brought to life again. Shakspeare, who, it is evident from numerous passages in his dramas, had watched by many a dying bed with the same interest and sagacity that he bestowed upon those who were playing their part in the busy world, has summed up the more obvious characteristics of death in the description the Friar gives to Juliet of the effects of the draught, which is to transform her into the temporary likeness of a corpse : "No pulse shall keep His natural progress, but surcease to beat No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou livest; These are the ordinary signs by which "Lend me a looking-glass; If that her breath will mist or stain the stone, "the critical tests of death ;" and presuming that the Romans could not be ignorant of them, he thought their calling in the ears of corpses "a vanity of affection,❞—an ostentation of summoning the departed back to life when it was known by other infallible means that life had fled. But it is now held to be a better method to scrutinize the movements of the chest and belly: one or both of which will rise and fall while any breathing whatsoever continues. It is generally, however, expedient to leave the body undisturbed for two or three hours after all seems over; for the case of Colonel Townshend, related by Cheyne in his "English Malady," appears to favor the supposition, that though the heart and lungs have both stopped, life may now and then linger a little longer than usual. Colonel Townshend, described as 66 a gentleman of great honor and integrity," was in a dying state. a dying state. One morning he informed his physicians, Dr. Cheyne and Dr. Baynard, and his apothecary, Mr. Skrine, that he had found for some time "he could expire when he pleased, and by an effort come to life again." He composed himself for the trial, while one felt his pulse, another his heart, and the third applied a looking-glass to his mouth. Gradually the pulse ceased to beat, the heart to throb, the breath to stain the mirror, until the nicest scrutiny could discover no indication that he lived. Thus he continued for half an hour: his physicians believing that he had carried the experiment too far and was dead beyond recall, when life returned, as it had receded, by gradual steps. It was at nine o'clock in the morning that the trial was made, and at six in the evening Colonel Townshend was a corpse. The post-mortem examination did nothing toward clearing up the mystery. His only disorder was a cancer of the right kidney, which accounted for his death, without accounting for his singular power of suspending at will the functions of life. Many And immediately afterward he adds, This boldly cut the knot they are not able to un feather stirs she lives! The same test which led Lear to the fallacious inference that Cordelia lived, induced Prince Henry to infer falsely that his father was dead : tie, and maintain that there was an action of wanted the skill to perceive. The narrative the heart and lungs which the physicians of Cheyne leaves an opening for criticism; but let it be considered that he was a man of eminence, that all three attendants were professional persons, accustomed to mark and estimate symptoms, that their attention was aroused to the utmost by previous notice, and that they had half an hour to conduct their observations; and it must at least be acknowledged that the signs which escaped them were too obscure to be a safe criterion for the world at large. Yet, whatever may be its other physiological bearings, it is no exception to the rule that life and breath are, for the purposes of sepulture, convertible terms. Without attaching importance to a principal peculiarity of the case, that it required an effort of the will to bring Colonel Townshend into the state, and that by an effort of the will he could bring himself out of it, he was unable, after all, to prolong the period of suspension, or apparently suspended, animation beyond a single half hour; and in order to his being buried alive he must have been a party to the act, and prepared his funeral in advance. The assumption, indeed, pervades M. Fontenelle's book, that everybody wrongly supposed to be dead had a narrow escape of premature interment, though it has never been long, in any instance that is known to be authentic, before some outward sign attracted attention, unless death had merely slackened his pace instead of turning aside his footsteps. Funerals, it is true, on the Continent take place sooner than with us. In Spain, if M. Fontenelle's word is a warrant for the fact, whoever oversleeps himself will have to finish out his slumbers in the grave,-which, beyond doubt, is the most powerful incentive to early rising that was ever devised. But in France, the grand theatre for these harrowing tragedies, it is usual to bury on the third day; and if at that interval it was common for seeming corpses to revive, we, in this country, should be habituated to behold persons whose death had been announced, whose knell had tolled, and whose coffins had been made, rise up and doff their grave-clothes, to appear once more among astonished friends. Yet so far is this from being frequent occurrence, that whoever heard in modern England of a person who had been numbered three days among the dead resuming his vacant place among the living? At sea there may be better ground for apprehension. Nothing more excites the superstitious fears of a sailor than a cat thrown overboard, or a corpse that is not; and very shortly after death occurs it is usual to transfer the body from the ship to the deep. On one occasion a man, with concussion of the brain, who had lost the power of speech and motion, overheard what must have been to him the most interesting conversation that ever fell upon his ears,- -a discussion between his brother and the captain of the vessel, as to whether he should immediately be consigned to the waves, or be carried to Rotterdam, to be buried on shore. Luckily their predilec tions were for a land funeral; and, though a colloquy so alarming might have been expected to complete the injury to the poor man's brain, he recovered from the double shock of fright and disease. Dr. Alfred Taylor, who