The Sun.
London, England, 1861-12-21 00:00:00

(From the Medical Timm)

There were fluctuations from time to time, and even
within an hour of his death the Prince expressed himself
as strong enough to get out of bed ; nevertheless, a terrible
fit of congestion of the lungs ensued, in which he expired,
shortly before 11 at night.
The Prince's constitution was one of those which wasnot
calculated to bear the brunt of an enfeebling zymotic dis-
ease. In spite of an active athletic life and of careful diet,
he displayed an early tendency to increase of bulk, winch is
rarely compatible with a healthy rigidity of fibre. He was
easily depressed by a common cold or any other slight acci-
dental illness, had a feeble circulation, and firmly believed
that any severe illness would at any time be fatal to him.
How and when he contracted his fatal illness is matter of
conjecture purely. All maladies of this class have a " period
of incubation." The fatal zymotic poison is imbibed, but it
does not at once show its full effects. It broods for a cer-
tain number of days, like leaven, in the veins of the victim
before there ern•ues that shivering fit, of greater or less
intensity, which is the starting point of the actual fever.
Some poisons, like the small-pox, have fixed periods of in-
cubation ; others, as the scarlet fever, are uncertain, for
there may be no interval whatever—the fever may begin
immediately on the receipt of the poison. In the typhoid
the period of incubation is probably about a week, and the
source of the fatal poison must have been at some place
which the Prince visited during the last week cf Novem-
ber. Was it Cambridge ? Was it South Kensington ?
It is in vain to opcoulato. Tho causes of typhoid fever still
abound even in places which ought to be the most exempt
from them. Like poisons of their class, they evidently do
not affect all alike, but only some persons who are predis-
posed, and no one who travels much can be sure that ho
may not meet with them.
So soon as unfavourable symptoms manifested themselves
Sir James Clark and Dr. Jenner requested that the patient
should have the benefit of additional advice, and that their
own responsibility should be divided. This proposition was
very unwillingly entertained at first by the personage most
nearly interested, partly from her unbounded confidence in
her advisers, and partly from fear of still further depress-
ing the vital powers of the Prince, and increasing his de-
spondency by alarm at indications of increased danger. The
repeated request of the physicians, however, was at length
complied with, and two physicians were specially selected
by the Royal Family—Sir Henry Holland and Dr. Wat-
son. The confidence which the Royal Family placed in their
advisers is fully shared by the public and by the profession.
They may be sure that the most refined and energetic re-
sources of medicine and diet were employed to save and
sustain the patient's vital powers. After the fatal event the
Queen, with a calmness and dignity which never desert her,
expressed her warmest thanks to Sir Jas. Clark, as one of
her oldest and best friends ; and more than one member of
the Roy al Family testified to I,r. Jena: r their gratitude for
the attention which he had lavished—unavailingly, alas l—
on their departed relative. We have these details from one
high in Ake., who received them from a member of the
Royal Family.