Saline

“ All “transplantable” diseases were called “saline” diseases, because, according to the medical theories prevailing in those days, they originated in some defect of the “salts” of the body.— (See Frommann, “Tract. de Fascinatione,” pp. 1017, 1018.)
Among the strongest “magnetic” medicines, according to Paracelsus, was the one “ex stercore humano.”— (See Etmuller, vol. i. p. 69.)
There was another: “Take a sufficient quantity of the ordure of a healthy man, and make it into a poultice with human urine, to which add sweat gathered from the body with a sponge ”

“ In watching the troops of patients who go to the wells we notice that most of them do more early rising, take more regular exercise, and drink more water in the course of a month at the well than they would do in the rest of the year at home. The watering-places divide themselves, according to the temperature of the waters, into cold and thermal, and according to the composition of the waters, into purgative saline, indifferent saline, sulphur and iron. Amongst the most celebrated saline waters are those of Carlsbad, which contain sulphate of soda and bicarbonate of soda. ”

“ Considering that the salt rivers are themselves salted by passing through salt regions, or being fed by saline springs, all of which derive their saltness from deposits laid down long ago by evaporation from earlier seas or lake basins, this explanation savours somewhat of circularity. It amounts in effect to saying that the sea is salt because of the large amount of saline matter which it holds in solution. Cheese is also a caseous preparation of milk; the duties of an archdeacon are to perform archidiaconal functions; and opium puts one to sleep because it possesses a soporific virtue. ”

“ OF what Nature then this Poison is we may conjecture from the Circumstances of its Production. All animal Bodies do more or less generate a Salt; or rather, in Proportion to the Strength of their digestive Powers, do they more or less subtilize the saline Particles which are taken in with their necessary Nourishment. This is abundantly manifest in the Distillation of many animal Substances, which plentifully yield a volatile Salt. ”

“ Such is the origin of the saline masses that exist in the interior of our globe. Whenever waters of infiltration reach these saline deposits, they dissolve more or less considerable quantities of them, and, when they come out again into the light, they constitute what are called saline mineral waters. ”

“ Sea-salt, perhaps also nitre and other salts, will be serviceable in a moist country, or far from the sea, where the plants and water contain little saline matter, and probably pernicious in a dry climate, where the plants and water generally contain much saline matter. ”

“ These saline matters are essential to health, and when not present in due proportion nutrition is disturbed. If a dog be fed on food freed from all salines, but otherwise containing proper nutrients, he soon suffers from weakness, after a time amounting to paralysis, and often dies in convulsions. ”

“ Of course, what salt finds its way into the sea remains there forever, except so far as it is carried away by man—for the process of evaporation takes up the aqueous particles alone, from saline solutions. ”

“ These consequences are constantly verified in the saline beds which exist so numerously on the globe. Thus, to bring up again the two most important salts, numerous beds of gypsum are known, without rock-salt, or any of the other deposits, above them—which verifies our first conclusion; but no bed of rock-salt is known without gypsum—which verifies the second conclusion. More than this, a vast saline bed is now known which corresponds with the complete period set forth in our list—that is, with the complete period of evaporation ”

“ THE BEGINNINGS OF THE SALT INDUSTRY Salt, being existent in all animal and vegetable life, is coeval with life itself; it was present in the first herbage which gave nourishment to the first beast that, in its turn, became food for the first omnivorous man. In the beginning, man consumed the saline essences that were required to preserve his body in health, in the form of sodium chloride, which he absorbed in the uncooked flesh of animals, birds, and fishes, and in raw green-foods. ”

“ They are especially useful in men who drink too little water at home, in gouty and plethoric subjects, and in states of acid stomach digestion and chronic constipation. The alkaline and saline waters are the best, the former containing a notable proportion of the carbonate or bicarbonate of sodium, potassium, or lithium—the latter having neutral salts in considerable quantity. ”

