ing as to apply it rightly. Those who walk slowly will make greater progress if they follow the right road than those who run swiftly on a wrong one." And Bacon put the same truth more tersely when he said: "A cripple on the right path will beat a racer on the wrong one." Let us begin right and travel along the right road and build with the right material and we shall have a stronger, better, higher type of man, even though it comes a little later.

In discussing this question I have endeavored to show: 1st. What these diseases are, what their specific and remote causes.

2nd. How widespread, how serious and how destructive to the peace and happiness of the individual and the state.

3rd. The pressing and growing need for some effective preventive measures.

4th. The vain and futile efforts hitherto to put forth and the reason for their failure.

5th. The object and functions of the sexual system, together with the laws which should naturally govern it.

6th. The influence of heredity and the disastrous results upon the offspring of vicious habits in one or both parents.

7th. The best method of developing a humanity which by intelligent self-control and self-mastery will live in obedience to those laws and therefore be free from those blighting diseases.

8th. Briefly, the most efficient remedies as curative measures in the diseases and the principle underlying their use, namely, the application of an agent which will fully counteract the particular infection present and place the sexual system again in harmony with and obedience to the laws of sexual health.

Mal de Mer.

A Philadelphian, on his way to Europe, was experiencing seasickness for the first time. Calling his wife to his bedside, he said in a weak voice: "Jenny, my will is in the Commercial Trust company's care. Everything is left to you, dear. My various stocks you will find in my safe deposit box." Then he said fervently: "And, Jenny, bury me on the other side. I can't stand this trip again, alive or dead."-Lippincott's.

ABSTRACTS.

A New Method of Percussion.

Wenzel (Zentralblatt fuer innere Medizin, 1911, No. 10). The percussion of the pulmonary apices can be rendered more delicate by anything that tends to render the lung resonance duller. Slight differences in the resonance on precussion of the supra and infraclavicular fassæ become more marked if the patient stands with his bare back pressed firmly but not uncomfortably against a wall. Wenzel has found this method, which he calls "wall percussion" (Wandperkussion) useful in the early diagnosis of tuberculosis.

The Effect of Alcohol on the Wasserman Reaction.

Craig and Nichols find that no dependence can be placed on a negative Wassermann reaction in individuals who have, within twenty-four hours of the collection of the blood, ingested considerable amounts of alcohol, while in some instances the drug may render the reaction negative for as long as three days. They have not, as yet, tried the effect of alcohol in smaller doses on cases giving a plus or plus minus reaction, but it is probable that the drug will be found to have a still more decided effect on weaker reactions, and it is certain that with the amounts used in the experiments, the strongest positive serum would give a negative result. Careful inquiry, therefore, should be made regarding recent use of alcohol before collecting sera for the complement fixation test in lues.

Carbohydrates in Diabetes.

Blum gives a number of tables and further arguments to recapitulate and supplement those he has recently published elsewhere. He is docent at Strasburg, and the work issues from the medical clinic in charge of Moritz, the scene of much pioneer research on the nutritional diseases. He reiterates anew that the aim in treatment is to put an end to the glycosuria, and that nothing is able to do this in such a simple, rapid and harmless way as restriction to oatmeal or wheat flour. But there can be no hard and fast rule for this; the amount of the carbohydrate allowed must vary with the severity of the disease.-Munich Med. Woch.)

Carbon-Dioxid Snow in Trachoma.

In forty of the fifty cases Harston effected a cure in from five to eighteen applications of carbon-dioxid snow. Three patients did not return and seven are still under treatment. At the first application the snow is applied to each part for fifteen seconds; later, when the patient is accustomed to the treatment, for as long as twenty, twenty-five and thirty seconds. The pain caused passes off at the end of two minutes, and is infinitesimal compared to the pain caused by bluestone, silver nitrate and such like caustics. The disease is considerably shortened in its course, and the resulting scarring is considerably less than when other caustics have been used.

Hexamethylenamin.

The very slight irritation following the hypodermic use of hexamethylenamin has encouraged Gundrum to use it subcutaneously or intramuscularly whenever it is desirable to produce, if not an actively germicidal, an at least inhospitable medium for bacterial growth in any serous cavity, or the bile or urinary passages within a short space of time. He has found this to be particularly valuable if the patient is nauseated, comatose, or about to be operated on when the postanesthetic vomiting too frequently empties the stomach of any drug and often prevents medication by mouth for several hours. He says that the frequent, early and generous exhibition of hexamethylenamin, particularly in cerebrospinal cases, is of exceeding value in the prevention of meningeal infection. It is not able to affect to any great extent a case of meningitis once established. It has seemed good practice at times when an early exhibition of hexamethylenamin is indicated, as a prophylactic measure, for example, in instances in which catheterization or other genito-urinary manipulation is necessary, and especially where meningeal or possibly also joint infection is feared, to use the drug hypodermically until such time as the administration by mouth can be taken

up.

