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with a soft sponge, dipped in the undiluted liquid and dried with the slight friction of a smooth towel. After the bath the stiffness and soreness of fatigue are all gone, the circulation is stimulated, and a gentle languor is induced, followed by a desire to sleep.

How Wagner Wrote His Operas.-The story of "How Richard Wagner Wrote His Operas" is indeed wonderful, and it will be told by one of the great composer's most intimate friends in the October Ladies' Home Journal. Wagner carried an opera in his mind for years before he began to set it down on paper.

Mental Depression.—It is very common in women suffering from pelvic disease to find more or less pronounced symptoms of mental depression. They are brooding, despondent and frequently given to tears. For the relief of this condition, along with change of environment and directions for plenty of outdoor exercise, Dr. Talley (Philadelphia Polyclinic) found the following formula of service:

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A Lady Professor of Gynæcology in Holland. We learn from the British Medical Journal that Fraulein Dr. Katharina van Tusshenbroek has been appointed professor of gynæcology in the University of Utrecht.

F. E. Harrison, M. D., Abbeville, S. C., says: I have used CELERINA in appropriate cases, and can heartily recommend it to all who wish an elegant preparation, combined with undiminished therapeutic activity. It is peculiarly fitted to such cases as delirium tremems, headache from debauch or excessive mental or physical exertion.

A Case of Maternal Impression,-Dr. Whyte Glendower Owen (Medical News, September 10th) records a confinement which he attended in which the child was an exact reproduction of one of Palmer Cox's "Brownies," with the grotesque features, froglike abdomen, and spindling limbs so familiar to all. Its most remarkable feature, however, was its cap-the thing which had puzzled him so greatly in

This consisted of a

making a diagnosis of the presentation. hood of fibrous tissue, of purplish hue, which originated in a space of probably two inches and a half on the top of the cranium and extended upward and outward about the same distance. The child weighed about eight pounds, was stillborn, and it was soon the centre of attraction for a curious throng of feminine neighbors who flocked in to view it.

Reverting to the cause of this lusus naturæ, the author ascertained that during the first month of the mother's pregnancy her little boy brought home a wooden "Brownie" about fifteen inches long, with its cap painted red. He threw this unexpectedly into his mother's lap, thereby giving her quite a shock, though afterward she was considerably amused upon examining the toy. Dr. Owen was extremely anxious to obtain possession of the child in order to submit it for inspection, but as this conflicted with the religious convictions of the parents, he was unable to do so. -N. Y. Medical Journal.

The Third Pan-American Medical Congress, meets in Caracas, Venezuela, the last week in December, 1899.

Dr. Marie L. Lefort, who was recently appointed district physician by the board of Health of Newark, N. J., is the first woman to receive such an appointment at the hands of that body.

Dr. Otto Juettner, of Cincinnati, reports the following as the best treatment in rectal ulcers:

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One every evening, followed by a warm rectal irrigation next morning. The protoscope should be used twice every week and the ulcer inspected. Of course the above directions can be modified and adapted to individual cases.

Investigation of The War Department.-The commissioners appointed by the President to investigate the concuct of the war department, and to place if possible the responsibility for the unnecessary shffering and loss of life of the soldiers at Santiago and in camp at home, met at Washington, September 24th. The medical member of the commis

sion is Dr. Phineas S. Conner, of Cincinnati. The departments to be specially investigated are the medical, the commissary, and the quartermaster's departments.Medical Record.

Births and Deaths in Relation to the Time of Day.-Roseri (Arch. ital. de biologia, xxviii, p. 362; Revue des sciences medicales, July 15th) states that the greatest number of births take place in the early hours of the morning, and the greatest number of deaths in the early hours of the afternoon. His conclusions were drawn from 25,000 deaths occurring at Cremona from 1866 to 1880, and from 36,515 births at Rome occurring between 1894 and 1897. The author seeks an explanation of the facts in the variations of activity of the material exchanges during the day; carbonic acid, which is more abundant during the earlier hours of the day, being an excitant of uterine contraction. The sympathetic he considers would be ordinarily more active at night because it is not then controlled by the brain and spinal cord.