“ In the common condition of the body it is not possible for the secretion of the skin to be very largely increased, or rendered fluid. Suppose, then, a soluble saline, as the Sulphate of Soda or Magnesia, or Tartarized Soda, to have obtained entry into the blood, it has the choice of being excreted by the kidneys or the bowels. The alternative appears to depend mainly upon the amount of the dose. A small quantity may pass in the urine, and will not produce purging. But a large quantity cannot so pass; it is excreted by the glands of the bowels, and acts as a Purgative. ”

“ And as some few grains of Salt is able to infect as great a quantity, as may be found by præcipitations, though not so easily by the sight or taste; so the Air, which seems to be but as ’twere a tincture or saline substance, dissolv’d and agitated by the fluid and agil Æther, may disperse and expand it self into a vast space, if it have room enough, and infect, as it were, every part of that space. ”

“ There are several sulfurous springs—one saline, another strongly impregnated with sulphuretted hydrogen—in great repute for gout, rheumatism, skin diseases and affections of the liver and kidneys. The well of effervescent chalybeate water is largely resorted to for anaemia and as a tonic. ”

“ In some of the mines of Cheshire and Austria the very fine saline dust that is diffused through the atmosphere is found by the miners to be extremely irritating to the eyes and lungs, but4 all the more usual kinds of salt are sufficiently hygroscopic to indicate plainly the condition of the atmosphere. ”

“ The salt rock in the earth beneath impregnates the springs with such an intensity of brine that eighty per cent. of fresh water has to be added before the saline mixture can be medicinally employed as a bath. If you take a glass of the water as it proceeds from the spring, and put a little salt in it, the salt will not dissolve, the water is already saturated. ”

“ That the application, therefore, of salt, of seaweed, and saline mud, does more than supply soda, must be very evident, if we only recollect how difficult it is to dry any part of our dress that has been soaked in salt water, and what effect damp weather has on table salt, which, in a balance, has often been made use of as an hydrometer. ”

“ Iodide of sodium has similar differences of effect, according as it is given by the veins or the alimentary canal. In short, the purgative effects of salines would appear to depend on the metallic and not on the metalloid element which they contain.
We must finish this hasty notice with a résumé of M. Rabuteau’s ingenious theory as to the cause of the constipation which so often succeeds saline purgation. According to him, if the dose of the saline be large almost the whole is directly eliminated by the alimentary canal; if it be medium, a part passes into the blood ”

“ VII. In case the water be suspected to contain any salts, it will be advisable gently to boil a quantity of the dry substance obtained by distillation, in five or six times its weight of pure common distilled water, such as is totally divested of all mineral particles. By this process, the saline matter will be dissolved or suspended in such water, in the form of a solution, which, on being filtred, and evaporated to dryness, will re-produce its salt. ”

“ The salivary secretion is one by which it may be more easily transmitted; and this transmission may even be facilitated by the affinity exerted to the Oxide of Mercury by the Muriatic Acid, the Soda, and Ammonia, which are the chief saline ingredients in saliva; for it deserves to be remarked that triple compounds of these substances are, to a certain extent, soluble in water; and if the Mercury 108is thus secreted, it will of course stimulate the secreting vessels through which it passes, and increase the discharge. ”

“ Any thing acting generally, and producing a nervous state of the system, such as the distressing passions, and particularly mental anxiety or fear, will frequently produce in many people an excess of this salt in the urine. The same is also true of many articles of food or medicine that produce a hurried secretion of the urine, and act as diuretics; as the neutral salts in some cases, and particularly the Rochelle salts and other saline compounds, in which the acid is of vegetable origin. ”

“ A very serious difficulty presents itself in the great thickness of many strata of salt; which, if regarded as the solid residuum of sea-water, must have necessarily required a proportionate volume of water, unless the seas of those distant periods contained a larger amount of saline ingredients than they do at the present time: an inference for which there are no reasonable grounds.
Wherever there are deposits of the chloride of sodium, they are almost always accompanied with layers and intercalations of gypsum ”

