The wilderness may be easily reached by several different routes, partly by carriage-roads and partly by boats, which latter will convey the tourist to almost any part of the woods which he wishes to visit. A favorite route is from Port Kent, whence stages convey the tourist to Keeseville, Au Sable Forks, and the Saranac Lakes, whence by boats and "carries" he can penetrate to the heart of the wilderness. Plattsburg is the natural rendezvous on the east for visitors. Camp equipage, stores and provisions for parties can be procured at the hotels.

The tourist need not necessarily "rough it," for the hotels in this region are comfortable, easily reached, and afford facilities for the entertainment of those who, from physical prostration or otherwise, avoid the pleasures and hardships of camp life.

Loomis says, under the head of A Cool and Moderately Moist Climate, "I know of no region that my experience during the past few years of its effects upon phthisical subjects would lead me more heartily to recommend to those likely to be benefited by such a climate, than the Adirondack region. In this region, during the summer months, the minimum temperature rarely falls below 50° F., and the maximum rarely reaches 70° F., while the winters are cold and the temperature equable. The atmosphere is peculiarly exhilerating in many instances, under its influence, phthisical bronchitis rapidly disappears. * * The good results obtained in individuals with developed phthisis who have remained here from six months to two years, are the strongest arguments in its favor."

The purity and character of its atmosphere, the complete change of diet which is necessarily involved in the sojourn here, together with the tendency to increased physical exercise, make it the inland place par excellence for invalids and others who are suffering from impaired nutrition, either primary or secondary, a cause which is the foundation of many a physical malady, a great variety of which we could mention. Therefore, in selecting a locality for invalids, if inland change is desirable, be sure to remember the Adirondack region.

DEAD-HEADS.

It is hard to draw the line between the deserving poor, to whom help is a real charity, and in our profession is almost always given cheerfully, and those leeches on society who never pay a bill if they can help it, and yet are always exacting in their demands. The able and kind house physician in one of our large city hospitals remarked to our inquiry, "How are you getting along?" "The only trouble we have is with our charity patients. They are never satisfied, always exacting, and nine times out of ten when I am called up at night, the call comes from the charity side of the house." It is the experience of almost every physician during those early years when life is a hard struggle, that for the majority of his tedious night calls and most severe labor he not only receives no remuneration, but sooner or later positive abuse. Most of the trouble in

practice comes, not from those who expect to pay, not from the unfortunate and deserving poor, but from the constitutional dead-head. Gratitude is unknown to him, and the slightest thing is enough to change his honeyed words into the bitterest abuse and the vilest slanders. No matter who starts a slander, or how pure the life against which it is aimed, it will always find believers, and the physician not unfrequently finds himself the object of the bitterest hostility from those who have only received kindness at his hands.

There is no profession so much imposed upon as ours, and none where so little discrimination is used. Accustomed to study character, we constantly allow ourselves to be duped, through our sympathies and kindness of heart, forgetting that we are only contributing to the support of a habit which is demoralizing society. If our profession would investigate more closely the character and responsibility of those who apply to them for medical aid, not only themselves but society would be benefited. This is true also of our charitable institutions. There should be connected with our dispensaries a society of helpers whose duty it should be to visit every patient at their home, and learn their condition and wants. It would be found that at least half are undeserving of charity, while many would be discovered, honest but unfortunate, not only in need of medical help, but of practical advice and pecuniary aid, only requiring a little helping hand to make them again useful members of society.

The plan has been adopted in many of our dispensa ries of charging a trifle for each prescription, except in special cases. The results are most satisfactory, the patients following more closely directions, and having more confidence in medicines for which they pay than when they receive them for nothing.

The charities of the country need reforming, and none more than those of the physician, which are often beyond his means and his strength.

STATE HOMEOPATHIC INSANE ASYLUM.

The appropriation by the last legislature of seventyfive thousand dollars for a new pavilion will enable the trustees to commence work immediately. The new pavilion will be, in external appearance, a counterpart of the old, but in its internal arrangement space will be economized so as to admit a large additional number of patients. The internal arrangements of the old pavilion will be altered to correspond with the new, so that on the completion of the work the capacity of the institution will be nearly doubled. During the past year great improvements have been made about the grounds. New roads have been opened, underbrush cut away, trees planted, and several thousand loads of stone removed from the lawn and utilized in buildings, fences and roads. The lawn cleared of stone has been seeded down and will soon be covered with an elegant turf, dotted here and there with flowering shrubs and beds of flowers.