has treated the signs of death with the sound sense and science that distinguish all his writings upon legal medicine, relates the anecdote as if he was satisfied of its truth, and the fate which one has narrowly missed, it is not impossible may have overtaken others. But even at sea, nothing short of the grossest negligence could occasion the calamity; and for negligence, we repeat, there is no effectual cure. The ceasing to breathe is not the only criterion of death antecedent to corruption. There is a second token specified by Shakspeare, and familiar to every village nurse, which is quite conclusive, the gradual transition from suppleness to rigidity. The first effect of death is relaxation of the muscles. The lower jaw usually drops, the limbs hang heavily, the joints are flexible, and the flesh soft. The opposite state of contraction ensues; then the joints are stiff and the flesh firm, and the body, lately yielding and pliant, becomes hard and unbending. The contraction commences in the muscles of the neck and trunk, appears next in the upper extremities, then in the lower, and finally recedes in the same order in which it came on. It begins on an average five or six hours after death, and ordinarily continues from sixteen to twenty-four. But the period both of its appearance and duration are considerably varied by the constitution of the person, the nature of the death, and the state of the atmosphere. With the aged and feeble, with those who die of chronic diseases, and are wasted away by lingering sickness, it comes on quickly-sometimes in half an hour-and remains for a period which is short in proportion to the rapidity of its appearance. With the strong and the muscular, with the greater part of the persons who perish by a sudden or violent death in the fullness of their powers, it is slow in advancing, and slow in going off. In cases like these, it is often a day or two before it commences, and it has been known to last a week. When decay begins its reign, this interregnum of contraction is at an end, and therefore a warm and humid atmosphere, which hastens corruption, curtails the period of rigidity, while it is protracted in the cold and dry weather that keeps putrefaction at bay. Though a symptom of some disorders, there is this clear line between mortal rigid ity and the spasm of disease-that in the latter the attack is never preceded by the appearance of death. In the one case the result comes after a train of inanimate phenomena; in the other, amidst functions peculiar to life. The alarmists, who deal in extravagant fables, will persist in retaining unreasonable fears; but upon no question are medical authorities more thoroughly agreed than that the moment the contraction of the muscles is apparent, there can be no revival unless the breath of life could be breathed afresh into the untenanted clay. storm which had spent its fury before life was extinct; for usually in natural death there is a lull at the last, and the setting is peaceful, however tempestuous the decline. In strict reason it can matter nothing, when the weary are once at rest, whether the concluding steps of the journey were toilsome or pleasant; but it is so much our instinct to attach importance to last impressions, and wounded hearts are so sensitive, that to many it will be a relief to know their inferences are mistaken and their grief misplaced. When the heat-developing faculty is extinct the body obeys the laws of inanimate objects, and coincident for the most part with the stage of rigidity is that chill and clammy condition of the skin which is so familiarly associated with death. To judge by the feelings, the atmosphere is genial compared to the corpse. But the skin of the dead is a powerful conductor, and the rapidity with which it appropriates the warmth of the living leaves a chill behind which is a deceitful measure of its actual frost. The length of time which a body takes to cool will depend upon the state of the body itself, and the circumstances in which it may chance to be placed. The process will be slower when it is well wrapped up than when lightly covered; in summer than in winter; in a still atmosphere than in currents of air; with the stout than with the thin; with persons in their prime than with the aged or the young. Usually in proportion as the disease is acute, and the death rapid, the less heat has been expended before the fire is extinguished, and the corpse will be the longer in parting with its warmth. If the disease is slow, the lamp burns dimly before it quite goes out, and the temperature, declining during life, will afterward arrive the sooner at its lowest point. This will also happen in particular disorders which, though sudden and violent, are hostile to the development of animal warmth. In certain forms of hysteria, in swoons, and in cholera morbus, the body, to the touch, might sometimes seem a corpse. An icy skin is not of itself an evidence of death, but it is sooner or later an unfailing accompaniment. There is one effect of the muscular contraction of death which often occasions erroneous and painful ideas. In the stage of relaxation, when the muscles fall, and there is neither physical action nor mental emotion to disturb the calm, the countenance assumes the "mild, angelic air" described by Byron in The Giaour, and which he says in a note lasts for "a few, and but a few hours" after the spirit has taken flight. It is the accession of muscular contraction which dissipates the charm, which knits the brow, draws down the mouth, pinches the features, and changes a soft and soothing expression to a harsh, uneasy, suffering look. Where the contraction is slight the face is less disturbed; and Dr. Symonds has known it drawn into a seeming smile. Those who may only chance to see the corpse of a relative while it bears the care-worn aspect which is far the most frequent, are distressed at what they suppose to be an indication that the latest impressions of the world were troubled -that death took place amid pain of body and sorrow of mind. It appears from the Journal of Sir Walter Scott, who evidently visited the mortal remains of his wife during the crisis of contraction, what