Grind the solids to No. 40 powder, mix the acid and the water, add the glycerin and alcohol, and in the menstruum so prepared macerate the powder for twenty-four hours; then percolate, adding enuf alcohol and water in the proportion given to make 12 fluid ounces. Finally add the syrup and, if necessary, filter.-Druggists' Circular.

JAYNE'S VERMIFUGE.

A muddy brown liquid, with considerable sediment, put up in an oval green bottle, holding nearly three fluid ounces. It has pronounced alkaline reaction, both to test and taste. It consists, according to our examination, of a solution of alkalin santonate of sodium, pink-root, jalap, sugar, water slightly flavored with peppermint and showing some evidence of erigeron and turpentine.-New Idea.

Pills, Patent Medicines and the Religious Press.

Recently in the "Philistine" there was a bald and crude screed by Mr. Hubbard on the pill habit. It was sane, however, and was informed with an idea. The article should have been written in this way:

In a late number of a popular magazine I see portrayed, with all the skill of the expert illustrator, a beautiful young woman with her hair neatly braided down her back. She is arrayed in a nightgown which is a dream. Like the goddess in New York harbor, she holds aloft a lighted candle and in the other hand-a pill. If the drawing is to scale, the pill is about the size of a baseball. The import of the picture is that the lissome beauty is about to swallow the baseball. Beneath the picture is the legend, as near as I can remember: My complexion is perfect because I take one of Billson's bully bilious bombshell boluses every night before retiring.

Now, while incidentally protesting against the tendency to realism in art on the part of the bilious Billson, I wish to call your attention to some facts first brought to my notice by a prominent eastern physician. He stated to me that all reputable practitioners lament the alarming increase of the pill and dope habit, and that those people who make a practice of irritating their systems with the thousand and one nostrums recommended by the illustrated magazines, family weeklies and religious journals are paying heavy penalties in physical, mental and moral decadence.

These periodicals teem with warnings that we must at once lay in a stock of Col. Carter's Little Lifter Pills, Dood's Sarsaparilla, Rip'em's Tabarets, Pink Pills for Pale Plumbers, Liar's Sherry Pictorial, Dr. Fierce's Golden Medical Freelovery, etc., etc., if we would have good complexions, sweet thoughts and long life. Too many people believe this: the habit begins by a gentle dalliance with Lady Cagliostro's After Dinner Assuager, assured by all the stall-fed aristocracy of Europe; it grows and grows; two pills, three pills, a box; a change of treatment becomes necessary and soon another change; the poor victim runs the entire gamut of nostrums and, almost a total wreck, is obliged to seek a specialist.

It is a great mistake to think that regular physicians object to patent medicines. The use of nostrums causes more than nine-tenths of the troubles which doctors are called upon to treat. If the magazines, family papers and religious journals were prevented from prostituting their pages to quackery and fraud, as they should be, there would be starvation times in the medical profesWithout paying attention to the secular periodicals which are known and expected, with a few exceptions, to be indifferent and entirely mercenary-let us look at the so-called religious press, which ought to be conducted upon a higher plane.

sion.

Taking those which happen to be at hand, I

find that the "Churchman" affects Dr. Mule's

Nervine, the "Christian Register" Acid Fulminate, the "Christian Leader" Dr. Fierce, the "Christian at Work" works for Dr. Fierce and others, the "Presbyterian" pushes Prune Juice, the "Christian Advocate" apparently advocates Early Prisers and Rip'em's Tabarets, and the "Baptist Standard" is boldly waved in favor of Dr. Gall's Windy Water Cure Self Treatment. The Rev. Dr. Talmage's "Christian Herald" seems somewhat undecided and gaily toots for Dood, Beat'em, Dr. Gall and others. The Southern Pulpit " not only holds out all these great gifts to mankind, but introduces "A Sure Cure for Petulance" in the person of Dr. Jingle-the name should sell the blessing, one would thinkwhose discovery is prayerfully recommended by seven clergymen, three of them D. D.'s.

Those who do not care to acquire the morphin habit had better leave nervines, compounds and other soothers to the editors of the journals which so persistently proffer them.

As it seems, after all, to be with these gentry only the same old question of money, the religious titles given their papers being a cloak, I would suggest the formation of a trust; rates could then be raised, clerical certificates distributed upon an equitable plan, and expenses much reduced. As it would hardly do to call the association a trust I would suggest the following title: "The United Association of Quack, Fake and Fraud Assisters, Unlimited." Motto: "Aloes, Alcohol, Opium and Dough."-Brann's Iconoclast.

404,670, a net increase of over $10,000,000 on the bill of 1897. And the English Chancellor of the Exchequer is delighted at his $60,000,000 income from the tax on beer, and hopes it will grow larger. At the same time the Registrar-General reports that the deaths from alcoholism are rapidly increasing! Moreover, what stupidity it shows. If the number of children and teetotalers and moderate drinkers are deducted, what hogs must be several millions of people to bring the average of consumption to 25 or 30 gallons. What a thick-headed way to get food, if beer is food, or, if it be only a diluted alcohol, what a witless way to buy alcohol. Not only in the direct production of disease is drunkenness a great national curse, but in the indirect results, as Sir Henry Thompson has pointed out, the denutrition from poor food both of the workman and his family, because the money that should have gone for good food has been spent for drink. It is a sad spectacle of blundering and sin.-Phila. Med. Jour.