The prosperity of this institution is justly a source of pride. It is doing its work faithfully and well, and shows a less death rate and a higher rate of cures than

"I have examined the case of Dr. Dowling, of Wappengendale (reported in the Transactions of the Medical Society of the State of New York, 1876, pp. 60 to 64), who in 1876 was excluded from membership of the Orange County Society on the ground that he, being a graduate of the Homœopathic Medical College of Pennsylvania, declined to submit to examination by the Censors of the Orange County Society. In that case the action of the County Society was sustained by the State Society, but it is evident that the fact that Dr. Dowling's diploma was from a college in another State, deprives his case of all authority as a precedent in the present inquiry. The language of the Transactions' leads to the belief that had Dr. Dowling's diploma emanated from a college incorporated under the laws of the State of New York, the decision would have been different. The report of the Committee, which was adopted by the State Society, says: We may fairly conclude that those are entitled to admission' (to County Societies) who are legal practitioners,' as is whose application is before you.

the case with Dr.

'Respectfully,

·

"JOHN TRACY, Attorney, etc." According to this opinion, a large proportion of the members of the so called Homœopathic School could join in society, where the requirements are simply nonsectarian practice, and we see no objection to their doing so, providing both parties agree to it.

We now have, as a matter of fact, a National Board of Health, and the President has appointed our most estimable colleague, Dr. T. S. Verdi, of Washington-a man eminently fitted for the position-a member thereof, and he has been confirmed by the Senate.

This appointment marks the first entering wedge of recognition of our rights, as a school, by the General Government.

With so liberal-minded, scholarly gentlemen for co-laborers as our efficient sanitary-scientist, Dr. Elisha Harris of this city, we congratulate Dr. Verdi upon his prospects of pleasant accomplishments in the direction of public health.

The following is a draft of the bill of the proposed

Board of Health in this State, but not to become a law this year.

"An Act to establish a State Board of Health." The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assembly, do enact as follows:

SECTION 1. The Governor, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint eight competent persons, one from each judicial district of the State, who, with the Health Officer of the port of New York, State Engineer and the Attorney-General, shall constitute the State Board of Health. Of the eight persons thus appointed, two shall serve for two years, two for four years, two for six years, two for eight years, from the first day of the month next following their confirmation, and until successors are appointed. Any vacancy in the said Board occurring during the recess of the Legislature shall be

filled by the Governor until the next regular session of the same.

§ 2. The State Board of Health shall meet at least once in every three months and as much oftener as they shall deem necessary, their first meeting being held within two weeks after the confirmation of the first elected Board, and each annual meeting to be held within two weeks after the first of May each year after the first, as herein provided, and six members shall constitute a quorum for business. No member of the Board, except the Secretary, shall receive any compensation, but the actual traveling and other expenses of the members of said Board, while engaged in the duties thereof, shall be allowed and paid out of the appropriation made for its support. They shall elect annually one member of the Board to be President; they shall also elect from among their own members, or otherwise, a person of skill and experience in public-health duties and sanitary science, to be the Secretary and Executive Officer of said Board, who shall have all the powers and privileges of a member of the Board, except in regard to voting upon matters relating to his own office and duties as Secretary, and he shall hold said office for the term of five years, but he may be removed for cause after a full hearing by the Board, a majority of the members voting therefor.

