An Abstract of a Letter from Dr. Peirce of Bath, to One of the S. of the R. S. Giving an Account of a Shell Found in One of the Kidneys of a Woman

An Abstract of a Letter from Dr. Peirce of Bath, to one of the S. of the R. S. giving an account of a Shell found in one of the Kidneys of a Woman. Sir, The Account of the Shell found in the Kidney of a Woman is as follows; A Gentle-Woman of about 28 years of Age, very Fat, and Corpulent, after having been long troubled with frequent, and sometimes violent Vomitings, fell at length into a Fever, which had no very ill Symptomes at first; yet she died in few days, and on a sudden: for the satisfaction of her Relations, the body was opend; the lower Region being first examind, I quickly found what might account for her long Vomiting (and perhaps her Fever and Death too,) Scil. an Ulcer in the Pancreas; which had Sphacelated some part of the Stomac and Bowells, that lay nearest to it. But there having been many things taken for the Stone, (many Physicians, as well as others, imputing her Vomiting to that Distemper,) I was willing to see in what condition her Kidneys were. They were covered with a prodigious quantity of Fat; which removing with my hand, and reaching one of the Kidneys I felt something prick my Finger in the lower part of the Kidney where the Ureter is inferred: I presently concluded it to be a Stone, and kept hold of it till I made my way to it with my knife and took it out (with an abundance of mucous bloody matter about it,) and laid it by in the window: opening the Kidneys, I found not so much as Gravell' (much less any Stone,) in either of them: upon further examination of this matter, (supposd to be a Stone,) by washing off the mucus that was about it, I found it to be a small Shell, very finely Wrought; in the hollow of it there was a mucous slimy matter, not at all unlike the substance of a snail as to consistence; but of a bloody colour. Fig. 3d. Represents the Shell in its true bigness. Fig. 4th. Shews the same Shell somewhat magnified: those indented Checkers, are every other a little depres'd, and elated: and very exactly Wrought: there are six or seven spiral lines or Rounds, in the Turban. I am Sir Your very Humble Servant ROBERT PEIRCE, Bath April 11th, 1685.