Show A SURE SURD TEST OF SEATS DEATTE the english public has been having a little scare over pier nature ture burial a subject that seems never to lack in interest when a sensation la Is desired flO Elred and though the medical authorities have been strenuously denyl denying n g the possibility sib lity of mistakes of this his hind ki it except under extraordinary conditions condl irions the matter continues to be ventilated in tha tit e public prints in this connection na W B 5 wilbea to the lancet october aith that what seems to be an infallible means of 0 real from rom apparent death has been quite generally overlooked this test depends on the fact that an electric current Is able to contract tho the muscles muscle for only a few hours after death all excitability or of this kind ceasing thereafter wo we quote below what lie has to say eay on the sua eject forty years oso ago the subject was investigated vesti gated by Crl CrI motel twenty years later by rosenthal and more recently re c antly by onimus it seems safe to say sa that irk no disease di certainly in none of at those conditions cond scions u usually sus ily enumerated as likely to be mistaken lor for death abolished I 1 Is gal eal i ante and faradic excitability abolished in every muscle of the body on the other hand electa omus cular co contractility disappears in fill all the tn 4 leg all within a few hours after death 1 ken brally ninety minutes to three hours to rosenthal haJ its persistence varying to some extent wt with th thi the particular examined find and with the mode of death therefore it electro tro contractility be present in any muscle it means life or death only a lew few hours before it Is clear that no interment or postmortem post mortem examination ought to take place so long us as there iq 1 any nicker flicker of electric excitability to me it seems almost equally obvious that in all doubtful cases sometimes in ili sudden death and often to allay the anxiety of friends this test ought to be applied and applied by one who I 1 Is q accustom d to handle electric currents current s for purposes of diagnosis |