Red Cross Work In Porto Rico .According to a report from Mr. H. F. Barnes, Red Cross agent at Ponce, the American Army in Porto Rico is now, and has been for weeks, entirely dependent upon the Red Cross for all of its hospital food supplies. The Spanish hospitals, he says, are well supplied with everything needful for the comfort of the sick. The number of sick among our troops on the island is about ten per cent. of the entire force. Most of the cases are of malaria, dysentery, and typhoid fever.-Med. Record.

INSOMNIA. - REPORT OF A CASE.

By 1. J. HIGGINS, A M. M. D., NEW YORK.

The author has been recently most highly gratified in treating a patient who had suffered from confirmed insomnia for at least three months and in whom neither bromides nor aught else, with the exception of morphine, had given the least relief. The depressing after-effects of the morphine were, however, so pronounced that it was only at rare intervals exhibited. In an article in the New York Medical Journal, March 26, 1898, embodying a report from the services of Drs. J. Rudisch, A. Meyer and A. G. Gerster, attending staff of the Mt, Sinai Hospital, attention is called to a

synthetic drug of marked value as an analgesic and hypnotic, which, although being powerful, is perfectly safe, even for children. After quoting from a series of one hundred and fifty cases some typical ones of acute suppurative arthritis with general sepsis and pericarditis; empyema with double lobar pneumonia in which various drugs had been ineffectual; and of sacro-sciatic neuritis (all successfully treated), the conclusion is reached that as a hypnotic, even when insomnia is due to causes other than that of severe pain, it (kryofine) is of decided value. This, in view of the case quoted is, to say the least, a very conservative statement.

Led by this report to test the drug, as yet unknown to me, I directed in the case above cited a teaspoonful of a solution of kryofine fifty grains to four ounces of menstrum (a dose equaling six grains with slight plusage), to be taken on retiring and that it should be repeated hourly if not effectual. The report to me after the lapse of one week was that within fifteen minutes after taking it he was asleep, and slept four hours without waking; then after a short time. dozed off for the remainder of the night and on the next day he felt like a new man. He had taken his dose nightly for a week with the same uniform result; the drug not losing its power and no further dose having been required. His general health was certainly greatly improved with no effects either ill or otherwise apparent from the drug.

For the second week I directed thet the kryofine should be taken only every other night. He reports that on the night of taking it he slept well and on the succeeding night (omission) likewise. The dose was neither increased nor, with one exception, repeated. This was on the evening of the hottest day and night of the season (July 3d), the extreme heat militating strongly against sleep in any one. On that evening he took a second dose two hours after the first and it proved completely effectual.

Needless to remark such pronounced results in an intractable case (no other drug during the time having been exhibited) encourage me to make further tests, and the above case has been reported with the view of interesting other observers in the clinical investigation of the drug Kryofine.

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REPORT OF AN UNUSUAL CASE OF TYPHOID FEVER; SWELLING OF BOTH BREASTS FOLLOWED BY SUPPURATION;

THROMBOPHLEBITIS.*

BY CHARLOTTE C. WEST, M. D.,

Assistant in the Department of Medicine and Therapeutics in the Philadelphia Polyclinic.

T

HE case which I have the pleasure of reporting to you

this evening, presents features of unusual interest, and after a careful search of the literature at my command, I have been unable to find exactly its parallel. The patient is a young girl, 20 years of age, tall, slenderly built, and of very dark complexion.

Psychologically she is a most interesting study, being at all times unmanageable, and of a violent temper. She cannot brook contradiction, and often has paroxysms of ungovernable rage when her will is thwarted. Though of limited education, she has a strikingly picturesque way of expressing herself that attracts the attention of all who come in contact with her. I mention these things because during her delirium they were not alone present, but markedly intensified.

On the 13th of August, 1897, while in a contrary mood, she deliberately exposed herself for hours to wet and dampness, and after becoming thoroughly soaked, threw herself upon the bed to rest without changing her clothing.

When I saw her two days later, she was apparently suffering great agony, and could scarcely move her limbs and head. There was much cough and sub-sternal pain, but beyond numerous bronchial rales, examination revealed nothing. The tongue was heavily coated, the bowels were

*Read before the March Meeting of the Alumnæ Medical Society of the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania. Reprinted from The Philadelphia Polyclinic.

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