§ 3. The Secretary shall keep a record of the acts intend the work prescribed in this act and such other and proceedings of the Board, perform and superduties as they may order, and shall receive an annual salary of thirty-five hundred dollars, which shall be paid him in the same manner as the salaries of other State officers are paid, and such necessary expenses shall be allowed him as the Comptroller shall audit, on the presentation of an itemized account, having vouchers annexed, together with the certificate of the Board.

of the interests of health and life among the people §4. The State Board of Health shall take cognizance of the State; they shall make sanitary investigations and inquiries respecting causes of disease, and especially of endemics and epidemics, the sources of mortality, and the effects of local conditions, employments shall collect such information in respect to these matand other influence upon the public health; and they ters as may contribute to the promotion of health and the protection of life in the State; they shall cause to be made by the Secretary, or by a committee of the Board, regular inspections, at such times as they may deem best, and special inspections whenever directed by the Governor or Legislature, of all public hospiregard to the location, drainage, water supply, distals, prisons, asylums or other public institutions, in posal of sewage and excreta, heating and ventilation, and other circumstances and conditions in any way affecting the health of their inmates, and shall also suggest such remedies as they may consider suitable to the removal of conditions, detrimental to health, in any such institutions, in writing to the officers

thereof.

§ 5. The said Board shall cause sanitary information in its possession to be promptly forwarded to the local health authorities of cities, villages, towns or counties, in the State, and such useful suggestions as the information and experience of the Board may supply; and it is also hereby made the duty of all such local authorities to supply the like information and suggestions to the said State Board of Health, together with copies of all their reports and other publications. And said State Board of Health is

authorized to require reports and information from a public institutions, their officers and managers, and from the proprietors, managers, lessees and occupants of all places of public resort, and from local boards of health in the State; but such reports and information shall only be required concerning matters or particulars in respect of which the Board may need information for the proper discharge of its duties.

§ 6. It shall be the duty of the said State Board of Health to give all information that may be reasonably requested, concerning any threatened danger to the public health, to the local health officers, and all other sanitary authorities in the State, which said local health officers and other sanitary officers are hereby required, in like manner, to give the like information to the said State Board of Health, and said Board and said officers, and said sanitary authorities shall, so far as legal and practicable, co-operate to prevent the spread of disease and for the protection of life and the promotion of health, within the sphere of their respective duties.

§ 7. The said Board of Health shall recommend such forms and amendments of law as shall be deemed to be necessary for the thorough organization and efficiency of the registration of vital statistics throughout the State. The Secretary of said Board shall be the Superintendent of Registration of Vital Statistics. The Comptroller of the State shall provide and furnish such apartments and stationery as said Board shall require in the discharge of its duties, at the capital of the State.

§ 8. The said Board, on or before the first day of December in each year, shall make report in writing to the Governor upon the vital statistics and concerning the sanitary administration and conditions in the several parts of the State, which report shall also set forth the action of said Board, and its officers and agents, and of the names thereof for the past year, and shall contain a full statement of their acts, with such suggestions for further legislation or other precautions as they deem proper for the better protection of life and health. This report shall also contain a detailed statement of the money expended by said Board and the manner of their expenditure during year for which it is made; but the total amount paid for the expenses of the Board, including the salary and expenses of the Secretary, all costs for printing and all other expenses, shall not exceed ten thousand dollars, which amount is hereby annually appropriated for the purposes of this act, to be paid by the Treasurer on the Comptroller's warrant, in such sums as the certificate of the Board, with proper vouchers annexed, may from time to time certify.

the

9. This act shall take effect from the date of its passage, and all acts or parts of acts inconsistent herewith be, and the same are, hereby repealed."

We have no doubt our school will be represented in this Board.

In a large number of other States, similar boards have donc efficient service, and such men as Ludlam of Illinois, and Dennis of New Jersey, have not only done themselves great credit, but reflected the same upon the school of medicine to which they belong. We ought to be much gratified with the aspect medical affairs are now assuming.

ODORLESS disinfectants are a great desideratum in the sick room, and Platt's Chlorides is one of the best.

THE NEW COLLEGE. We learn that a new college is about to be established in Buffalo, under the title of the "Homœopathic College of Physicians and Surgeons-Modern School." We cannot conceive why any set of men want to be so foolish. We already have too many medical colleges, and we certainly do not, in the present aspect of affairs, want to increase the distinctively sectarian schools. From the information we have, it is evidently the inten taught in any school," and if this is the case, why antion of this proposed new school to teach "everything nounce it "homœopathic?" No, gentlemen, leave off the "homœopathic" misnomer, and go on as you propose, if you must, teaching all that is known in medicine in an intelligent manner, and if there is room-or if you can make your school so far superior to others as to attract students-you will have done the best you can by aiding in breaking the barriers which continue sectarianism in medicine.

