(twentieth dynasty) present all the signs of diffuse anthracosis," being choked with soot, as though in life they had been in I smoke-laden air. "Numerous micrococci are packed in an alveolus" of another set of lungs, and Dr. Ruffer does not hesitate to diagnose pneumonia, "which had advanced to the stage of hepatisation." In the tissues of the liver and the blood-vessels of the same mummy large numbers of bacilli were also found. "These bacilli stain well with hematoxylin, methylene blue, fuchsin, but not with Gram's method. . . . . . . It is clear that micro-organisms retain their characters unaltered in mummified tissue." These particular ones were ovoid in form and "about the size of plague bacilli though plumper." In other mummies renal lesions were found, which took the form, in one case, of multiple abscesses, full again of bacilli resembling bacillus coli. All these micro-organisms were dead and incapable of doing harm. In examining a renal calculus of Dynasty II. Mr. Shattock, the pathological curator of the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, found in a closed central cavity a mass of mould conidia in so good a state of microscopic preservation that he unsuccessfully attempted to raise a growth from themthey were dead. Were the bacilli of mummies capable of spreading disease among the living, who shall say what results might not follow?

Medical Students in United States.According to The Journal of the American Medical Association there were 22,145 students pursuing medical studies in this country last year. Of these 20,554 were in attendance at regular schools, 899 at homeopathic, 413 at eclectic, 52 at physiomedical, and 227 at unclassified colleges, respectively. A year ago there were 4,442 graduates in medicine. There has been a slight decrease within the last few years in the number both of students and graduates.

According to statistics submitted at the last meeting of the Council on Medical Education there are 160 medical schools in this country, as compared with 172 in all the rest of the world. In Germany there

are 20 medical schools; in France 5; in England 21; in Scotland 8; in Austria 7; in Russia 10; in Spain 9; in Mexico 1; in Argentine 2; in Brazil 3. We certainly have our share!

There is the same disparity in the number of physicians. In Europe the average is probably one physician to 1,500 or 2,000 people. In the United States there is one to 656, according to the figures of the Carnegie Foundation, though others make the professional congestion even greater. It should be recalled, however, that this country is the richest in the world. The average income is higher than anywhere else. The people are much more able to employ the medical man than in the old world, so resort to him much more frequently. In spite of the large number of physicians the position of the medical man in America is far above that of his brother in Europe.

New Pure Food Catsup.- Wesener, (Illinois Med. Jour.) sums up his paper as follows:

I. Sodium benzoate and benzoic acid are medicinally less active than the other substances used in the preservation of food, and the benzoate is less active than the preservatives now used in making the pure food catsup, which it has been stated may be made without the use of chemicals.

2. By the use of sodium benzoate and benzoic acid, the flavor of the article preserved is not lost nor can any inferiority of the product be disguised.

3. The flavor produced by vinegar and spices is wholly artificial and does not retain much of the natural flavor of the product that is preserved. By this means it is easy to cover up inferiority and thereby deceive the consumer.

4. Changed conditions in economics have made it imperative for the manufacturer to prepare his food to reach the consumer in a sweet, wholesome and palatable

state.

5. Sodium benzoate and benzoic acid for catsup do this far better and in a less injurious manner than the products that are now used and so extensively advertised in the manufacture of pure food catsup.

Opposition to a national department of health from any one who does not have some selfish interest liable to be restricted or regulated by the proposed plans is quite incomprehensible. The alignment of the patent medicine men and allied interests against the project is only too significant. An effective department would assuredly curb those whose activities conflict in any way with the welfare of the people, but those who are engaged in honest enterprises will find only new and enlarged opportunities. For instance, few of the honorable, open, above board pharmaceutical manufacturers of the country are opposing the plan for a national department of health. On the contrary, the great majority are strongly in favor of the proposition. It is well for the medical profession to take cognizance of this fact, for of

late there has been an unfortunate tendency to place all pharmaceutical manufacturers, patent medicine makers, and quack remedy vendors in a class together. The attitude taken on this question of a national department of health by the clean, honest firms who are keeping good faith with the profession, tells its own story, while at the same time a very natural suspicion is created concerning those firms who are striving to defeat the project.

