Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1853-12-31
COMMUNICATION.
MOTIVE POWER OF THE BLOOD.


ing himself A. w. En- Census Bureau SA street" has
been amusing himself with throwing at my humble
self and distinguished lady, whom never saw, Mrs.
Willard, OF Troy) for being the advocates of doc
rine on the motive power Of the blood which he pleas
ed to regard as most absurd and ridiculous lie thinks
1t has not made one convert yet he view il Of
sufficient Importance the extraordinary
Of converting the Census Bureau into battery and to
borrow your Paixhan to throw his missiles at it,
Coming from the Census Bureau, and relating to a
question not personal but of general interest suppose
you deemed it unnecessary pass his materials through
your editorial crucibe aud admitted them without exam
nation as you would any other from the Departments of
the Government But as there is lady in the case
whom found at the head of the stairs great physio
logical question, without knowing, as the Frenchman
would say, how she got there, l sure, gentlemen
that your galantry if nothing else, will deny me the
privilege Of defending her through the medium that
her doctrine has been assaled and what is of less i'm
portance, incidentally myself both stand on the
physiological platform But there is another rea-
ncnng to notice your correspondent for the
purpose of newspaper controversy scientific subject
but 10 prevent question mt issue between myself and the
head of the Census Bureau political from being
forestaled his subordinate forestang this The
OF that issue be seen in the November number of De
Bows Review page 538, where he claims be my only
approver convert in the face of all the medical and
scientific men of the country" satisfied with
approyer convert; and the question whether
there be not than approve the .'negro dis
ease article we are at ISSUE claiming not only the
physicians Of Louisiana assembedin convention whom
it was read, and by whom it unanimously approved
and directed to be published but the millions among
whom tho observations made. | freely give up q
few medical and literary men to be found in cities
mostly of foreign educaton who know nothing of and
less about the physical pecuares of the Ethiopian
race, whom the editor of the Review mstook for all The
medical and literary of the country"
The question of popularity of is intimately
nected with the true doctrine Of the motive power Of the
blood that Thomas Jefferson, in pursuing the former
very stumbling on the latter In his Notes
Virginia he says Perhaps too difference Of structure
IN the pulmonary apparatus, which late ingenious expert
mentast MR. Crawford has discovered to be the prnc
pal regulator of animal heat, may have disabled them
THE negroes extrcang in the act of inspiration, so
much of that fluid from the outer air. obliged them in
expiration to part with more of it."
What Mr.. Jefferson imagined have proved by the spi-
rometc and by anatomical observations actually to exist
There is difference in the pulmonary apparatus. The
negro less oxygen than the white Hence
his motions slower according to that lately discovered
law which shows that the circulation of the blood and
muscular motion in proportion to the amount Of oxy
gen consumed in respiration and also the generation of
animal heat. The negros slow motions GOODNESS and
orpor and the characterization of his intellectual and mo-
raj faculties when left to himself aud under the slim
ulus of compulson to make him oxygenae and decarbon
ze his blood by expanding his lungs would doubtless have
led Mr. Jefferson to the perception of the great truth an
nounced by Mrs. Willard and also perhaps Sir Benjamin
Brod who kept poisoned animals alive by Initiating their
lungs had physiology made the advances in their
day the present time If they had known that there
direct communication between the arteries and the
veins between the blood to the lungs and that
going from thence to the heart they would have at
the necessity Of looking for other motive power
of the blood going TO the heart Mrs Willard looked Tor
it and found it.
If your correspondent of the Census Bureau should
proper take the liberty with the facts and figures
of been pleased do with
those relating to the doctrine of the motive powers
Of the blood calling his imagination for figure where
exists, and spiritng away few standing IN his
way would not be difficult task to make Rhode Island
up entitled larger representation in Congress
than New York. He has certainly called his imagina
ton to supply him with figure in representing me as
attribung the motive power of the blood to caloric
have where advocated such doctrine and in several
of my papers in the Boston Medical and Surgical Jour
nal have expressly warned the reader that had moth
ing do with that hypothesis accepted the doctrine
announced by Mrs Willard, that The chief noUe Poue
Of The blood located IN the lungs and derived rePird
to, great physiological truth requiring no hypoth
esis to uphold it being law, ike that OF gravity OF
magnetism, better without explanation than with one
1t is that the hypothesis alluded to lent its tenuous
and expansive wings the American Fea N1td JoUs TO
rise to the perception of great physiological truth hid
from the scientific world But the law or truth itself was
affected by her hypothesis than was the law OF
gravity by its discoverer alphabetically attribung to
realms Of ether.
Your ingenious correspondent not content with trying
to entange in hypothesis which expressly repu-
dated has taken the liberty in his quotations. to reverse
the sense by important omissions. Thus in one ofmy
publications in the New Orleans Medical and Surgical
Journal, July, 1853, page 1S9, said:
The time is approaching when America will look back
with wonder that there IN which her people
hunbugged by physiology imported from Europe
shroudsd in much darkness place the chief motive
power Of that nourshng hud called the blood in the mechan
cal propulsion OF muscular organ whcA not hd the animal
creation hare got young ebyos aud ceyJe1 aniSdulcs
He quoted this verbatim until he to the
words muscular organ" and then spirited away the ba
lance Of the sentence which have italicized by tear
ing the sentence apart at place where not even COM
divided it, he enabled to convert the fragment
into for his logic and to represent me as having
pronounced the doctrine humbug that muscular or.
gan has any agency in propeling the blood; whereas
denied the agency Of that muscular organ
called the heart in assisting prope the blood going from
It, | have elsewhere shown that the lymphatics in some
animals have hearts muscular organs expressly con-
structed 10 assist in propelng the lympth but have
denied the hearts agency in propeng the blood coming
10 have denied its agencyin that class Of animals
having heart also in all animals in the early stage OF
their existence before that organ is formed The facts
stated in the sentence which your correspondent tore in
two sufficient Of themselves when duly considered
to awaken the nquiring mind Of countrymen to the
necessity Of looking out for other motive power OF
the blood than that derived from muscular organ Be-
sides the animals without heart there are twelve thou
sand species of fishes with heart to propel the blood
into the gs but muscular organ TO prope II through
the body. The hypothesis that the small feeble, muscu-
lar organ mpelling the blood into the gls drives II
through the body Of the FISH, loses sight OF the fact that
the boodvessels going and returning from the glls
interlocked like the teeth Of two combs stuck to-
geher, with direct communication between them and
the fact that in the human system has been ascerained
by experiment that the mpuson Of the blood going from
the heart is lost before il reaches the caparies.
Although the progress Of natural history since the days
nf hna al IN