[p. 238]inclination inward; for, even in those who are erect in stature,
dyspnoea is induced by this bone inclining inward, until it be restored
to its place. From this frame of body, such persons
appear to have more prominent necks than persons in good health, and
they generally have hard and unconcocted tubercles in the lungs, for
the gibbosity and the distension are produced mostly by such tubercles,
with which the neighboring nerves communicate. When the gibbosity
is below the diaphragm, in some of these cases nephritic diseases
and affections of the bladder supervene, but abscesses of a chronic
nature, and difficult to cure, occur in the loins and groins, and
neither of these carries off the gibbosity; and in these cases the
hips are more emaciated than when the gibbosity is seated higher up;
but the whole spine is more elongated in them than in those who have
the gibbosity seated higher up, the hair of the pubes and chin is
of slower growth and less developed, and they are less capable of
generation than those who have the gibbosity higher up. When the gibbosity
seizes persons who have already attained their full growth, it usually
occasions a crisis of the then existing disease, but in the course
of time some of them attack, as in the case of younger persons, to
a greater or less degree; but, not withstanding, for the most part,
all these diseases are less malignant. And yet many have borne the
affection well, and have enjoyed good health until old age, more especially
those persons whose body is inclined to be plump and fat; and a few
of them have lived to beyond sixty years of age, but the most of them
are more short-lived. In some cases the curvature of the spine is
lateral, that is to say, either to the one side or the other; the
most of such cases are connected with tubercles (abscesses?) within
the spine; and in some, the positions in which they have been accustomed
to lie cooperate with the disease. But these will be treated of among
the chronic affections of the lungs; for these the most suitable prognostics
of what will happen in these cases are given.
Part 42
When the spine protrudes backward, in consequence of a fall, it seldom
happens that one succeeds in straightening it. Wherefore succussion
on a ladder has never straightened anybody, as far as I know, but
it is principally practiced by those
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