and sub-tropical countries of Asia, Africa, and America, and consists of strong-scented annual or perennial herbs or small shrubby plants, with flowers disposed in whorls forming terminal interrupted racemes." According to the same authority O. Sanctum is much used in medicine by the Cingalese. The leaves of O. virde, "which is native of Western Africa, possess febrifugal properties; and at Sierra Leone where it bears the name of Fever-plant, a decoction of them, drank as tea, is used as a remedy for the fevers, so prevalent at that place.” It is an interesting observation that the same plant which keeps off mosquitoes, the bearers of fever, also cures the fever. (This calls to mind that our "insect-powders" are made of the Pyrethrums or "fever-fews.") Ocimum canum was introduced into homeopathic medicine by Mure, and has proved on his indications a remedy of the first rank in cases of renal colic. It has also striking symptoms in connection with the female breast and the function of lactation. It is sudorific, and is used in bilious and remittent fevers.-Hom. World, Feb., 1903.

Report of a Case of Almost Fatal Poisoning by Six Grains of Quinine. Dr. Lewis A. Connor reports this case, with comments: (Med. Record, April 4, 1903). A healthy man, twenty-seven years old, of medium height and slender build, was brought to the Hudson Street Hospital on the afternoon of May 11 last, in a condition of collapse. Less than an hour before he had applied to an apothecary for medicine for a "cold" and had been given five pills said to contain quinine. He had taken two pills at once, and about fifteen minutes later had noticed a burning of the skin and fluttering of the heart. To these symptoms were soon added vertigo, faintness, tachycardia, and great weakness. These symptoms had so rapidly grown worse that he had been hurried to the hospital.

When seen by the acting house physician, Dr. Beckwith, the man was conscious and complained of some abdominal pain and of intense weakness. His face was pale and was covered with cold sweat, his respiration shallow, and no pulse whatever could be felt in the radial arteries.

On listening over the pericardium, faint heartbeats, too rapid to be counted, could be heard. The patient was given vigorous stimulation subcutaneously, together with external heat, and half an hour later the radial pulse could be felt, although still very feeble. The count at this time showed 180 beats to the minute. The burning and itching of the skin, which had been noticed early, gradually increased, and about an hour after admission, there appeared over trunk, extremities, and face a diffuse scarlatiniform rash with much swelling of the skin, especially about the face. At this time the temperature was 100° F. Under very active stimulation the patient's general condition improved steadily, although the swelling, heat, and itching of the skin caused great discomfort and restlessness. On the following morning the eruption had well-nigh disappeared, and the patient, although still very weak, insisted upon going home. Two days later he was seen again. The pulse was normal in rate and of fair force, but was somewhat irregular and occasionally intermittent. The patient still felt very weak but was able to be about. There was still some unpleasant itching of the skin. It is interesting to note that

at no time during the attack was there either ringing of the ears or deafness.

The remaining three pills proved, on analysis, to contain each three grains of quinine sulphate. These symptoms had, therefore, been produced by six grains of the drug.

The patient volunteered the information that there existed in his family a distinct idiosyncrasy toward quinine. One sister had twice been violently poisoned by the drug and had shown symptoms similar to his own. A brother had also shown the same susceptibility. On the other hand, a second sister and his parents had never displayed any such peculiarity. He himself some years before, had had some disagreeable symptoms after taking quinine, but they had been mild as compared with those of the present attack, and had not made much impression upon him.

The extreme cardiac depression seen in this case, which, for a short time, was such that death seemed imminent, is the feature which chiefly distinguishes it from the many other cases in which marked susceptibility to the drug is shown. The rash, the itching and burning of the skin, and the vertigo are not uncommon symptoms, and have sometimes been produced by doses smaller than that taken in this case. Such an effect upon the heart, however, seems very rare among the published cases of poisoning by small or moderate doses of quinine. Wood' speaks of a case in which two grains administered by the mouth produced a furious general urticaria and cardiac depression of the most alarming character. Upshur saw, in the case of a susceptible woman, thirty grains, administered in the course of sixteen hours, produced intense nausea, diarrhea, abdominal pain, and a very feeble pulse; and saw in the same individual, one year later, eight grains produce similar symptoms with a "thready pulse."

Huseman, in 1888, collected four cases of fatal poisoning by quinine, but in all of them the amounts were relatively large.

The most noteworthy case found is that reported by Miccichè in 1894 A girl of thirteen years, suffering from a severe form of malaria was given about eight grains of quinine hydrochlorate subcutaneously. Within fifteen minutes there developed severe abdominal pain and vomiting. Following this there were prostration, a small frequent pulse, high fever, great nervous depression, and later stupor, jaundice, hematuria and anuria, with death from uremia on the seventh day. The autopsy showed marked swelling of the liver and spleen, swelling and fatty degeneration of the kidneys, and evidences of great destruction of red cells. The girl had previously shown great susceptibility to quinine, and each administration of it had been followed by vomiting, fever and hematuria. The possibility that the symptoms and fatal ending in this case may have depended upon the malarial infection rather than the quinine is not discussed by the writer.

I.

REFERENCES.

Wood.-Therapeutics; its Principles and Practice. XI Edit., page 545. 2. Upshur-Atlan. Jour. of Med., Richmond, 1883-4, I, page 828. 4. Huseman-Therap. Monat., Berlin, 1888, II, page 97.

4. Miccichè.-Riforma Medica, X, 1894, page 14; also Schmidt's Jahrbücher, No. 249, page 133.

CONDUCTED BY

Electro-Therapeutics.

WILLIAM H DIEFFENBACH. M.D.