SUSPENDED ANIMATION.

An article which appeared in an Australian paper, covery whereby animation can be suspended for a long the Brisbane Courier, regarding an alleged new disperiod and then restored, has led Dr. B. W. Richardson to state what is already known to physiologists regarding suspended animation. He says that "if an animal perfectly free from disease be subjected to the action of some chemical agents or physical agencies which have the property of reducing to the extremest limit the motor forces of the body, the muscular irritability, and the nervous stimulous to muscular action, and if the suspension of the muscular irritability and of the nervous excitation be made at once and equally, the body even of a warm-blooded animal may be brought down to a condition so closely resembling death that the most careful examination may fail to detect any signs of life." The stage of passive efficiency of the muscles is that in which animation is usually suspended, and then the heart works just enough to sustain molecular life, and no more. So far is it from this stage that full reanimation or active efficiency of the whole organism may be produced; and the restoration depends on whether the blood, the muscular fluid, and the nervous If they remain aqueous, life may be restored after the fluid remain in the aqueous or the pectous condition. lapse of weeks, and possibly months, unless decomposition of the tissues does set in; and even after some decay of the tissues there may be renewal of the life of coldblooded animals. But if the pectous change is induced, recovery is impossible. Dr. Richardson then proceeds to state the effect of cold in producing the passive efficient stage, and the action of such substances as madragora, deadly night-shade, nitrite of amyl, woorari, chloral hydrate, cyanogens, alcohol, and oxygen in causing this stage; also by holding the colloidal fluids in the aqueous state. He expects great results in the future from the positive results already obtained; and the world should be prepared to receive them without bewilderment.

OFFICE OF NEW REMEDIES, AN ILLUSTRATED MONTHLY TRADE JOURNAL OF MATERIA MEDICA, PHARMACY AND THERAPEUTICS. 27 GREAT JONES STREET.

EDITOR OF The Homeopathic Times,

issue, I think your earnestness in dispensary-reform Dear Sir In your editorial, on page 60 of the June leads you into an overestimate of the the ignorance of attending physicians in matters of case-taking and prescriptions; for I have in several capacities, had good occasion to become familiar with their work and am obliged to disagree with you as regards the ammount of information shown in these and other matters re

ferred to by you. Very many of these attending physicians, are appointed (undere the rules of the dispensaries) from among those who have served as hospital internes-positions which are only to be had through competitive examinations and in which experience in these matters is very extensive. C.

[The above communication is printed verbatim et literatim, and perhaps corroborates the truth of our statements.-EDS.]

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL.

OPERATION FOR CLOSURE OF CLEFT OF THE HARD AND SOFT PALATE. By A. Vanderveer, M. D, Professor of the Principles and Practice of Surgery, Albany Medical College; Attending Surgeon at the Albany Hospital and St. Peter's Hospital. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 182 Fifth Avenue. 1878; pp. 243 to 257 of the "Series of American Clinical Lectures." URETHRISMUS, OR CHRONIC SPASMODIC STRICTURE. By F. N. Otis, M. D., Clinical Professor of Genito-Urinary Diseases, in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York; Surgeon to Charity Hospital; Member of the British Medical Association, etc; pp. 22.

A CLINICAL LECTURE ON INFLAMMATORY AND ON SPASMODIC STRICTURE OF THE URETHRA. By Henry B. Sands, M. D., Professor of Anatomy in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, New York; Attending Surgeon to the New York and Roosevelt Hospitals; pp. 10.

THE EPIDEMIC OF 1878, AND ITS HOMOEOPATHIC TREATMENT; A GENERAL HISTORY OF THE ORIGIN, PROGRESS AND END OF THE PLAGUE IN THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY. By Ernest Hardenstein, Vicksburg, Miss., including a Treatise on the Dissease by A. O. H. Hardenstein, M. D., and other valuable papers and statistics (including Herings' charcoal prophylaxis), from the most reliable sources, pp. 105. Fifty cents.

