Thomas Beddoes to Davies Giddy, 3 March 1799
Dear Giddy
You will be shocked when you come to know that if I had had as much information on the treatment of consumption when Miss Baines first came hither as I have now, I cd more than probably have cured her. In cases of tubercle & of incipient consumption where ulceration is not extensive I have succeeded & am succeeding wonderfully – The cases of success are as yet but few, for I have but just learned the method, in the discovery of which I have had no share. Two of my correspondents without communication with one another both took up the idea of giving digitalis so as to abate the pulse without producing languor or sickness – & both succeeded – from what I have seen & from their testimony I now go to <prescribe for> patients in the above circumstances with somewhat of the same confidence as for those affected with ague & siphylis – my experience does not warrant me to expect much in the last stage except by way of relief – I hourly expect my correspondents’ papers for insertion in our Collection, which they will worthily close, & which will appear in a fortnight; & a very valuable large volume it will make –
At present I am led to hope that the ravages of this devouring disease will be greatly checked; & by some little <further> improvements entirely stopped. The digitalis I find an exceptionally ticklish thing to manage in delicate women – My correspondents say they have carried the does up to near 100 drops of Darwin’s Tincture – I cannot get to 30 in such subjects – & I find 10 some times sufficient & the depression from an overdose is terrible.
I have just published a Collection on nitrous acid in siphylis – I thought myself called upon to expose some unfair treatment of this question by a London surgeon – & once seeing about it I endeavoured to do it effectually – disagreeable as the task was
I am Dear Giddy
Yours truly
Thomas Beddoes
Address: Davies Giddy Esq / Tredrea / Marazion / Cornwall
Endorsement: Doctor Beddoes / 1799 /March the 3d // Recd March 6th 1799 – Miss Baines died on the 3d – DG
MS: Cornish Archives MS DG 42/12