Schirrus

[…] 'Tis true, when once a Schirrus is formed in a glandular Part, no one can tell how it may terminate; becauſe various changes may ariſe from various Cauſes in the Conſtitution of the Perſon; and if the Juices ſhould degenerate into a highly acrid, or what the Ancients termed an atrabiliary State, the Schirrus will be (cæteris paribus) more liable to become a Cancer.

“A schirrus of the favourable kind, may continue a long time almost harmless, unless it compresses the neighbouring vessels pretty much; as is observed by Van Swieten, though that learned physician says, that so long as a schirrus possesses any part of the body, it is plain there is reason to be in continual dread of something worse succeeding, &c. for whatever incites the motions of the humours, and quickens circulation, as passions of the mind, errors in diet, motions of the body, bruises, falls, fevers, &c. may change a benign schirrus into a deplorable cancer.

We have seen it occur without preceding schirrus, present an equal smooth surface with little secretion; and many other appearances of this ulcer have been observed, as it has been modified by accidental circumstances.

An exquisite Schirrus is uncurable; for seeing it is senselesse, it is manifest that the part is deprived of the influence of the animal spirit: and seeing this humor doth distend the sinewes, veins and arteries, the faculty itself is strangled and choaked, so that it neither can direct, nor help the naturall heat to concurre with the meanes, to be applyed for the dispatching of this griefe.

Chirurgical writers have generally enumerated tumor as an essential symptom of the schirrus ; and it is very true, that this disease is often accompanied with an increase of bulk in the part affected.

In acute cases they are rapidly produced, make scarcely an attempt at development, and die off with rapidity; in schirrus they are formed more slowly, and in much smaller numbers, live longer, and make some attempt at caudation, but they are still farther removed in form from the typical cell of healthy tissues.