ON DIPTHERIA. ILLUSTRATED BY CASES. By Henry B. Millard, M. D. A. M., read before the N. Y Medico-Chirurgical Society, etc., pp 32. Boericke

& Tafel.

CLINICAL LECTURES UPON INFLAMMATION AND OTHER DISEASES OF THE EAR. BEING A COURSE OF LECTURES DELIVERED TO THE STUDENTS ATTENDING THE CLASS OF THE LONDON SCHOOL OF HOMOEOPATHY DURING THE WINTER SESSION OF 1877-78. By Robert T. Cooper, A. B. M. D., Trin. Coll. Dublin, physician diseases of the ear. London Homopathic Hospital, London. The Homopathic Publishing Company, pp 170. "An excellent little monograph for students, but not sufficiently exhaustive of therapeutics.

PLUMBER AND SANITARY ENGINEER. The great popularity of this journal has warranted the proprie tors in enlarging it from a monthly of sixteen pages to a semi-monthly of twenty pages to each issue. In the field of sanitary reform, to which public attention is now being everywhere directed, this journal is doing noble work. It is edited with signal ability, and the most practical talent which can be found employed in discussing the various questions of sanitary reform of so much importance to the health of the community.

A PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY OF ALCOHOL. Translated for the HOMOEOPATHIC TIMES from Chas. Richet's "Les Poisons de L'Intelligence.”

I.

In studying the phenomena of life, nothing is more instructive than an examination of the disorders produced in the organic functions by the different poisons. The signification of this word poison, however, should be materially enlarged. A poison is not, as many would suppose from the ordinary use of the word, a substance always deadly or dangerous. On the contrary, all substances used in medicine are poisonous, and every poison has its medical use.

Opium is both an admirable medicine and a redoubtable poison. Alcohol, which, taken in small quantity, is a salutary stimulant to digestion, in large amount produces serious disorders which are often fatal. And so the separation of medicines from poisons may become a difficult matter. M. Claude Bernard defines a poison as a substance which cannot enter into the composition of the blood nor penetrate into the organism without causing transient or permanent disorders. This distinct and formal definition enables us to distinguish a poison from an aliment. An aliment is an assimilable substance that should, when given, form part of the blood or of the tissues; a poison, on the contrary, should be eliminated and disappear, for its presence in the blood is only by accident. An egg is an aliment, because its constituents will be absorbed to pass afterward into the circulation. But if we give to a patient a grain of tartar emetic, we have administered a poison, because the emetic will be of necessity eliminated, since the organism cannot tolerate its presence in the blood. In every case the action of tartar emetic as a medicine is not different from its action as a poison, it is simply a mild dose of poison. It appears, then, that the distinction between a poison and a medicine is artificial, and should be banished absolutely from scientific language.

The study of poisons, then, is equally interesting to the physician and the physiologist. To the physician wishing to cure organs that are functionally diseased it shows how the substances act, so that toxicology, or the science of poisons, is the same thing as experi mental therapeutics. Formerly, in the time of Orfila, experiments with poisons were devoted solely to clearing up the most delicate medico legal problems. To-day they are of service in every branch of medicine. Again, as M. Claude Bernard has said, a healthy organ and one that is diseased do not perform their functions differently, and the action of a poison upon a healthy organism may become a curative action in an organism that is diseased.

A great advance was made when it was attempted to limit the action of poisons to a single organ or tissue. It seems to us now that this idea was elementary, and that nothing was more simple than to try whether this or that substance acted more especially on the blood or muscle or on the brain. But this research, which

seems to be the first step of toxicology, dates scarcely a score of years; and it may almost be said that the brilliant studies of M. Claude Bernard on curare formed its starting point. Previous to this, instead of analyzing the functions of organs and tissues, they had been considered chiefly in their totality. In all the physiological phenomena they tried to see the result of a speciallyacting force upon the organs, and all the properties of these organs were called vital properties. Who holds these theories to-day? The principle of life is not unique, it is disseminated in all the living parts, and no one wishes to resuscitate the theories of the ancient school of Montpellier, which admitted a vital force presiding over organic functions. A living being is one composed of living organs that can die separately. These organs are composed of tissues, the tissues are formed from cellules, and all these parts may disappear