Circuit of the Blood. --the blood thus purified passes back to the heart to go on its circuit through the body, every organ of which renews its energy and vigor from the Magician's fiery wand, pure, healthy blood; while the air exhaled carries off the impurities.

Change in color of blood. --during this process the blood changes from a dark purple to a bright red. Pure air is the cheapest necessity and the greatest luxury of life. Let it not be the rarest. The relative proportion of the respirations to the pulsations of the heart is about 1 to 4 1/2 or 5; and the quantity of air required to keep the blood pure is very great. Indeed, respiration is the falling weight, event spring, which keeps the clock of life in motion; the inspirations and expirations are the strokes of the pendulum which regulate it.

____________________
I have a new theory. Actually maybe this is my first theory. I think the authors may delve into flowery language and the peculiar like analogies whenever they don't know what they're talking about. I could be wrong I like to give the authors the benefit of the doubt. However it seems that whenever they lacked substance and factor knowledge, their prose gets a little loose.

I've also heard that it is a urban legend today that blood has two different colors. If that is truly an urban legend and blood does not have the color of purple and red, and this book might actually be one of possibly many sources that helped to create that legend, which may not be all that urban after all. Maybe more of a historical legend.

Wikipedia today provides an excellent description of what the color of blood is and why it is that color.  They describe a situation of optical illusions that led scientists and doctors as evidenced by the Library of Health to believe that veinous blood deprived of its oxygen was actually 'purple' or blue.  Sheesh

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

• BONES OF THE HEAD, BASE AND NECK.
  
  

  
  

  Bones of the Skull — this illustration gives an accurate and faithful representation of the head, face and neck, surrounded by an outline of the fleshy parts as they appear in the human frame. The bones of the head, eight in number, constitute the skull, and those of the face, 14 and number, compose a strong, hard bony case, which encloses and affords a suitable protection for the brain and the four organs a special sense, viz.: site, smell, taste and hearing. All of these bones are in movable, except the lower jaw, which moves by means of a hinge-joint, and permits of the opening and closing of the mouth.

  One of the things that struck me as I dictated this last segment (for my readers information I am using Dragon Naturally Speaking to dictate this text as well as my views on the text) was the large number of commas as used in this paragraph. By my count there were 15 used in this paragraph which had three sentences. Now this book in general uses the coma extensively and reminds me of a style of writing that I was taught in grade school shortly before several rules of language were simplified. For example when I was in grade school I was taught that a conjunction that included the word “and” should have a coma in between each item building up to the conjunction including the last word that preceded the word “and.”

  Back then I would’ve drafted this sentence as follows:
  I went to the store, the post office, the car wash, and the bank.

  Later in high school some economy of writing came about and decreased 1 of the commas needed in writing. I don’t know when or why this occurred, but I do recall several grammar teachers remarking on the fact and teach in is the new writing style. Back then I didn’t follow the news quite to the extent that I do today and so I do not recall whether there was a boost in the global economy due to the increased productivity allowed workers especially “knowledge workers” who would not have had to write, type or dictate quite as many commas. In fact they would have one less coma to write. Can you imagine what everyone did with all that extra time saved him from writing?

  Now honestly one coma probably to make that big of a difference. But now as I read the library of health I realize that over the last 82 a hundred years the world hasn’t saved just one coma; they have saved close to a dozen per paragraph. Computers may have brought a significant amount of productivity to the workforce, but just imagine how much we’ve saved over the last hundred years writing fewer comas.

  I wonder when the majority of the comas as were lost. Maybe it was the result of World War I or World War II or the combination of both wars. It’s possible that to expedite communications Society had to adapt and reduce the number of dits in das used in a telegraph. The war to end all wars may have failed in Indian all wars, but it may have succeeded in putting an end to a few extra comas.

• The Itch Mite
  
  

  The Itch Mite.–This parasite which afflicts man causes the condition spoken of as “Itch,” “Seven Years Itch,” “Army Itch,” “Jackson Itch,” etc. It has an oval body with spine-like projections. The female is larger than the male and measures 1-70 of an inch in length by 1-50 of an inch in width. The female causes the development and pain of the afflicted person. She burrows into the superficial skin, forming a tortuous or a straight dotted line, slightly elevated which varies from 1/8 to 1/2 inch in length.

  I wonder if they had to invest in a Bugaboo stroller after scratching this itch fifty years ago?

  This line if observed closely appears dark gray or blackish in color and is slightly more elevated at one end. The eggs are laid in this furrow and at the elevated end is usually found the female, which has perished, as a rule. It takes almost 13 to 20 days for the eggs to develop into adult mites. The young mites feed upon the tissues of the body and move about causing discomfort until they reach the surface of the skin where they mate and females start a fresh burrow and deposit more eggs.

  The Itch Mite is commonly found in the skin between the fingers, hands, folds of the wrist, arm pits, around the stomach and about the neck. It is not known as a carrier of disease, but can be dangerous to health by causing burrows in the skin and abrasions due to scratching which afford an opening for germs to enter the system of the bitten individual.

  The Itch Mite can be conveyed from one person to another by means of towels, clothing, bathing suits, etc., carelessly washed, handled, or worn by anyone afflicted with the pests.

  TREATMENT.—To destroy them, have all bed linen and clothing used by the individual infested, thoroughly boiled or baked. Treat the region of the body by taking a bath, washing first with warm water and castile soap, using a brush to thoroughly open up the burrows and expose the eggs for destruction. After this, apply an ointment,

  Sublimed sulphur…….one drachm (teaspoonful)

  Balsam of Peru…….one drachm (teaspoonful)

  Vaseline …………one ounce (2 tablespoonfuls)

  Rub in morning and evening for from two to four days and repeat at end of a week if any itching continues.

• The Olfactory Nerve & The Tongue
  
  

  This week I have uploaded a number of the pictures I’ve been promising for a couple weeks scanned. I will provide an administrative update about that soon after I do it, and I will go back and update hyperlinks in past articles directing to those images readers that find the articles and some date after they’ve been published. For anyone following along in the feed of this website the ordering of articles may get a little jumbled for a day or two as I perform those updates. I apologize for that in advance.  Here is the link for the often reference set of pictures from Chart 1.

  With this article I’m going to move into the next two sections that cover the olfactory nerve and the tongue.

  The Olfactory Nerve – the olfactory nerve is graphically displayed, branches of which are seen passing in all directions over the mucous membrane of the nose. A little to the left of the olfactory nerve is seeing the posterior nares, and immediately below the pharynx and epiglottis, the aesophagus or gullit, the larynx and trachea or wind-pipe.

  The Tongue – the tongue, or organ of taste and instrument of speech, is most accurately represented, the muscular fibers of which are seen running in different but determinant ways, is giving to this important organ variety and regularity of motion and 18 it to assume numerous shapes and forms. The cervical portion of the spinal column is seeing, with the fleshy part of the back of the neck attached. This plate is one that commends itself to our deep in careful study.

  There is not too much that leaps out from this particular section as the text is basically describing a picture. I didn’t spell a suspect is in the way that the book spells the word with an ‘a’ proceeding the ‘e’ of esophagus. There is something about old writing which I have not learned yet that sometimes puts an ‘a’ before and ‘e’. I’ve seen this in words such as, Aegypt v. Egypt and many others. One of these days I will look up the history of the word possibly it’s a Latin derivative of some type or another, I’m not certain today.