THE MOST PAINFUL DEATH.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 3296, 15 August 1911, Page 2

THE MOST PAINFUL DEATH.

PROVISIONS OF NATURE

Few pe.ple know how one dies. They have only a blindly superstitious foai and horror of death. The deaths which are to be .most dreaded have little or no terror for most people. Now, to decide what is'the most painful death we must look into the nature of .pain. The greatest suffering is produced, not by thtf surface or superficial nerves of the body, but by a disturbance at some important nerve centra. Many deaths which are supposed to be -accompanied by the most excruciating agony are almost painless, because only tie outer nerves are affected. Tue most familiar example is death from burning. We imagine that to be burned alive is the most intense torture conceivable. Mr. A. P. Smith says : T would rather be burned to death than die from many of the so-called “natural” causes. ' This is also true of the pain produced by cuts and bruises. Unless such cuts go ' very deep, or the bruises are very severe, a death caused in this way, though distressing, is not so oamful 'as that from many familiar diseases. Most of the railway accidents injure people in just this way. Death from such causes is more distressing to relatives. It is grievous to see a lodv mangled or cut and .bruised. We dread such a death, and imagine that it is the most painful. But for the victim of such an accident the actual pain is not so great as people fancy. A severe shock produces a dulling or numbing effect upon the system. This is a most merciful provision of nature. A man who falls from a high place is likely to be unconscious before he reaches the ground. The victims of railway disasters, as a rule, nave their senses dulled, aud it is much the same with a person who is burned aiive. Lockjaw causes most painful death. On the other hand, some diseases cause at the end the most intense agony. The most painful death a man can die is from tetanus or lockjaw. In this disease the nerve centres are so affected that the muscles are set or knotted together rigidly, so that the pain is acute. The disturbance in this case directly affects the spinal cord, and this quickly spreads to the brain. It is Impossible for anyone who has never seen a death from lockjaw to appreciate the terrors of it. Fortunately, this disease is rare... It is a mistake to believe that the most violent deaths are necessarily painful. As a rule, whenever the patients are violent they arc delirious and unconscious of their pain. ‘