The Croonian lecture : in which the power that enables the eye to see distinctly at different distances is considered / by Everard Home.

  • Home, Everard, Sir, 1756-1832.
Date:
[1795]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Croonian lecture : in which the power that enables the eye to see distinctly at different distances is considered / by Everard Home. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by UCL Library Services. The original may be consulted at UCL (University College London)

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    o?t Muscular Motion. 5 and while my mind was strongl}^ impressed hy them, a favour- able opportunity occurred. Ayoung man came into St.George's hospital with a cataract in the right eye: this proved to be a fair case for an operation, to which the man very cheerfully submitted, and was put under my care for that purpose. In performing the operation, the crystalline lens was very readily extracted, and the union of the wound in the cornea took place unattended by inflammation, so tli it the eye suf- fered the smallest degree of injury that can attend so severe an operation ; these circumstances it is proper to mention, as they contributed to render the patient a more fa vourable sub- ject for experiment. The man's name was Benjamin Clerk ; he was a seafaring man, 21 years of age, and in perfect health. Both his eyes were free from complaint till about the 1 ith of April, 1793, at which time he was on a voyage home from the East Indies, a sud- den mist or dimness appeared before his right eye; this in- creased very rapidly, and on the 18th of the same month the sight was entirely obscured. The crystalline humour was ex- tracted on the 25th of November; and 27 days after the ope- ration the eye was so far recovered as to admit of the fol- lowing observations and experiments being made upon it. In this man we had all the circumstances combined, which seemed to be required to determine how far the crystalline lens was the principal agent in adjusting the eye. The man himself was in health, young, intelligent, and his left eye perfect; the other had been an uncommonly short time in a diseased state, and appeared to be free from every other defect but the loss of the crystalline lens. He very willingly allowed me to make the following experiments on him; and remained in town,