EPILEPSY AND TYPHOID FEVER.-In the Revue de Médecine Dr. Lannois has recorded a case which illustrates a curious and interesting peculiarity. The influence of intercurrent ailments upon the frequency or severity of the attacks in epilepsy has been long recognized, and the pyrexia has been, at least by some, regarded as the influential factor in suppressing the fits during acute illness. Dr. Lannois' patient was a woman who had suffered from attacks ever since childhood in consequence of an attack of infantile hemiplegia. This patient suffered first from an attack of erysipelas affecting the thigh, and soon after from an attack of typhoid fever. During the attack of erysipelas the fits occurred much less frequently than usual; during the attack of typhoid fever, on the other hand, they took place much more frequently. Dr. Lannois regards these facts as suggesting that the modified frequency of the attacks during acute illness depends, not. on the febrile process as such, but on the nature of the specific poison, which may, on the one hand, cause an increased frequency of the attacks, or, on the other, lead to their total or partial suppression for a time.-Ibid.

SULFANILIC ACID IN ACUTE CORYZA.-According to Valentin, of Berne, this acid acts very rapidly and favorably on certain symptoms of acute coryza. Tumefaction is relieved and secretion diminished, sometimes disappearing completely in less than two hours. Formula:

Acid sulfanilic, . .
Carbonate sodium,
Distilled water, .

Sig: Tablespoonful every hour.

zij;

3iss;

3ij.

SYPHILIS TREATED BY HYPODERMATIC INJECTIONS OF CALOmel, of SALICYLATE OF MERCURY, AND OF MERCURIC THYMOL.-Leudin finds calomel most effective in cases treated for the first time; in relapsing cases effect of all three is about the same. The salicylate and mercuric thymol are much better borne than calomel, producing no inflammatory reaction. Suspension in oil was found to produce abscess much less frequently than suspension in glycerine.

M. H. FOLET, of Lille, suggests that perhaps the air coming in contact with the peritoneal surface of the intestines has something to do with the beneficial result of operation on cases of tuberculous peritonitis. In one case, after evacuating six liters of serous fluid, he simply injected into the peritoneum three liters of air. The fluid did not reaccumulate, and patient has remained well for the past eight months.

CONSTIPATION et Danse du VENTRE.-M. Simon records the interesting case of an actress who suffered from constipation from childhood, and who had never been benefited by any plan of treatment. It became necessary for her to practice the danse du ventre, when her constipation disappeared as by enchantment!

THE AMERICAN PRACTITIONER and News.

Vol. 19.

"NEC TENUI PENNÂ.”

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1895.

D. W. YANDELL, M. D., and H. A. COTTELL, M. D., Editors.
JOHN L. HOWARD, M. D., Assistant Editor.

No. 3.

A Journal of Medicine and Surgery, published every other Saturday. Price, $3

per year, postage paid.

This journal is devoted solely to the advancement of medical science and the promotion of the interests of the whole profession. Essays, reports of cases, and correspondence upon subjects of professional interest are solicited. The editors are not responsible for the views of contributors.

Books for review, and all communications relating to the columns of the journal, should be addressed to the Editors of THE AMERICAN PRACTITIONER AND NEWS, Louisville, Ky.

Subscriptions and advertisements received, specimen copies and bound volumes for sale by the undersigned, to whom remittances may be sent by postal money order, bank check, or registered letter. Address JOHN P. MORTON & COMPANY, Louisville, Ky.

WHY SO MANY DOCTORS?

In a recent very able address before the McGill University at Montreal Dr. Wm. Osler gave as two reasons for the relative numerical increase in the medical profession, notwithstanding the great decrease in the number of certain diseases, that the development of specialties has given employment to many extra men who now do much of the work of the old family practitioner, and again that people employ doctors more frequently and so give occupation to many more than formerly.

The second reason at least will certainly be borne out by experience. The spreading of a hazy knowledge of the conditions and causes of disease among the laity, and especially the popular notions in regard to disease germs, causes people much earlier than formerly to subject themselves to examination, and to be much readier to undergo treatment. But it is hardly creditable to contend that the outlay on the part of the sick is greater with specialists, whose chief claim is that they understand diseases better and can cure them quicker than the old family practitioner. The best claim for higher medical education is that it benefits the public in the way of more speedy and thorough cures and consequently diminished cost.

There is another reason that would seem to be still more potent operating in all the professions, and that is the multiplication of monop

olies and trusts in the commercial and manufacturing world. Formerly any prudent, industrious, and energetic man could start up an independent business, with bright prospects of gaining a comfortable livelihood if not a fortune. Of late years, however, a few men who have got a start establish a trust or monopoly and manage to crush out all weaker enterprises while with certainty piling up for themselves enormous fortunes.

