Rupture into the gut is exactly what will happen every time, in all cases, if left alone and no food nor drugs given.]

"Treatment:  Warm, followed by hot, flaxseed poultices; rest, freshly expressed meat juice or beef tea, in all 200 grams; thin gruel made with milk, 200 grams; wine, 100 grams in twenty-four hours, small portions to be taken every two hours; no drugs.”

[A little over six ounces of meat juice and six ounces of gruel made with milk!  The starch contained in the gruel will always create gas in these cases and stimulate peristalsis; the gas inflates the cecum and drives the contents of the bowels into the abscess cavity; this sets up secondary inflammation.  The meat juice and wine could have been left out to the patient’s betterment.  It is refreshing to know that no drugs were given, and if the case had been treated from the start on the no-drug plan the course and ending would have been very different.  The poultices would have done as much good if they had been put on the leg of his bed, and much less harm.]

“This improvement continued for several days and even became more marked The abdomen returned to the norm with the exception of the ileo-cecal region; there was a small stool daily without recognizable pus; no fever.

“Upon the_ twelfth day of the disease vomiting suddenly recurred with severe diffuse abdominal pain, marked meteorism, and fever to about 102.2 degree F.;”

[True, diffuse peritonitis set in at this time.]

“the symptoms increased in severity, and changed during the collapse, his temperature 97.3 degree F., pulse 160, thready, uneven; conspicuous facies hippocratica; no pain; a slight comatose condition, moderate meteorism, no movement of the bowels.  Stimulants were without effect; subcutaneous saline infusion revived the patient but only for a short time? and death occurred the following morning upon the fourteenth day of the disease.”

[Meteorism!  What at is it?  A blown-up condition of tile bowels.  Gruel caused gas to form the gas was driven into the abscess cavity, reinfection took place? which ended in diffuse peritonitis.  The patient’s resistance was used up and, being exhausted he died.  He had made a brave fight a against all sorts of odds but the second round was too much for him.]

"Autopsy: Normal condition of the scrosa above the omentum:  the appendix surrounded by adhesions embedded in fecal pus? gangrenous toward its terminal portion, and showing perforation; fecal calculus in the pus; appendix movable toward the cecum.”

[Just what may be expected in all cases!  Nature is always busy reinforcing weak points, but the modern physician and surgeon is too wily and artful for her; she can’t always anticipate his moves, hence she can’t always fortify successfully.]