Year: 1868

she hsd no fear Of death, but turned up
on her side, and. as she did SO, al pain
disappeared, and she aank 10 sleep as
peacefully as q child. She lay, she
thinks, unconscious for an hour or more,
for when she came to herself she found
that she was laid out ready for burial.
She tried to speak to them, but her
tongue refused to do it's office; she tried
to move, but could not and there she
lay blessing her mother for her refusal
to allow her to be buried. Upon two oe-
casiOns, when her mother was alone with
her Ia the room, it seemed as though she
left the body, and, standing by the side
of it, could look down upon it as she
could upon her mother.


Then, too, there is the instance which
occurred in Rochester but week or two
since-thst o. the little girl who was
found drowned as 1t wss thought, and
carried te her home for preparations for
the grave. fortunately, attempts were
% ade to restore her 20 life, and, after
several hours of unwearied labor, they
were successful, and the little child in q
short time was as full of life and anima-
ton as she had ever been. Now, Whist
would have been her fate had not kind
friends interposed and restored suspended
animation? We cannot say with GER
tsinty, but it is more than probable that,
after a short time-perhRps after she had
been laid in her coffin, sealed up forever
from the wOTld-nature would have re-
sumed her functions, and the little girl
would have awakened only to undergo
the uncomfortable oppression Of the lungs,
the rigid embrace of the narrow house,
the blaekness Of night, and the unseen
but palpS0le presence Of the conqueror-
death.


Now, If life is suspended in case of
drowning, why may it not happen when
other causes produce death, or what is
taken for it? May it not be that the
vitsl power, though not diseernible, is
not extinct, when it appears to those
who surround the death-bed that the
signs Of life have departed


The two diseases which most nearly
simulate death are catalepsy and the
state Of trance or prolonged syneope. In
the first Of these diseases, death is not 40
perfectly counterfeited as in the last.
The patient II quote from good author
ityl lies immOvable and apparently un-
conscious; the limbs are rigid and cold,
the eyes are fixed, sometimes remaining
open, and the jaw sometimes drops. But
the resemblance of death goes no fur
ther. The body and head retain their
usual warmth the pulse and breathing
can always be noticed il particular at
tention is paid to them.


The latter disease is the cause Of much
more error, because it more closely re-
sembles death and its consequences. The
patient is mOtiOnless, and apparently un-
conscious, although he is usually aware
OF what is passing around him. The
pulsation of the heart and arteries, and
he hr- iria in
force and frequency, until they become
at last quite imperceptible the whole
surface OF the body grows cold. and all
this may last for many days. How (the
writer asks from whom quote) liz one
in such a condition known not to be
dead?


There are various ways known to med
zeal men by which the dead body can be
distinguished from the living persou-by
sscultstioD, by microscopic exsrniua-
tiODs of the blood, and by what is called
" dyn8moscoDs,n that is, the buZzing,
hummiRg noise which is heard all over
the body Of the living; all these meth
DDS have in some cases proved fsiIacious,
especially the last named, which has
been proposed in cases OF catslepsy and
syncope.


Now, there is one test which never
fails, which is alike significant to the
common eye, as well as to medical sci
eDce. 1t is the only test which cannot
fail or deceive. It is invariably certain.
That test is putTefsction or modification
of the system. When this is observable,
there is no longer room to doubt; and it
is q question which concerns every living
human being, whether, in all cases,
signs Of decomposition should not be
manifest before the remains are con-
signed TO the tomb; or, which is the
same thing, before the undertaken screws
down the coffin lid. The writer OF this
article is cognizant Of two instances
where the remains were, within few
hours, after signs of life disappeared, en-
cased in double coffin for trsnsporta-
ton to the place Of interment-distant
hundreds of miles from the place Of
death. Happily, both for the survivors
and the dead, the coffins were opened at
the place of burial, and no signs OF pre-
mature embrace Of the narrow house "
were visible.


Great csdtion should be observed in
this regard and the writer of this arti-
Gle, who may meet his death in some
locality distant from his place of inter-
ment, most devoutiy prays that it may
not be his fate to wake up in his coffin to
find the "clinging of the death gar
ments" about him, the "blsckness of
absolute night, and silence like 8 sea
that overwhelms"