... Disputatio De pleuritide

and something else: and indeed, by reason of its location, it is a spurious pleurisy, which is also an inflammation having the same causes, but is situated in the external muscles of the thorax.

XIV.

As regards the causes, pain also arises from phlegm, which sometimes descends from the head by distillation into the cavity of the thorax, and, adhering to the side of the thorax, brings about a pain similar to that of pleurisy. Sometimes it abounds in the whole body, and thus it can also excite a tumor with pain in those parts.

XV.

Signs: Respiration in this case is indeed difficult, but not to the same extent as in the true form; the fever is not as acute; the pricking sensations of the sides are more tolerable; and the cough admits of a posture more opposed to the affected side.

XVI.

It is also reported that pain in the sides is generated by flatulence, when, that is to say, some such matter adheres in those parts.

XVII.

Furthermore, yet another species is recounted by more recent authors, especially by Quercetanus, which in all respects imitates the true and legitimate form, yet not the spurious, even though it has a clearly different cause—namely, malignant and acrid vapors carried upward from the lower parts into the region of the chest, from which follow inflammation of the pleura, erosion of the veins, spitting of blood, and other similar symptoms imitating true Pleurisy.

XIIX.

The cause of these, it has been discovered, is worms and lumbricos (roundworms) contained in the lower parts, which