“ Varro relates of dwellers on the borders of the Rhine, who having neither sea nor pit salt, supply themselves by means of the saline cinders of burnt plants. Pliny speaks of ashes as impregnated with salts, and in particular of the nitrous ashes of burnt oak; adding, that these salts are used in medicine, and that a dose of lixivial ashes is an excellent remedy. Hippocrates, Celsus, Dioscorides, and especially Galen, often recommend the medical use of sal alcali. To the mixture of acids and alcali, Plato ascribed fermentation. ”

“ In rubbing together different substances, it is necessary to remember that there are many saline bodies, which in the dry state become moist and even liquid, by triture with each other, and that, under such circumstances, they are susceptible of mutual decomposition. ”

“ Something must be found suitable for this saline, imperfectly oxygenated, tepid sea. Something, too, is wanted that can aid in introducing « 159 » conditions more favourable to higher life in the future. ”

“ Glauber salts to clear the bowels of offensive matter, and deplete from liver and portal vein, bicarbonate of soda or iodide of potassium to eliminate the poisons through the kidneys and to lessen the induration, and finally salicylate of soda as a liver stimulant and intestinal antiseptic are suggestive of the line of treatment that may be pursued. The saline laxatives and diuretics, and antiseptics may be changed for others according to special indications, and bitters and mineral acids may be resorted to. ”

“ To such constitutions may not food of a refractory nature and hard of digestion have even an advantage over what is more delicate and digestible?
It does not appear that it is the salt quality of the provisions used at sea that makes them productive of scurvy, but the want of their native juices and of the nutritious principle. A small quantity of salt is necessary to make all food palatable and wholesome, in so much that it is reckoned one of the necessaries of life. All animals have a craving for sea salt, and nature has kindly made it the most abundant and universal of all saline bodies. ”

“ Ox-gall and pig-gall are laxatives only; they have no effect on the liver, but can be added to other purgatives in pill forms.
Salines largely diluted may be given to strong adults: Epsom or Rochelle salts quite early in the morning, a solution of sulphate of magnesia with dilute sulphuric acid, to which dried sulphate of iron may be added, are quite popular; and of the bitter waters, Hunyadi Jânos, Friedrichshall, or Pullna water serves the purpose. One grain of sulphate of quinia added to a saline will increase its effect. The milder laxative waters are to be preferred to the bitter waters. ”

“ Avoid known causes, untimely clipping, exposed buildings, over-fatigue, chills, cold rains, dews and frosts, disorders of liver and bowels, sweets, spiced food, overfeeding, constipation, torpid liver, injuries to joints or tendons. Treatment: warm stall and clothing, laxative food in moderation, purgatives, aloes, castor oil, jalap, saline enemas, colchicum, alkalies, trimethylamine, acetate of ammonia, salicylic acid, salicylates, salicine, oil of gaultheria, salicine for debilitated. Large doses hourly or every two hours. Less effective in chronic cases. Heart failure. Salol. ”

“ Like other salines, in febrile and inflammatory diseases, whether in horses or cattle, it is believed to lower pulse and temperature, clean the tongue, improve appetite, gently stimulate the bowels and render the evacuations more natural and less coated with mucus. It is frequently prescribed with good results in horses suffering [141] from catarrhal conditions of the bowels. In epizootic catarrh, purpura, it is very beneficial prescribed with iron salts, as it increases the coagulability of the blood. ”

“ The free acids, both mineral and vegetable, with the exception of Sulphuric acid (vide p. 262,) pass into the urine, and act as Diuretics. So also do the mineral alkalies. But as these medicines have important agencies in the blood, and tend further, by altering the reaction of the urine, to produce in it deposits of different kinds (vide p. 151,) they can seldom be safely employed for this purpose. Salines are more appropriate. They should not be given in large doses, for they will then act upon the bowels. ”