Marshall County Republican. (Plymouth, Ind.) 1856-1878, 1876-12-28
DEATH.
The Sensation of Different Modes of Dying
some Curious Facts.


From the New Haven Register.l
The popular ideas relative to the suf-
ferings of persons on the point of death
are undoubtedly to certain extent er-
roneous. The appearance of extreme
agony, which is often presented under
these circumstances, is due to mere mus
cular agitation, independent of any ex-
traordinary sensation of the nerves of
feeling. Those who die natural death
in the very last stages of existence are
scarcely conscious of bodily suffering
not more than they frequently are of
the attentions and soiicitude of friends.
Those who die by violence or acct
dent undoubtedly experience a degree
of pain proportionate to the event of the
bodily mutilation. Hanging is doubt
less an unpleasant mode of death, but
few, after all, "shuffle off this mortal
coil" more easily than those who are
suspended by the peck. 1t is akin to
dro wing in this respect. The blood
Immediately seeks the head and soon
deprives it of all consciousness. The
effort to inhale the air, which are kept
up for some time after the cord is at
tached, and which cause such violent
movements of the chest and extremities,
arise from the influence of the spinal
marrow. whose sensibility is not so often
destroyed by the congestion of blood as
that of brain.
Persons who die by decapitation will
probably suffer more, though their pain
is only momentary this is the case
with those who blow out their brains.
The sensation produced 10y ball pass
ing through the body would be difficult
to describe by one who has never expe
rienced it, but it is something singular
In this case that those who are shot, al
though the leaden messenger Of
death may not have penetrated any es-
sentially vital organ, Immediately fall to
the earth, apparently under an irresisti-
bic feeling of their approaching return
to dust, exclaiming, as it were, invol-
unfairly, / am dead man ~
A dagger wound in the heart, for the
few moments which are consumed in
the ebbing of life, must occasion unut-
TERRIBLE feelings of agony, independent
of the mere sensations of pain In the
pacts sundered by the entrance of the
blade. The rushing out of the blood at
each convulsive pulsation of the heart
must seem like the actual spectacle of
the flow of life.
Those who are crushed to death may
not expire instantly unless the Uranium
happens to be involved in the casualty.
Where the skull is not fractured there is
probably an inconceivable agony for a
few seconds flashing thought OF
home, friends and family, and all is
over. Those who are cut into by q
heavily-burdened railroad carriage
mnst experience some similar sensa-
tons.
If the neck is broken low down the
person does not necessarily die on the
instant. His situation is the most dis
tressing of any which can be imagined.
He may live and have being for days,
but he cannot move. His face may ex.
press all the passions, feelings and emo
tons but beyond the motions of his
breast and countenance his energies dc
not go. His arms are pinioned at his
side his legs are ifeless (; and he essen
TALLY sees his body in the grave, while
he is yet in the full possession of his
faculties. The least disturbance of his
position is liable to launch him at once
into eternity.
In taking laudanum person exists in
state of insensibiity for a length OF
time, a melancholy spectacle to his
friends. In poisoning from arsenic 9
great amount Of suffering is undergone
The sensibility of the stomach is ex
ceedingly acute when infamed, and the
effect of arsenic is to produce fatal in.
fammation of the viscus. Prussic acic
is rapid, and acts by paralyzing the
brain
In rejecting on the horrors which
death presents under the different as
poets of violence the mind becomes sat
isfied with disgust. We cannot do bet
ter than turn TO the contemplation OF itl
features in the milder course of disease
where, if the mind be at ease, the fina
exit is made without any of those revolt
| ING exhibitions of bodily SUFFERING