Part of a Letter from Sir Robert Sibbald, to Dr. Sloane, Concerning Several Stones Voided by a Boy, etc.

purging stoutly, said, There, Mistress, is Gold for you. A Child in the Cradle having also tasted of the Pye, was much dosed, and turned its Mouth to and again, and thus they continued for some Days, and then became well. All which was confirmed to me by the Man and Wife of the said House, where we then went to refresh ourselves (they then keeping a Publick House). Here it may be queried, whether the Yellow Colour the Flowers running in their Minds (which the eating of the Roots had now depraved) might not beget that Idea in them, to fancy most things to be Gold, they also being Yellow. VI Part of a Letter from Sir Robert Sibbald, to Dr. Sloane, concerning several Stones voided by a Boy, &c. This same Month of June, a rare Case occur'd to me in the Person of a Boy, going in the Thirteenth Year of his Age, Son to a Friend; this Boy had the Misfortune Four Weeks ago to fall backwards upon a Stone, against which the hinder Part of his Head was struck with such Force, that (as they who were thereby informed me) he lay the Fourth part of an Hour without Sense, and the next Day vomited some Blood, he felt a Pain and Weight in the hinder part of his Head and Neck, and lost Appetite. He concealed his Case, and so nothing was done for more than a Fortnight. After the Fall he went into the Country, and stayed a few Days, Days, and as he was coming back he had a frequent Desire to Piss, and lighted from the Horse several times, but could make no Urine; he vomited in this time; the Suppression had continued Twenty Four Hours and more, when I came to visit him. He had a great Pain in his Head, a Pain in his Back and Groines, and in the Region of the Bladder, which was swell'd, and he could not suffer it to be touch'd. I caused some mild Diuretics to be given to him presently, anointed his Groines and the Regio Pubis with the usual Ointment, and caused a Clyster to be injected; upon which, that Night he passed first some Sand, and then some Urine by Spoonfuls. I caused him afterwards to be put in an half Bath of Appropriate Simples: He was the Days following let Blood and Purged; and because the Pain and Weight in his Head troubled him much, a Large Vesicator was applied to the Nucha, which discharged much Humour from it. While this was a doing, he past very much Sand of a Greyish and Whitish Colour; and after the first Purge, began to pass Stones by the Yard, of a considerable Bigness, with Pain in the Back sometime before they fell down, then in the Groines, or along the Ureters, and most in the Right Side, yet sometimes in the Left also. He found the Yard much dilated while they passed it, and he had a Smarting Pain then and while the Urine flowed; the Stones came in with the first of the Urine: He got several Emulsions which had good Effect. Some of the Stones were Round, some Oval, some of these Shapes R r Some Some of a Pyramidal Form, some Cubical. The Colours were different, some whitish, some brown, some blewish, some black, or of a dark Colour; the Consistence of a sandy Stone, and some looked like to Bricks, some in the thickness the Tenth Part of an Inch, some the Twelfth part of it, some half an Inch long; most of them approached to a Triangular Form. He found a Weight in the Bladder when they fell down; and he told me, he was sensible they came down the Ureters. He leaped and ran sometimes to hasten their Descent. I was present when he past One, and I heard it fall into the Urinal, and saw it there; his Relations saw most of them when they were past. These Stones are not made up of several Coats upon other (as many confirmed Stones are) but look like Bricks, and may easily be mouldred to Powder. In a Fortnights time he hath past above Threecore of them by the Yard. Since my writing this, the Boy (who is but going Thirteen Years (as his Parents say) hath passed several Triangular Stones, some thicker than the Sixth part of an Inch; and upon the 20th and 21st Instant he hath passed Three by the Fundament, Two of them Triangular pretty big, and One as big as a little Plumb, but of the Shape of a Pear, of the same sandy Consistence as the former, and of a Greyish Colour. He hath past none by the Yard since he past these the other way. I was inquisitive about his Diet, and was told by his Parents, that for some Years that they lived near to the Shoar of the Firth of Forth, the Boy ran often after the Women that catched the Sand Eels (Ammodites) and brought Home his Pockets full of them, which oftentimes he boiled without taking Pains (as he ought) to free them of the Sand that stuck to them. This, with the Glutinous Juice of that Fish, and the Sand mixed with with the Bread, and other Aliments he used, hath furnished abundant Matter for these Stones, it is like (since he never had any Symptome of this before the Fall he got of late) the Hurt in the Hinder Part of the Head might have occasioned some Torpor in the Nerves, so that the Fibrillæ in the Kidneys could not act so vigorously (as need was) in the Separation and Expulsion of the Sand; and thus it came to gather and form into Stones. He continueth passing daily several of them with great Quantities of Sand, notwithstanding the usual Remedies are continued. This is a Specimen of the Art of Nature and her Mechanism, in giving such various Shapes to these Stones, by directing the Matter so regularly to such Forms. I shall give you some Cases which shew her Power in dissolving Stones, when coated and of a more united Texture. The First occur'd in a Worthy Friend of mine, a Reverend Divine now above the Seventieth Year of his Age. He, after he hath these Ten Years past suffered much from a confirmed Stone he hath in his Bladder, since the beginning of this last Winter he hath passed a vast Number of Slices of several Figures, many of them cornered and pointed, much of the thickness of a Shilling Sterling, white within and smooth, but without of a dark Colour, with Pain, and sometimes a Suppression of Urine for several Hours precedeth them; he maketh use of the usual Remedies; in the Intervals he hath tolerable good Health. I was told by an expert Physician, a Friend of mine, of Two Patients of his, the One yet alive, who after passing an incredible Number of these Slices, is now in perfect Health, and free of that Disease. The other, who died long ago, after passing for a long time such Slices, became free of the Disease, and when his Body was opened at his Death, no Stone nor Slices were found in his Bladder. So even in this obstinate Disease, sometimes Natura est Medicatrix.