Cholera Morbus.

THE, above name is given to a disease common in warm weather, and characterized by sudden attacks of bilious vomiting and purging, with severe pain in the belly, cramps, and general fever and subsequent prostration. The great amount of bile secreted and discharged has given it the name cholera, from cholos, bile.

Symptoms. The disease begins by sickness and distress at the stomach, which is succeeded by violent gripings, with vomiting of thin dirty yellowish, whitish, or greenish fluid, with discharges from the bowels similar to that vomited. The nausea and distress, with some few exceptions, continue between the vomiting and purging, and the pain, at times, is intense. The pulse is rapid, soon becoming small and feeble, the tongue dry, the urine high colored, and there is much thirst, though no drink can be retained on the stomach. It is to be distinguished from diarrhea by the bilious discharges.

Treatment. Apply a large mustard poultice over the stomach and liver, and give tablespoonful doses of compound powder of rhubarb and potassa, every half hour, until the vomiting and nausea are checked, adding to each dose five to ten drops of camphor, if necessary. Perhaps it would generally be best, however, to give liberal draughts of warm water, at first, or flaxseed tea, that all the solid contents of the stomach and bowels may be washed out.
A teaspoonful of laudanum in a wineglass of flaxseed tea, given as an injection, every two hours, will sometimes do excellently well; or a tea made of chamomile flowers, or colombo, and made sour by a few drops of nitric or sulphuric acid, and given internally, will sometimes succeed better than most other things. One grain of svapnia and thirty grains of bicarbonate of soda dissolved in an ounce of sweet tincture of rhubarb, and given in teaspoonful doses, every half hour will often have a fine effect. The prescription 162 is also valuable.
Hot water bags should be applied to the feet, and warm flannels, or other kinds of dry heat, to the whole body.