The young man, looking around him and seeing nearly all who have attempted business on their own account crushed out and left to spend their old days in poverty, rushes into some profession, hoping thereby to gain something that can not be taken away from him at a time when it may be too late in life to attempt to make a start in business with any hope of success. It is the fierce struggle whose outcome is the survival of the fittest that is driving so many young men to huddle in the professions, there in turn to be largely plucked by the ruthless fingers of "natural selection."

LESSONS FROM JAPAN ON THE FOOD SUPPLY.

Just at this time Japan is the cynosure of eager eyes in all parts of the world, and in nearly every department of human activity.

While the mechanic, the manufacturer, the strategist, and the scientist, as well as the religionist, may each find something instructive in the wonderful awakening in that new old empire, the physiologist and the political economist may also learn somewhat of interest and advantage. Previous to the startling revelations of the pending war between China and Japan the intellectual boldness and enterprise of the people, as well as their deep insight, had already strongly impressed those who in many departments had visited them as missionaries. Whatever was brought them, these receptive and responsive people were ready to im

prove on.

Even the Christian religion they quietly appropriated and remodeled to suit their own predilections and characteristics, with as much coolness as if it had been a new pattern of matting or a new kind of naval They even established alongside of each other a Christian and an infidel college to see which would come out best.

All this was not so strange in a people whose food was almost exclusively rice, but when they began to show themselves such soldiers as

any nation in Europe or America would be proud of, the meat-eating nations of the West were startled.

There is a valuable lesson in all this which the physiologist may well pass on to the consideration of the political economist. In the consumption of meat as food there is a waste of perhaps not less than eighty or ninety per cent as compared with the use of grain. The grain that as bread would well sustain five men, if fed to animals and turned into flesh would not sustain more than one.

Every day we are coming into closer and closer contact and competition with the Japanese and other nations of the East with their simple wants. In that competition our wasteful and extravagant habits must tell more and more against us, until these new competitors take possession of our markets, close our factories, and subject us to harder industrial conditions than our race has yet known.

Especially must we awake to the truth of the maxim given us long ago, that "bread is the staff of life." This at all events well becomes. the poor, who with scant earnings must live through times of depression. On a quantity of rice, each day, that is the equivalent of not more than one or two cents' worth of wheat at our prices, one of these brown people of the East will fare sumptuously; and with a little practice our own people could do as well when circumstances require it or even better, for wheat possesses in greater variety the elements required by the system than rice. And to some it might seem that the efforts of our public press might be directed to the dissemination of such information as is required to secure economical and at the same time healthful living.

PROSTITUTES AND PUS TUBES.

It is very widely maintained among gynecologists that tubal abscesses are in a large measure traceable to the existence of previous gonorrhea on the part of the husband. It is not uncommon for surgeons to contend that this condition is to be traced back to gonorrheas that have passed away years before marriage. They insist that the gonococcus has been hiding away all that time in some quiet receptacle, only to come out and in the light of the honeymoon invade the uterus and tubes of the unsuspecting bride.

If this contention be true, prostitutes who ply their trade more than two or three years ought not to possess healthy ovaries, for it is the

rarest thing for them to escape having in that time two or more attacks of gonorrhea. Yet, as far as impressions from our reading and personal observations go, they are strong that the number of operations on account of salpingitis among prostitutes is disproportionately small; and this notwithstanding the fact that the temptation is great for those who would gain experience to operate on this class of patients. It would be interesting to know what proportion of cases of pus tubes are found respectively in chaste women and in prostitutes.

Notes and Queries.

To the Editors of the American Practitioner and News:

A CASE OF MYIASIS AURIUM.-W. C., aged fourteen, was brought by his mother to me suffering exquisite pain in right ear, which had been growing more intense since the morning of the day previous. The patient had come to me directly from the office of a neighboring physician who had failed to find any visible evidence of trouble, and told the mother it was but a case of " earache." On careful examination with a speculum and mirror I could detect occasionally what appeared to be a moving parasite as it crossed the limited field of vision.

With a nozzled glass syringe and plenty of warm boracic-acid solution I washed out seven of the larvæ of the creophila-the flesh fly. The history of the case was that three days previous to the day the pain began the boy was working in the field, and an insect flew in his ear, when he struck at it and pinched it in two, and it proved to be a "green fly." He had evidently squeezed out some of the eggs which found a perfect condition for incubation in an ear which was discovered to be scrofulous, and had for years been "running." There was history of tuberculosis in his father's family.

The tender ear had been rendered infinitely more so by the presence of the rapidly growing larvæ, which were about two centimeters in length, and the pain he described as “if a dog were scratching in his ear." After washing out the ear with the warm boracic solution, I used a mild bichloride solution, and with an insufflator I blew a little boracic acid into the inflamed aural cavity, and directed him to come to me on the second day following the operation for another dressing, but with a complete relief from pain and no further trouble at all, he was led to believe he needed no further attention and never returned; but I saw his father almost daily, who reported uninterrupted recovery from the effects of the "earache."

BORDEN, IND.

J. MARCHAL WHEATE, M. D.