Infants are remarkably insusceptible to the sialagogue operation of mercury. Nevertheless they are now and then even profusely salivated; and, where the salivary glands have not been affected, I have, in a very few instances, noticed ulcers of the mouth produced, which I could ascribe only to the medicine. But in no instance have I seen injury ultimately result.

From the researches of Dr. Ad. Lize, of Mans, it would appear that mercurialization in a woman has some influence on the product of conception. According to this authority, the death of the foetus in mercurialized women, if frequent, may be considered as a result of the mercurial infection; and the death of the child born under similar circumstances, may reasonably be referred to the same cause. (Arch. Gén., Fev. 1863, p. 229.)

Disease often greatly affects the susceptibility to the mercurial impression. in Bright's disease, at least that variety of it which may be ascribed to fatty degeneration of the kidneys, the system is often affected with extraordinary facility; while in certain violent and malignant fevers, in which the blood is greatly diseased, as in malignant cases of yellow fever, it is often impossible to induce salivation. I once saw the experiment tried in a young man extremely ill of yellow fever. Calomel was poured into him in indefinite quantities, and mercurial ointment was most energetically applied over almost his whole surface, but without success.

Occasionally mercury, after having been administered for some time without effect, has been abandoned; and, after a long interval, mercurial-ism has apparently taken place, without, so far as was known, any renewed exhibition of the medicine.

A cumulative effect is sometimes also exhibited by the medicine. After having been exhibited for some time without obvious phenomena, it begins to operate with great energy, as if the whole quantity taken had come at once into action.

Irregular and Poisonous Effects. Ordinary mercurialism, as already described, may be carried so far as to prove poisonous. The patient may die of hemorrhage from the mouth, of the exhausting effects of gangrene and necrosis of the fauces, jaws, or face, or of a general cachectic condition, aggravated by the local affection.

But there are also abnormal effects of mercury, which may become sources of danger or solicitude. Sometimes, instead of throwing itself mainly upon the mouth and neighbouring parts, it acts more especially upon the great vital organs, producing much disturbance of their functions, and profound debility. Such a condition is described by Dr. Pearson, as sometimes resulting from the abuse of mercury in the hospitals. The symptoms, stated by him, are small and frequent pulse, precordial anxiety, pale and contracted countenance, great nervous agitation, and alarming general weakness. In this condition, death sometimes follows any sudden effort, such as rising from bed and attempting to walk. I have never witnessed this effect of mercury.

When given in states of system in which the blood is already greatly depraved, and especially when there is existing ulceration with a phagedenic tendency, or disposition to passive hemorrhage or gangrene, mercury has sometimes appeared to aggravate the affection, causing a more rapid progress of disorganization, and hastening the fatal issue; perhaps producing it, when it might otherwise have been avoided. This, however, is not peculiar to mercury. Any other agent which has the property of lowering the quality of the blood, of diminishing its plasticity, and impairing as well its reparative as its supporting properties, would have the same effect. It has thus proved injurious in certain cases of scrofulous, syphilitic, and cancerous cachexia, and other analogous conditions of system. It may have even, in some instances, so far impaired the blood through its own unaided influence, as to give an aggravated and alarming character to any accidental wound or ulcer. It has, however, no special tendency to cause ulceration elsewhere than in the mouth; and here the affection is a mere result of the inflammation, though no doubt aggravated, and rendered more difficult of cure by the depraved state of the blood in some cases.

Sometimes mercury, instead of acting as usually upon the mouth, throws its whole force apparently on the nervous centres, producing paralytic phenomena, and other evidences of impaired nervous power. This is said sometimes to have been the case where it has been administered internally; but I have never witnessed the effect, and have no doubt that the result has often been ascribed to the mercurial influence, when it was nothing more than a sequence, and really dependent on other causes, perhaps upon the very disease which the mercury was given to relieve. But there is no reason to doubt the occurrence of a state of system, to which the name of shaking palsy or mercurial palsy has been given, as an effect of habitual exposure to the vapours of the metal. This affection is most apt to occur among the workmen engaged in metallurgic or manufacturing processes, in which the air becomes necessarily more or less impregnated with the vapour of the metal, as in the mining and melting of mercurial ores, the silvering of mirrors, etc. The constant inhalation of these vapours is said to occasion wandering pains; mental hebetude; trembling of the muscles, beginning in the arms, and extending more or less over the body; sometimes stammering; vertiginous sensations, and failure of the memory; and at length, if the exposure continue, paralysis, epileptic convulsions, delirious hallucinations, imaginary terrors, coma, and death. Sometimes palsy of one or more of the limbs has been noticed, as an attendant or result of severe mercurialism of the ordinary character.

An eruptive affection, variously denominated eczema mercuriale, erythema mercuriale, lepra mercurialis, and hydrargyria, sometimes accompanies mercurial influence, but whether always an effect of the mercury may be doubted. The eruption, as I have seen it, has accompanied profuse sweating, proceeding from other causes than the mercury, and, like the ordinary sudamina or miliary eruption so common in that state of skin, might have been ascribed as fairly to those other causes as to the mercury. The affection consists in the eruption of innumerable minute vesicles, with more or less redness, itching and soreness, and a rough feeling under the fingers, sometimes extending over the whole body. They often at the first glance appear like small papulae, but a close examination shows that they are filled with a clear liquid. in two or three days this has become turbid and opaque, and the vesicles have attained the size of a pin's head; after which they generally dry up, and desquamation of the skin follows. They are said occasionally to break, and produce excoriated surfaces, which discharge serum copiously, like those of eczema rubrum, and from which, when they heal, the epidermis separates in large flakes, and sometimes with the loss of the hair and nails. I have never seen anything which could be at all ascribed to mercury exhibit these latter phenomena; though I have frequently witnessed similar cases of eczema rubrum, which, if mercury had by accident been taken, would probably have been ascribed to it. I have little doubt that the fatal cases of mercurial eczema, reported by some writers, were independent of mercury, and had but an accidental connection with that medicine.