a pang the sight communicated to a heart which, if quick to feel, could never be outdone in the resolution to endure. Violent passions, extreme agony, and protracted suffering may give a set to the muscles which the rigid state will bring out anew into strong relief. But the expression of the face is chiefly determined by the condition of the body, or, in other words, by the degree of contraction. Persons who have died of exhausting dis- To rigidity succeeds corruption, which, eases will often, notwithstanding they expire both from its own nature and the surroundin despair, wear a look of benign repose; ing circumstances, cannot possibly be conwhile a more muscular subject who fell founded with vital gangrene. It commences asleep in peaceful hope, may be distinguish in the belly, the skin of which turns to a ed by a mournful, lowering visage. Even bluish green, that gradually deepens to brown when the expression is influenced by the or black, and progressively covers the remainbent which was given to the muscles by pre-der of the body. But when the bue of puvious feelings, it is mostly the memorial of a trefaction has spread over the belly there is a risk to health, without an addition to security, in waiting for the further encroachments of decay. In England a body is seldom committed to the ground before there is set upon it this certain mark that it is hurrying to the dust from whence it sprung. Nor is the haste which is used at some seasons, and in some diseases, a real deviation from the rule. The rapid onset of corruption creates the necessity, and that which renders the burial speedy ensures its being safe. Of the innumerable paths which terminate in the common goal some are easier to tread than others, and it might be expected from the diversities of temperament that there would be a difference of opinion about which was best. Cæsar desired the death which was most sudden and unexpected. His words were spoken at supper, and the following morning the Senate-house witnessed the fulfillment of the wish. Pliny also considered an instantaneous death the highest felicity of life; and Augustus held a somewhat similar opinion. When he heard that any person had died quickly and easily, he invoked the like good fortune for himself and his friends. Montaigne was altogether of Caesar's party, and, to use his own metaphor, thought that the pill was swallowed best without chewing. If Sir Thomas Browne had been of Cæsar's religion, he would have shared his desires, and preferred going off at a single blow to being grated to pieces with a torturing disease. He conceived that the Eastern favorite who was killed in his sleep, would hardly have bled at the presence of his destroyer. Sir Thomas Browne was one of those men who habitually apply their hearts unto wisdom, and his latter end, come when it might, would have found him prepared. But Christianity, in enlarging our hopes, has added to our fears. He felt that the mode of dying was comparatively an insignificant consideration, and however much he inclined by nature to Cæsar's choice, and studied to be ready for the hastiest summons, a sense of infirmity taught him the wisdom of that petition in the Litany by which we ask to be delivered from sudden death. With the majority flesh and blood speak the same language; they had rather that the candle should burn to the socket than the flame be blown out. The prospect, nevertheless, of protracted suffering will sometimes drive desperate beings to seek a shorter and easier passage from the world. Many of the Romans during the plague of Syracuse attacked the posts of the enemy, that they might fall by the sword instead of the pestilence. Every day for a considerable period of the French Revolution, numbers drowned themselves in the Seine, to anticipate the tedious anguish of famine." Death, which in one form is fled from as an enemy, in a different shape is welcomed as a friend. A condemned soldier, in Montaigne's time, remarked some preparations from his prison which led him to think he was to perish by torture; he resolved to discharge for himself the executioner's office, though he had no other weapon than a rusty nail, which, having first ineffectually mangled his throat, he thrust into his belly to the very head. The authorities hastened to his cell to read out the sentence, that the law might yet be beforehand with death. The soldier, sufficiently sensible to hear what was passing, found that his punishment was simple beheading. He immediately rallied, expressed his delight, accepted wine to recruit his strength, and by the change in the kind of death seemed, says Montaigne, as though he was delivered from death itself. If his suspicions had proved correct, it is difficult to suppose that his tormentors could have improved on his own performances with the rusty nail. Gustavus Adolphus, who realized his aspirations on the field of Lutzen, was in the habit of saying that no man was happier than he who died in the exercise of his calling. So Nelson wished the roar of cannon to sound his parting knell. "You know that I always desired to die this way," said Moore to Hardinge at Corunna-and the anguish of the wound had no power to disturb his satisfaction. Marshal Villars was told in his latest moments that the Duke of Berwick had just met at the seige of Philipsburg with a soldier's death, and he answered, "I have always said that he was more fortunate than myself." His confessor urged with justice that the better fortune was to have leisure to prepare for eternity;-but possibly the exclamation proceeded from a momentary gleam of martial ardor, which instinct kindled, and reflection quenched. A Christian would never, indeed, fail to make the preparation for battle a preparation for death. Unless " "every soldier in the wars do as every sick man in his bed, wash every mote out of his conscience," he must know that he is staking both soul and body on the hazard of the fight. Soldiers," says an old divine, "that carry their lives in their hands, should carry the grace of God in their hearts." Death at the cannon's mouth may be sudden, and answer the first of Cæsar's conditions; with none but the presumptuous 66 |