It can be readily understood that honest differences of opinion will arise as to the

way in which a national department of health should be organized, the scope of its activities, methods of procedure and so on. Such differences of opinion are not only natural, but entirely wholesome in that they indicate a thoughtful interest. But it is the opposition to the fundamental idea. of marshalling and utilizing the obvious resources of the government for the promotion of the public health that we cannot understand.

Most any sane man will agree that the more the utilities and resources of a government are used for the common welfare, the closer that government comes to fulfilling its mission. With the splendid opportunities that have been opened up for governmental activity by the development of modern hygiene and sanitation, it would seem that every day is wantonly wasted that fails to see every resource, force and energy of our national government focussed on the two most important economic questions of the hour,the prevention of disease and the prolongation of life.

The fallacious argument promulgated by the "National League for Medical Freedom" against the proposed national department of health is not apt to deceive for long any but those who wish to be deceived. The claims that the Owen bill aimed to create a medical trust, to establish a schedule of medical fees, to give all

offices to "allopathic" physicians, and to drive all practitioners except the "allopaths" out of business, are as ridiculous as they are baseless. If the author of such claims did not know they were absolutely and unqualifiedly untrue, he deserves nothing but pity. The American Medical Association is attacked especially and here again erroneous statements are made. Never has the association attempted to regulate fees for the practice of medicine. To the contrary the subject has been left severely alone and nothing in the constitution and by-laws can be properly construed as referring to the subject. During the past decade the American Medical Association has grown substantially. It has placed the medical profession on an organized basis and served to give the physicians of the United States a broader and more comprehensive view of their duties to the public and to themselves. It has created and fostered a broader interest in medical affairs in general. It has attempted to break down the bigotry and narrowness of sectarian medicine, and opened its membership to every qualified physician who would renounce the claim of practicing under any special "school" "pathy." It has worked for uniform and stringent laws regulating the practice of medicine. It has zealously worked to elevate the standards of medical education. It has worked for and supported pure food and drug laws. In fact, the American Medical Association, including in its membership the leading physicians of America. has been constantly arrayed on the side of every law or movement that tended to improve medical efficiency and promote the welfare and health needs of the people. If it has been a medical trust, it has been a trust well fulfilled.

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To deny that mistakes have been made would be foolish. The affairs of the association have been directed by a few mentoo few perhaps who have been as open to human errors as are all other men. their efforts at reform, their zeal and earnestness have sometimes warped their judgment and led them to make the ages old mistake of misinterpreting the motives of those who dared to disagree with them. In their effort to ferret out and correct abuses occasional-perhaps frequent-injustice has been done. Several instances have been brought to our attention in which grave accusations and charges have been wrongfully made to the best of our knowledge and belief. But we are not prepared to call such errors or mistakesif such they prove to be-wilful and meretricious. They are the errors and mistakes of individuals who are no less infallible than other men. We and other men, can therefore attempt to refute such mistakes, but no refutation is ever strengthened by unsupported charges of "graft," "crookedness" and "dishonesty." Questions of fact and opinion call for evidence and the issue necessarily depends on the burden of proof pro or con. Then again, without a doubt some of those who have been honored and trusted by election to prominent offices in the association have used their positions to advance their personal interests. Men unfortunately have been doing this since the most primitive. organization. But the point we wish to make is that in their ultimate analysis none of these things has reflected on the association itself, or its fundamental objectshowever much they may have reflected on certain men and their motives. No, the association has too great a destiny and too large a purpose to be held back by the

machinations of any group of men of any period. The American Medical Association is a strong, purposeful institution, a force for unlimited good in the progress of the American nation.

The American needs no defense.

Medical Association Let no one interpret our remarks as an effort in such a direction. A great deal of criticism both from within and without the profession has been directed against the association. To us this seems wrong for we believe that the association, its fundamental principles and all that it stands for are unimpeachable. If those directing its immediate affairs and policies, do wrong or make mistakes, let us direct our criticisms against them. Let us who are members voice our opinions in no half hearted way, and if the necessity arises, use every effort to correct any existing wrong. But let us be sure that wrong actually exists, that we ourselves are right. Moreover, let us not make the grave error of condemning the whole for a part, or lose sight of the worth and nobility of the association itself, because of differing with the ideas or acts of any of its officials.

