DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.70303#0370
340 PERNICIOUS EFFECTS OF SPIRITUOUS LIQUORS,
it was slightly burnt, but the feather-bed; the clothes,
and covering were safe. Mr. Wilmer entered the apart-
ments about two hours after it had been opened; and ob-
served that the walls and every thing in it were blacken-
ed; that it was filled with a very disagreeable vapour,
but that nothing excepting the body exhibited any strong
traces of fire.
The transactions of the Royal Society of London, like-
wise furnish an instance of human combustion equally
extraordinary.—Grace Pitt; the wife of a fishmonger m
the parish of St. Clement, Ipswich, aged about GO, had
contracted a habit, which she continued for several
years, of coming down every night from her bed-room,
half-dressed, to smoke a pipe. On the night of the pth
of April; 1744; she got up from bed as usual. Her
daughter who slept with her did not perceive that she was
absent till next morning, when she awoke ; soon after
which she put on her clothes, and going down into the
kitchen found her mother stretched out on the right side,
with her head near the grate; the body extended on the
hearth, with her legs on the floor, which was of deal,
having the appearance of a log of wood, consumed by a
fire without apparent flame. On beholding this specta-
cle, the girl ran in great haste, and poured over her
mother’s body some water contained in two large vessels
in order to extinguish the fire ; while the foetid odour and
smoke which exhaled from t]ie body almost suffocated
some of thq neighbours who had hastened to the girl’s
assistance. The trunk was, in some measure, incinerat-
ed, and resembled a heap of coals covered with white
ashes. The head, the arms, the legs and the thighs had
also participated in the burning. This woman it is said
had drank a large quantity of spirituous liquor in conse-
quence of being overjoyed to hear that one of her daugh-
ters had returned from Gibraltar, There was no fire in
the
it was slightly burnt, but the feather-bed; the clothes,
and covering were safe. Mr. Wilmer entered the apart-
ments about two hours after it had been opened; and ob-
served that the walls and every thing in it were blacken-
ed; that it was filled with a very disagreeable vapour,
but that nothing excepting the body exhibited any strong
traces of fire.
The transactions of the Royal Society of London, like-
wise furnish an instance of human combustion equally
extraordinary.—Grace Pitt; the wife of a fishmonger m
the parish of St. Clement, Ipswich, aged about GO, had
contracted a habit, which she continued for several
years, of coming down every night from her bed-room,
half-dressed, to smoke a pipe. On the night of the pth
of April; 1744; she got up from bed as usual. Her
daughter who slept with her did not perceive that she was
absent till next morning, when she awoke ; soon after
which she put on her clothes, and going down into the
kitchen found her mother stretched out on the right side,
with her head near the grate; the body extended on the
hearth, with her legs on the floor, which was of deal,
having the appearance of a log of wood, consumed by a
fire without apparent flame. On beholding this specta-
cle, the girl ran in great haste, and poured over her
mother’s body some water contained in two large vessels
in order to extinguish the fire ; while the foetid odour and
smoke which exhaled from t]ie body almost suffocated
some of thq neighbours who had hastened to the girl’s
assistance. The trunk was, in some measure, incinerat-
ed, and resembled a heap of coals covered with white
ashes. The head, the arms, the legs and the thighs had
also participated in the burning. This woman it is said
had drank a large quantity of spirituous liquor in conse-
quence of being overjoyed to hear that one of her daugh-
ters had returned from Gibraltar, There was no fire in
the