130. George Ricketts Nuttall to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 1, 126–127.
[London]
[Postmark: 31 May 1821]
I take it kind, my dear Elizabeth, in you, to deliver so clear a description of the symptoms which necessarily obtruded themselves on your own observation; but before I can advance any opinion further, than that, already in the possession of your Father; there are other symptoms of which I wish to be apprized, of the existance or modification of which you could not be aware unless your attention had been attracted to them, & there are a few more besides which are obvious to none but the practised eye, & touch. Under the last class the pulse is to be ranged, & also the action of the Heart, as to number of strokes during the minute, their regularity, or otherwise; their force, compared with that of others; at the present time, as well as during a paroxysm: Under the former class, are to be included sensations arising from pressure on a part &c. Having offerd these general remarks allow me to request, that you will answer the following questions as early as you shall have gained the necessary information. What is the state of your pulse, and Hearts action, during the advancement of a paroxysm? What, when you do not suffer? If you apply moderate pressure to your sides below the short ribs, pit of stomach, & bowels, what sensations arise? does pain ensue? or does a positive sense of uneasiness? when actually, or passively suffering. Are your bowels distended more than before your complaint began, & has your appetite vascillated; food oppressed, bowels torpid, or irregular in their action? At the time you suffer so much commotion, & distress, when rising do you suffer much distension from wind, & does it escape when the, “tendons & lineaments—break”–? How long after breakfast is it before the agony begins, & what do you take for breakfast? Does any one part of the bowels seem more tumid, at one time, or constantly, than another, & harder, as if distended with air? or even something more solid?
The severe pains you experience about the chest, & right side, proceeding towards the back, are in all likelihood owing to irregular, or spasmodic action, then occurring in the Heart; arising sympathetically from some disorder advancing in the alimentary canal, generating flatus, which pressing in the midrif, or internal boundary of the chest, & consequently impeding the Hearts free action renders it for a time irritable. Your active turn of mind, & inactive state of body, together with your age &c incline you, as well as other young bodies under similar circumstances, to dyspeptic complaints. It not unfrequently happens, that the Bowels become loaded, with vitiated matter, which does not sometimes become obvious, notwithstanding the best means have been adopted to remove it, for 10 days a fortnight or three weeks, nay more. The sure criterion that all is not right there, is the appearance of clay-coloured, or greenish, or blackish, or frothy, or mucous, or yeasty motions, fœtid in character, but sometimes these conditions do not occur till the disease is about to be removed.
You have too much good sense, my dear Elizabeth, not to be candid with me, on a point, of so much moment to yourself, & those who love, & value you. In matters of this kind, false delicacy might, & have, often, led to the most ruinous consequences; therefore scrupulously attend to all I have suggested to you, for observation. Get the following prescription made up directly, & take the two pills the same night, & <obs>erve <what t>hey shall cause to be dislo<dged> from the <bow>els next morning. Give my best love to Father, Mother, Brothers, & sympathetic Sisters.
Yours truly
G R Nuttall
Rx
Estracti Jalapie—gr:
Estracti Aloes—gr:ii
Hydrargyr: Sub-mur:—gr:ii
Bene contunde, & divide in pilulas duas.
nocte sumundas hora somni [1] –
G R N
Address, on integral page: Miss Elizabeth Barrett / Hope end / Ledbury Herefordshire.
Docket, near address, in unidentified hand: Illness– / 1821.
Publication: B-GB, pp. 346–348.
Manuscript: Pierpont Morgan Library.
1. The prescribed ingredients were extract of jalap root and extract of aloes, both purgatives, and hydrargyri submurias (submuriate of mercury) to promote operation of the purgatives. The final instructions translate as “Pound well, and divide into two pills. To be taken at night at bedtime.”
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