G. L. Dempsey, W. M. Dickson, D. J. Evans, W. O. Fowler, W. Francis, C. W. Griffith, C. L. Hane, D. Hartnett, J. H. Helleman, C. W. Henderson, E. S. Holmes, D. C. Houser, W. E. Jewett, jr., A. F. Kaler, J. Kennedy, W. H. Knauss, O. M. Kramer, J. Laughlin, J. F. Lee, R. B. Leister, J. M. Liggitt, T. M. Lippit, G. R. Love, J. B. McComb, M. McCullough, D. W. McKitrick, J. W. McMurray, jr., W. H. Martin, J. L. Morehouse, B. D. Osborn, D. T. Phillips, J. R. Philson, jr., R. W. Pratt, H. W. Queen, Worth Ray, C. D. Reedy, R. A. Rice, C. E. Schmauser, W. S. Scully, H. C. Sefert, D. O. Sheppard, C. M. Showman, A. G. Six, C. D. Slagel, B. A. Smith, F. S. Smith, S. C. Smith, E. A. Sommer, A. M. Steinfeld, C. I. Stephen, C. T. Swaney, L. L. Taylor, W. C. Taylor, C. C. Van Kirk, E. W. Ver Wayne, J. O. Wickerman, P. W. Willey, O. C. Wilson, J. S. Wiltshire, F. C. Wright, E. E. Fowler, J. T. Patton, H. G. Gibson, A. T. Stewart. If the applicants above named are all so fortunate to graduate it will make a class of ninety. The following are the resolutions passed by the students of of the Ohio Medical University in respect to the memory of Prof. E. T. Nelson: COLUMBUS, O., March 5, 1897. To Mrs. E. T. Nelson and Family: The class of ninety-seven extend to you our heartfelt sympathy in this your late bereavement. Owing to the illness of Dr. Nelson, our acquaintance with him as a class was limited; but we feel that in his death we have lost a teacher and friend whose place can be filled by few. In losing him, the loss we cannot estimate, but having known him, we can easily understand the universal demand for his services while living, and the universal sorrow in his death. (Signed) J. WARD WILSON, Committee. Military Medicine and Surgery. CONDUCTED BY JAMES E. PILCHER, M. D., U. S. A. THE PREVENTION OF THE EXTENSION OF VENEREAL DISEASE AMONG SOLDIERS. The London Lancet for January 30th refers to the evils resulting from the abandonment of legal prostitution in connection with the British army in India. The problem of venereal disease is one which is constantly present in every army, and we of the United States military forces, both of the regular service and the national guard, may well give careful attention to the subject. From the time when the lock hospitals were closed, all restrictive measures have been gradually surrendered. The results obtained even before that date, however, showed that the system and machinery, as then applied, had proved inadequate to cope with the evil; but if these measures fell far short of accomplishing what they have effected in Continental Europe and what had been anticipated from them, we see, now that all restrictive barriers have been taken away and replaced by a system of free-trade in prostitution, that they nevertheless, did impose some check on the flood of disease which has since taken place. The number of admissions-not the number of men, for the same individual may be admitted once or several times-for this class of disease has been steadily rising during the last few years from over 400 per 1,000 until it has now reached considerably over 500 per 1,000. Nor does the extent of the evil end here, for, not only has venereal disease been augmented in quantity, but it has acquired such a degree of virulence as to quality that numbers of soldiers have been invalided from India and landed at Netley, in a truly terrible and pitiable condition. Would it not be well, by the way, if some of the leaders of the purist party obtained permission to visit these object lessons and see for themselves the practical results of their agitation? We may well institute a comparison between the plague at Bombay and the results of this scourge, one being a rare and tem porary, the other a perennial and persistent evil, which yearly consigns hundreds of our young and inexperienced soldiers to the grave by loathsome paths of preceding suffering and illness. In the case of the plague we strive to do everything in our power to stamp out and limit the ravages of the contagion; in the other we do nothing of the kind, but all attempts in this direction are branded as the licensing of vice! We must look the facts in the face. Nature has implanted in every man, in common with the lower animals, an appetite so strong that it is hopeless to suppose we can successfully war against it. Deplore it as we may, it is nevertheless a fact conterminous with the history of the race itself that prostitution has existed from the earliest to the present times. No one would willingly allow people to wander about a powder magazine with a lighted torch or pipe. Not to prohibit them from doing so would be regarded as criminal folly; but we must take no steps to prohibit a diseased woman from pursuing her trade in the midst of the highly inflammable material of a short service army! To do so is to interfere with the liberty of the subject and to legalize vice forsooth! We take every precaution to safeguard people from all other infectious diseases, but none must be taken in regard to that kind of infection which does not simply end with the individual attacked, but may be, and often is, conveyed to other and innocent persons and even to the unborn. It is impossible that the whole army should be married at the ages at which men enlist and serve as soldiers. To do so would be be tantamount to having no army at all. And we all know, moreover, what it means to allow every young man to marry regardless of his being able to maintain a wife and family; it means misery, suffering and early death. What, then, is to be done? It seems to us that we need somebody with the courage of his opinions to grapple with this question. Before we fold our hands and confess ous inability to do anything let a full and impartial inquiry be instituted in the first place so as to ascertain the facts; and, in the second, let it be seen whether some method of dealing with the subject cannot be devised and put in force in real earnest. It may be found to be no good merely returning to the old Indian system as it was carried out; if so, let a new and better one be substituted for it. We have for our guidance, at any rate, the results that have been obtained |