Piccinino and Sbordone (Naples) report a "New Efficient Treatment for Trachoma" by means of electricity. Treatment consists of cocainizing (4 per cent.) the parts to be treated and after a five-minutes' wait applying the high-frequency sparks to the diseased conjunctiva and the cornea. The electrode is held 1⁄2 inch from the parts and the application lasts for two minutes. Treatment is given daily. In a large number of cases treated, they report excellent results even in lesions of long standing, two or three treatments sufficing in some cases for a cure. The average number of treatments required in all cases was six. These positive statements of the above physicians should induce American ophthalmologists to give the high-frequency current a trial in trachoma and other infectious diseases of the eye. The high-frequency spark is germicidal and produces marked tissue changes when applied intelligently and its scope of therapeutic utility is constantly increasing.

Von Lutzenberger (Naples) reports a number of cures of Varicocele treated according to the method of Wiederhold. A very small electrode is kept moving along the spermatic cord while the stabile electrode, larger in diameter, is fixed at the internal abdominal ring. A mild galvano-faradic current is employed for five minutes, treatment being given daily at first, and, later on, three times. a week. The labile electrode in moving along the spermatic cord must be applied with moderate pressure and the direction should be from below upward, following the venous current.

The Bactericidal Action of the Ultra-Violet Rays.-Strebel (Muenchen) reports a number of experiments with cultures of pathogenic bacteria with ultra-violet rays at varying distances, and notes that the micro-organisms are absolutely destroyed even at distances of from 10-20 inches from the quartz lens through which the light is filtered.

Kaiser (Vienna) some months ago reported his investigations on the blue rays with reference to bacterial affections, an extract of which we append.

"He threw the light of a powerful lantern, filtered through a glass which allowed only blue rays to pass, directly upon cultures of tubercle bacilli. Similar cultures were attached to the back of a patient whose chest was exposed to the light at a distance of fifteen feet for half an hour daily for six days. In all the experiments the bacilli were killed, even when the invisible heat rays were also filtered out. This proved conclusively that the blue light was able to penetrate the body.

"The effect of exposing tuberculous patients to the light was markedly beneficial. A few days' treatment produced perceptible improvement and a diminution of the number of bacilli in the sputa. Tuberculous abscesses which had resisted every other treatment during three months were healed by the blue light in four weeks."

Piffard (Medical Record, March 7, 1903) in an interesting article on Radio-praxis reviews the present status of photo-therapy, offering a comparison between the physical properties of the X-ray and ultraviolet ray. He emphasizes the fact that the ultra-violet rays, while absolutely inimical to bacteria, cannot penetrate tissues unless the latter are dehematized, as the circulatory fluid offers sufficient resistance to prevent penetration. He makes a strong plea for a trial of the blue-violet rays in tuberculosis, citing the much-quoted cases of Sciascia (Rome), who absolutely cured a supposedly incurable cases of tubercular peritonitis in a child of nine years by means of concentrated solar rays. A trial of the blue light by the authorities of the municipal tubercular infirmary during the coming summer would be of great value in determining the usefulness of this agent in the treatment of the "great white plague."

In this connection we would state that the X-ray and static breeze will be subjected to a thorough test at the Metropolitan Hospital, Blackwell's Island, during the next month as an adjuvant in the treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis and phthisis. Dr. E. Guernsey Rankin proposes to select a number of cases in varying stages of the disease which will remain under perfect control and supervision and will receive treatment at different intervals in order to eliminate any doubt as to the source of improvement if such should supervene.

French Electro-therapeutic Journals at regular intervals publish extracts on the treatment of Alopecia Adnata, Presenilis, Areata and even the senile form of baldness. The current employed in most cases is the high frequency; some recommend the static head-spray. When we consider the nutritional changes which these currents can induce in all tissues, it might well be accepted as a fact, that hair bulbs or follicles unless absolutely atrophied can also be stimulated to renewed activity through properly applied agents. We have experimentally treated a case of alopecia senilis of a man seventy years of age, with surprising results, the bald pate becoming completely covered with a fine, downy new growth which appears to be becoming denser with each succeeding week. This case is treated with glass-vacuum electrodes, very mild currents being employed for one minute at each station or until an erythematous glow is produced. Treatment is given every other day.

Von Lutzenberger (Naples) in an excellent review of the progress of electro-therapeutics for 1902 (Zeitschrift fuer Electro-therapie, March, 1903) deplores the fact that medical universities as a whole seem to ignore the subject of physical therapeutics. He asserts that this agency is destined to revolutionize the practice of medicine and notes with gratification that the University of Rome (Italy) has recently added a chair of physical therapeutics to its teaching staff.

NORTH AMERICAN

JOURNAL OF HOMEOPATHY.

Original Articles in Medicine.

POSOLOGY.

By E. B. NASH, M.D.,

Professor of Materia Medica New York Homœopathic Medical College and

THE

Hospital.

more

HE question of dose, or potency which by most physicians is understood to be the same thing, is one that has caused m bickering and strife in and out of our school than anything else. Nor do we expect to settle it to the satisfaction of all at this time.

We will start out by affirming that the word "dose," in the general acceptation of the term, does not by any means cover the ground of what is accepted by Hahnemann as the significance of the word potency.

The first signifies quantity, more or less from a materialistic stand-point, this and nothing more, while potency means power even beyond the material discernible by any existing tests, except the physiological. This power or potence is discernible in substances that were never known in the material substance. Notable instances are in the case of salt, carbon and silex. Discovery of this was like many others; for instance, the discovery of gravitation, steam, electricity, etc., by accident.

Attempts to apply remedies according to the law of similars were followed in several instances by terrible aggravations of the sickness. This led to a reduction of the size of the dose. In carrying out this reducing and subdividing process, it was discovered that new and important energies were developed in the remedies, and substances comparatively inert proved to be of great power. Provings instituted upon persons in health brought out effects that were entirely foreign to anything that had ever occurred in poison