not only be tolerated better by the patient's stomach, but will not cause distressing effects, such as deafness, tinnitus aurium, vertigo, etc., as it does when exhibited during a higher temperature.

When the system is properly prepared, as indicated above, a suitable antiperiodic, as quinia sulph. (or Cinchonidia) should be given in full doses, twenty-four grs. of sul. quinia in twelve capsules, to be taken at two doses, four hours apart.. Several severe cases of remittents in persons who had contracted the disease in the South, have been quickly and thoroughly restored to health by this line of treatment. Several who have written me, complain that they cannot get the liver to act, even with full doses of "Resini podophylli," to all of whom I say, let the liver alone. If the tongue is dry and dark, avoid mandrake until the tongue is moist and broad and dirty brown, then resin of podophyllum in one-twentieth to onetwelfth of a grain every six hours may be admissible, but is really seldom required.

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DIPHTHERIA. Notwithstanding the pages of the MEDICAL TIMES have contained many articles on this malady, doctors continue to write to know "the very latest and most improved method of treatment." The treatment I have advocated and persistently used during the past five years, has been so successful as to prompt me to outline it again in this connection. First, watch well the temperature, preventing a retention of heat heat by the use of small doses of tr. aconite frequently repeated, alkaline sponging, etc., and to check a too rapid oxidation by salicylate of soda or salicin. These measures to be kept at hand, and the temperature kept below 102°, if possible. The diphtheritic exudate, if confined to the pharynx, may often be controlled by frequent gargling or washing with chlor. potassa, tr. ferri mur, encalyptol with glycerine, boracic acid, sul-. phite of soda, etc., which should be used frequently. However, should the exudate occur from the laryngeal or bronchial lining, the case becomes more serious, and calls for prompt remedial measures. A good atomizer is usually indispensable with this class of cases. Nitrate of sanguinarina is our agent, one grain to water iii, used with a steam or hand atomizer, and

the solution thrown well into the larynx and trachea, sufficient to disorganize the fibrine in the exudate. Should there be a great mass of this exudate in these positions, when called to the patient, a first duty is to not only use the atomizer to disorganize it, but dislodge it even if emesis by ipecacuanha is required (after the spray is used), or else our little patient may collapse from suffocation. If the respiratory track is successfully cleared, there will be but slight trouble to keep it so, by using the atomizer every three to five hours. As to internal remedies, besides those to control the temperature, tr. ferri mur., eucolyptal, baptisia, quinia, tr. cupr. acet., etc., as indicated, will be attended with the happiest results. Of course suitable nourishment is to be used promptly and thoroughly. Animal broths, milk, eggs, gruels, etc., which can be taken with but slight difficulty when more solid food could not be swallowed.

CHOLERA INFANTUM.-Chronic cases occasionally come under our care even in the winter months, but the long-heated term during September, throughout the Western States, caused an unusual number of cases at this season. A long-continued high temperature and low barometer, enervates the nervous system of these little patients, so that it is next to impossible for them to digest the simplest forms of food, and they gradually become emaciated and sometimes die from actual inanition.

The treatment required in such cases is very simple as regards remedies; much medication is detrimental. Nourishment is usually the most important requisition. Proper food in proper quantities should first be selected, then insure its prompt digestion and assimilation by full doses of pure pepsin or lactopeptine. The secretions will usually regulate themselves if the stomach performs its functions promptly, and nutrition and restoration will be the result.

DISTRIBUTION OF DISEASES.

The National Board of Health Bulletin (No. 13), in its monthly review of mortality for August, gives some interesting facts in regard to the distribution of disease in different sections of the country. The following summary may be of

value as an aid to prognosis in regard to what may be expected as the cooler autumn weather advances :

