Show OUR ANCESTORS WERE HEROIC they shed not only on the field of honor the following extract from a letter written by dr rush of philadelphia published in new york april 13 1795 is reminiscent of the spartan treatment to which our ailing ancestors submitted themselves in the primitive days of american medicine A disease called the pleurisy has proved fatal to many people in philadelphia it appears to be a continuation of the bilious remittent fever of last autumn accompanied only with symptoms which symptoms arc by no means it requires not only very copious bleeding but daily purges with calomel and aalop co subdue it by means of these remedies I 1 have out of upward of one hundred cases lost only two patients and they were in the last stages of the disorder when I 1 saw them I 1 have in one case been forced to take one hundred and twenty ounces of blood at thirteen bleedings in eight days before the disease yielded and in another case I 1 have taken thirty ounces of blood at four bleedings in seventeen hours the pulse in the last case was so low as scarcely to be perceptible it rose in the most sensible manner after each bleeding the patient a delicate lady isnow out of danger from observation I 1 have long ago made and which experience has lately confirmed I 1 am satisfied that when physicians are not almost uniformly successful in curing febrile diseases they are under the influence of erroneous theories or if their theories be true their practice is too feeble to overcome the disease |