The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1908-05-29
COUNTED THE HOURS
HE HAD TO LIVE
Vim. u. Marsh, Victim Of Rydrophohia.
Passes Away.

y
New York Especial William NJ.
Marsh, the Brooklyn man condemned
| by his gentleness to pet bulldog to
die In the commissions or rabies, pas
sed away at $50 p. M. He had
known in lucid moments that death
was near during the last "a hours
Nothing remained but to await the
wearing down of the mans great
nerve and the strength of his body
by the racking tortures of convul-
sions
For the last "a hours the patient
had tossed and burned on his bed
at his home, A Ocean Avenue, suf-
fering a double torture. DR.. Henry
M. Cullinan, the physician who had
been in close attendance upon Mr.
Marsh since first he went home with
the knowledge that death was COM
ing on him, said that the man had
been able to follow step by step the
course of the disease that was rack
ing him through-knowledge he once
acquired in a full course in medicine
that he had taken. Like man sit
ting in the condemned cell and lis
tening to the striking of the clock
that brings the dawn nearer, Mr.
Marsh had diagnosed the advance of
the plague that had him in it's hold
during the intermittent periods OF
consciousness.
One of the cruelties of rabies is,
that between the times that it's vic
tins are twisted with the stiffening
of their muscles and the commissions
are attended by species of hallu-
cination, the mental faculties remain
remarkably clear. According to the
testimony of the three physicians
who were at Mr.. Marsh's bedside, the
patient showed unusual mental
strength, and during his periods Of
consciousness, he inquired calmly of
his symptoms and commented upon
the advance of the disorder knowing
ly, and with almost detached in
tereSt.
Counted His Hours OF Life.
True, hydrophobia, and as the
medical men explained, pseudo-rab-
bies induced by self-hynotism is very
rare, is almost as certain in the peri
DDS of it's development and final cul-
mination as the march of the clock.
When Mr.. Marsh left the Pasteur
Institute on Monday he knew that
he must die, and he had been told
that ~ hours was almost the def
mite limit to his life. Since that time
the patient had made subtraction of
the passage of time from those II
hours and reckoned the total that
was left to him. He did not know
the approach of the end by several
hours, for with the final paralysis
came merciful coma.
When Mr.. Marsh went back to his
house on Monday and told his family
that he had to die he was already
well advanced in the second stage
of rabies. The intermittent conyul-
sions of the larynx, which had first
led him to seek medical advice were
more pronounced, the characteristic
difficulty of swallowing had grown
acute and the sense of unrest and ex-
citability that drives dog stricken
with the malady to wander without
purpose in the streets had made
themselves evident.
DR.. Cullinan called DR.. w. L.
Wheeler, of the Pasteur Institute,
and DR.. E. H Fiske, of Brooklyn, in
consultation. To the physicians the
patient spoke nationally and without
fear.
When the commissions get too
hard" he said, make things easier
with opiates."
During Tuesday night and all day
Wednesday DR.. Cullinan, who never
left the mans bed endeavored to
make things easier. He administered
constant doses of morphia and
hyoscyamine. Chloroform he dared
not use, for in too great quantities
it becomes a poison. The law which
forbids a physician committing mer-
ciful murder made the alienation of
the stricken mans tortures only
partly possible.