During the summer months, there has been a general decline in the death-rate of all pulmonary diseases, that of acute lung diseases having shown the greater reduction. Both classes continue to fall in the northeast and southeast sections; but both show an increased rate in the Northwest, which probably results from the earlier change of season in the more elevated portions of that inland section. Croup has increased in all sections, but diphtheria shows a marked decline in the Northwest, with a small increase of mortality in the other sections. The rate of deaths from measles continues to fall in all parts of the country, and scarlet fever has advanced only in the Northwest. Whooping-cough has begun to fall in its rate of mortality for all sections, the most marked decline being in the Southeast, where the disease had spread extensively, and, in July, reached a death-rate of 0.50; it falls to 0.40 this month. The increase of enteric fever, noted last month, still continues in all sections of the country, the advance being most marked in the Northwest; this may be ascribed to the earlier change of season in that section, as referred to in connection with the increase of mortality from acute lung diseases, enteric fever being notably an autumnal disease in this country. Malarial fevers being in the same class, as to season, a general increase is noted in all sections, being most marked in the Northeast and Northwest, where the temperature required to develop the cause appeared latest. The change of death-rate from diarrhoeal and other summer diseases does not necessarily follow the temperature in their decline so closely as in their inception, many deaths occurring from a sudden fall of temperature acting upon subjects previously prepared by the exhausting effects of the heat. The reduction of death-rate from diarrhoeal diseases has been greatest in the Northeast, where it had been highest. Since July, the rate has fallen 40 per cent in that section, 30 per cent in the Southeast, and 20 per cent in the Northwest. It has been noted that other influences than temperature control the movement of this class of diseases. The epidemic of small-pox at Camden, N. J., has furnished

twenty-four out of the thirty-nine deaths reported; Philadelphia reports thirteen, and Chicago and San Francisco report one each. A report of Asiatic cholera in Erie, Penn., caused some alarm, but no case of that disease has been proved to exist in the country this season. Indiana, Tennessee and adjoining States have reported extensive prevalence of typhomalarial fevers, but usually not of very fatal type. No yellow fever has appeared at any of the exposed points of the coast, the few deaths reported during the month having occurred on infected vessels or in quarantine hospitals. The fever known

as dengue has prevailed along the Lower Mississippi and the Gulf Coast, and in Charleston, S. C., but the mortality was generally small.

THE HOBBY HORSE.

With

Only a limited number of doctors are partial to equestrian exercise, in the ordinary sense of the term; but there is one horse that most of them are by far too fond of riding. one the hobby-horse is calomel, with another quinine, while another is continually astride of some pet theory like the law of similars or "specific medication." The hobby-horse is an animal of most wonderful endurance; he apparently never tires, and, although sometimes ridden to death, yet death does not relieve him of his rider, who often clings as pertinaciously to a defunct hobby as to any other. It cannot be denied that the hobby is a great convenience to the doctor, for it saves time, as well as the wear and tear of mental labor. It is much easier to write a pet prescription, dismiss the patient and pocket the fee in five minutes than to make a careful and deliberate study of the case and adapt remedies to meet the indications. Hobby-riding is not confined to the illiterate and superficial members of the profession. It is quite as likely to manifest itself in the person of a college professor. The attentive student in attendance upon the college clinics soon learns what prescriptions to expect from each instructor. We clip from The Country Practitioner an anecdote which illustrates this point. The incident occurred in Philadelphia, in the clinic of Prof. Robley Dunglison.

"The Professor, for convenience' sake, had a tonic preparation which he called ferrocyline, which, of course, came frequently in play.

"For the sake of cleanliness and counter-irritation, he nearly always ordered the patient rubbed with a coarse towel, and gave carbo-ligni for the stomach's sake.

"One clinic day, after carefully questioning a patient who had presented herself, he turned to the class and said, "Gentlemen, what shall I give this woman? Any one of you should be able to prescribe as well as I can." A student away up in the upper tiers of the arena, and who had evidently been paying more attention to a neighboring groggery than to his studies, swung his hat around his head and sang out in stentorian tones, "Give her carbo-ligni, ferrocyline, and rub her down with a coarse towel." The ensuing scene can be imagined but not described.

Doubtless, many prescriptions are made in private practice in the same manner and for the same reason, and to this cause may be attributed many of the much-talked-of failures and uncertainties of medicine.

individual hobbies.

Let us try to discover and weed out our

BOOK NOTICES.

SUPPLEMENT TO THE AMERICAN DISPENSATORY. By JOHN KING, M. D., and JOHN U. LLOYD. Cincinnati: Milstach, Baldwin & Co., Nos 141 and 143 Race street. 1880. For sale by Jansen & McClurg, Chicago. The American Dispensatory has achieved a well-deserved reputation, not alone in Eclectic circles, but also among practitioners of the Homœopathic and Allopathic schools. A rapidly-increasing list of new and useful remedies has called forth this supplement, which is a valuable contribution to medical science. The work is well done; the therapeutics, by Prof. King, are elucidated in his usual clear and conspicuous style, while the sections on chemistry, pharmacy and botany, by Prof. Lloyd, are full and accurate. Altogether, the work is so good as to call forth commendations from even the Allopathic press. Says the St. Louis Clinical Record:

"The work will make a valuable addition to any physician's library; especially will it be of use to those who are disposed