The respiratory murmur was fair over the upper twothirds of the right lung, but faint towards the base. Percussion gave a normal note, except at a small point just at the apex and at the base, where the sound was dull. A good deal of bone had been discharged by the wounds during convalescence. A French soldier had a Minie* ball driven through his right chest at Inkerman. It entered an inch below the nipple, between two of the ribs, and escaped behind, exactly opposite the place of its entrance, within two inches of the spine, fracturing one rib, and chipping another. Severe haemoptysis and bleeding from the wound followed. He was bled frequently, and kept very low afterwards. Most violent inflammation set in, and effusion took place into the pleural cavity.
The fluid was not evacuated; but while it was being absorbed, the, wound of entrance having closed, a most violent and prolonged attack of trismus seized him, which, for a couple of days, threatened to cause death, but which ultimately yielded to large doses of opium, without the spasms WOUNDS 09 THE CHEST becoming general over the body. This patient perfectly I was sent to Franc-. A soldier of the (luards was struek at Inkennan by a ritle l>all. which was fired at a short distance behind him by one of our own men. It entered hi- low the angle of the right scapula, 11 the fourth and fifth ribs. the upper edge of the latter. The very profuse, and much Mood escaped by the wounds.
He sank down exhausted, almost immediately.n receipt of the wound, and lost consciousness shortly afterwards. He lay a considerable time, he could no: how long, before he recovered. When he was received into hospital, blood continued to ooze from his wounds, he spat constantly, and his breathing was greatly impeded. He was bled twice during his stay in the and when I saw him, a mouth afterwards, he had in a great nica.-uiv recovered. The exit wound had closed, but that of entrance had taken on a. ph. denie action for some days, and was not yet healed. The act. -d well; he could lie on either side; and, to all appearance, he was in a fair way to a complete no adhesions are formed, by which the bailor bodies driven into the thorax are arrested, rally are found lying on the diaphragm, in the angle formed by it and the costal walls, and close to the of a ball through a bur: has been occasionally found to In becoming lined by containing curdy pus.
Tinpulm-'. may, or may not, have an of the OF THE CRIMEAN WAR. chest. A circumscribed abscess may exist between the ribs and the lung, or be in the substance itself, and communicate with this track. The perfect manner in which these collections, and the track connected with them, are closed off from the lung, and the evil which may arise from the presence of this pus, make it a question, which the facts before me do not enable me to discuss, whether, or not, it would be advisable to evacuate it by operation, seeing that our modern means of diagnosis would permit of its detection. This evacuation could be accomplished by such a puncture through the parietes, as would insure the closure of the wound as soon as the object was effected.