In plain language, the man who from pique, dissatisfaction. or difference of opinion, turns on the association and attacks it, is stultifying himself and falling far short of his obligations either as a member or as a man of honor. Likewise, to

deny the good that has been accomplished and the success that has been attained, just

because this official or that group of of

ficials have made mistakes or gone contrary to our opinions is a confession of smallness that no man of even ordinary calibre would care to make.

It has been a source of genuine satisfaction that the particularly virile attack

of a prominent Chicago member has been directed exclusively against individual officials. Whatever opinion one may hold as to the propriety, wisdom or justice of the attack referred to, it is gratifying that the member in question has been one of the staunchest supporters of the association. Indeed, there is every reason to believe that his sentiments toward this great association of American physicians are no different from our own.

To us there is no institution in the country that we esteem more highly than the American Medical Association, both for the

splendid work it has done and for its possibilities. We are glad and proud to commend every force or factor that has been useful in placing it where it is and in enabling it to accomplish what it has. And while we may honestly feel that different methods might have produced larger results, and that needless harm has been done, we have sense enough to realize that having opinions and actually working them out are two vastly different things. One cannot look over what has actually been done therefore and comprehend the present status of the association without exulting. Such success is good, it is inspiring, and after all is said and done, it makes one feel that right, and right alone is going to prevail.

The people will soon realize the truth. They will see that the forces behind the

"League for Medical Freedom" are not as lily white and free from ulterior motives as those exploiting it would like to convey. Unquestionably many have been attracted to this organization in good faith and with no other object than to further the principle of medical freedom. When such people realize that the great bulk of the reg

ular medical profession are heart and soul with the broadest possible freedom of medical thought, teaching and practice, and awaken to the unselfish, self-sacrificing work of the men who are bending every energy to what seems to them the summum bonum of present day living-the prevention of disease, it is entirely probable that any reason for the "League for Medical Freedom" will cease to exist.

In the meantime, it is a shame, a miserable shame, that work such as the medical profession have so long been doing, also the clean disinterested efforts of such men as Professor Irving Fisher and his colleagues on the Committee of One Hundred, and finally the wholesome educational work of the American Medical Association should be forced to make any defense against such an unjust and unwarranted attack as that of the "League for Medical Freedom." If such an organization wishes to promote freedom of thought or belief in medicine all well and good. Surely the regular medical profession are not disposed to oppose such teaching, for it is in line with the doctrine of every regular physician. He favors it, teaches it, practices it. It is his sectarian colleagues who stand in the way of such medical freedom, and yet so far as can be learned the "League for Medical Freedom" numbers few but sectarian practitioners in its membership. Truly, it is an anomalous situation. One cannot help but wonder just how far an organization pledged to the propagation of medical freedom can go. with so many members whose very existence depends on their adherence to medical sectarianism—the antithesis of medical freedom. It begins to look as though Mr. B. O. Flower let his zeal for members overreach his sense of fitness when he started

out to preach medical freedom with such a choice assortment of. medical slavesosteopaths, Christian Scientists and the like.

Allopathy is a misnomer for to-day there is no such school, nor are there any physicians who care to be dubbed "allopaths." Long ago it was recognized that it was contrary to the spirit of medical science to claim adherence to any particular "school" of medicine, or to follow any restricted line of medical practice. The broad, liberal practitioner of medicine realized that his practical usefulness depended on his freedom to use any and all means at his command in combatting disease, no matter what their source or derivation. True science knows no limitations and the instant that medical practice is denied absolute freedom it becomes inethical and irregular. Hence, the physician who admitted no restriction of his methods of treating disease, but claimed the absolute right of using anything or everything that would accomplish desired results in the best possible way, saw that his attitude. was the only right or ethical one and henceforth he called himself and his colleagues of like belief and practice, regular.

Few liberal minded people will deny the correctness of this classification of medical practitioners into regular and irregular. The regular physician uses everything that serves his purpose and enables him to accomplish definite results. In other words, he is more interested in the ends than in the means. The irregular practitioner follows one line of practice to which he limits his methods—or at least professes to. He denies good in any other method than his own-ostensibly. But the feature to be deprecated principally in sectarian