The Psychology of Mental Deficiency.

By Bird T. Baldwin, Ph. D., is logically and rationally discussed in The Popular Science Monthly, Volume 69, No. 1, with the following conclusions:

1. Defectives are worthy of careful study for their own

sake, for the welfare of society, and for the scientific insight they offer into the mental processes of normal children and the problem of education.

2. They offer, where their ancestry may be traced, the best material at present available for the study of human heredity on account of the pronounced deviations which may be traced.

3. They have so far contributed most to the scientific application of "mental and physical tests," which dominates contemporary tendencies in child psychology and its application to education.

4. Mental defectives present tremendous sociological difficulties in the advancement of our present-day civilization and educational progress. As cure is impossible, the two chief sources of prevention suggested are to keep such people segregated in institutions and to prevent marriage. Other means may in extreme cases be justifiable; sometimes sterilization is found advisable, but popular opinion usually rebels against such measures.-Joseph M. Aikin, Omaha.

Vaginal Section.

Following abdominal approach, for example, in dealing with pus tubes or complicated myomata, it is manifest that vaginal cul-de-sac drainage is an aid to convalescence; but it is our purpose to consider and to advise a more frequent use of vaginal pelvic drainage in septic implantations usually having origin over some portion of the parturient canal. Whether we deal with complications following conception naturally or prematurely terminated; or whether we deal with irregularties in habits that may invite pelvic septic infection, or with pelvic hæmatocele (not ectopic in origin), but due to a ruptured vessel from coughing or other unavoidable extra pressure upon the illy supported vessels, vaginal drainage is indicated chiefly to provide for drainage of the peritoneal cavity at a dependent point; and equally important it is to provide for additional drainage of the sub and retro peritoneal spaces, filled as this place is with a septic ascending lymphangitis; the essential feature in the technique being multiple puncture not only of the retro uterine space, but of the lateral uterine area also; just as multiple incisions and puncture contribute to the arrest of a progressive septic lymphangitis in the hand or forearm.

We have found it an advantage in making multiple puncture especially at the side of the uterus to have a specially constructed gynecological forcep, having approximately the curve of an ure

thral sound. And this instrument also facilitates efforts in reaching an abscess located high, laterally or ante uterine in origin. The drainage tube should be maintained in position by cat gut suture, including the tube and the edge of the vaginal section. -Allison.

Hope In Diabetic Coma.

Few physicians of large practice have not had the sad experience of standing helpless before a patient sunk into the coma of diabetes; they permitted the injections, the wrapping in hot sheets, the exhibition of pilocarpine, the efforts of any kind to delay the inevitable end, but without hope. A message of promise comes in the Journal de Medecine de Paris for July 29, 1911, from Labbe and Carrie, who maintain that they had had recoveries from profound diabetic coma following the injection of sodium bicarbonate. In one case where the secretion of urine had sunk to almost nil and the patient was deeply unconscious they injected 500 grammes of a three per cent solution of the salt intravenously; finding the patient somewhat better they administered internally sixty grammes of the salt in vichy water. The following day there was a chill and a sharp rise in temperature, but the patient was lucid and no longer somnolent. The treatment was continued practically along the same lines for twentyeight days, and, with the exception of a relapse into unconsciousness on the fifth day, the patient rapidly improved and now, three months afterward, she is in excellent health. It is important, according to the writers, to begin the alkalinization of the blood as soon as there are premonitory signs of acidosis, somnolence, vertigo, vomiting or headache, but once the coma has begun the bicarbonate should be given fearlessly in large doses.

The use of dogs in the relief of the wounded was recently tried at Vincennes in the course of instruction of the sanitary service of the military government of Paris. Several men who were supposed to be wounded were hidden in various places on the plain. All the pseudo wounded were found in a few minutes. The trial was made as follows: The dog is sent off by his master in a given direction at various distances; he aids the wounded, takes his kepi and brings it back. The dog leads or, one might say, drags his master immediately to the spot where he found the wounded man without hesitation. In default of the kepi the dog hunts with his paw or his muzzle in the wounded man's pocket and takes his handkerchief, glove or some other object showing the identity of the man.