The Minuteness of Bacteria.

In order to convey some concrete idea of the extreme minuteness of bacteria it has been calculated that if a postage stamp seven-eighths of an inch long and three-quarters of an inch wide (22.2 mm. by 19.05 mm.) were covered by a single layer of the typhoid bacteria, placed end to end and side by side, 500,000,000 bacteria would be required.-Bulletin of Pharmacy.

The Perfect Physician.

He is humble-for the grandeur of unaccomplisht possibilities rises like a mountain before him. He is self-respecting-for he justly esteems the dignity of his profession, and the obligations which his admission thereto lays upon him. He is courteous, yet never servile; bold, yet always prudent; fearless, yet always prudent; fearless, yet never reckless; sympathetic, but never sentimental; ready, but not precipitate; inflexible without harshness, cool, calm, and open to conviction; imperturbable, whatever may occur: honorable even to punctiliousness; and sincerely religious in the best and loftiest sense. He is a reading and thinking man; one who aims not so much to be "up with the times," as to be liberally conservative in all things. In short, the ideal physician is a type of the highest manhood that human nature can produce. Such a standard as this we

should keep constantly before us; striving to realize in ourselves, as far as practicable, the comprehensive character of the medical vocation. DR. R. H. G. OSBORNE.

Morrisville, Pa.

Proper Recognition of the Profession. 1. The laws of the land should provide for a Surgeon-General of the United States, as a Cabinet advisor to the President.

2. Such officer and the department under his direction, should, in times of peace, constitute a National Board of Health.

3. In times of war such Cabinet officer should have absolute authority over the medical department of the army and over matters pertaining to its health and wellbeing, subject only to the orders of the Commander-in-Chief, the President.

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These propositions, in one form or another, have furnisht the substance of so many resolutions and memorials to the powers that be," that they are familiar to every member of the profession. They are propositions which the profession has come to regard as well nigh axiomatic, and yet what has been accomplisht? Nothing! Worse than nothing, for from one end of this land to the other, one of the most capable and conscientious medical men that ever lived is being blamed by the people for not doing, during the late war, what their laws would not permit him to do. Thousands of lives that were lost are, in the minds of the people, charged up to inefficiency of the medical department, while we know as a matter of fact that they were lost because the commanding officers are, by law, given authority for which neither their training nor experience fit them.

We must fight the devil with fire; politicians with politics.

We once heard an active and successful politician say that he would rather have the family doctor "fur him" than any other individual in the community. Nor did he overestimate the wholesome and legitimate influence upon legislatures and legislation which the profession is capable of exerting, if only the wholesome and legitimate practitioners chose to exercise it.

The "political doctor" and the doctor in politics are two widely different matters. People look askance at the former, while they willingly defer to the special knowledge of the latter. If, then, the profession and its special field of activity, is not, in this year of grace, enjoying its due recognition under the American government,

There is no difference of opinion in the profession as to what recognition is due us by the Government, and if we should set about it with the same unanimity, we could put thru Congress, without a dissenting vote, any reasonable proposition we choose.

We must meet politicians by political methods. A fund should be raised by subscription, or otherwise, sufficient to pay for the clerical work, printing and postage necessary to make every medical man in the Union acquainted with just what it was purposed to do. Then in every district the candidates of both parties should be given an opportunity to sign a pledge to vote for the bill determined upon, the full text of which would be presented to them. There would be no difficulty in securing the necessary pledges under such circumstances, as the politician, sufficiently advanced to aspire to a seat in either branch of Congress, appreciates the advantage of having the doctors "fur 'em.”

Let us do one thing or the other. Either put in motion the wheels which will, with absolute certainty, effect the changes we have outlined, or cease grumbling because a mythical some one" does not do for us that which can only be effected by ourselves. Western Clinical Rec.

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[This "cabinet officer" should not be subject to change with every change of administration. He should be selected solely on account of fitness, and not for partisan reasons. Such a man, with absolute control of the hygiene of camps, and of the food and medicine supply, could prevent 50 per cent. of the usual mortality in time of war.-ED. M. W.]

Physical Peculiarities of Great Men. Big-nosed men who in their early boyhood may have been as sensitive as the long-nosed Cyrano de Bergerac have for long been made to feel that their ugliness was repaid by alleged possession of more than the average talent.

Gray-eyed blondes have been given the credit of practically running the world's

affairs. However, these and many other old long-held ideas are being dispelled. Large heads and weight of brain are no longer synonymous with genius or even talent.

Indeed, says the Record, it now seems that the ancient belief that short men generally possess more than their fair share of brain power must also be relegated to the realms of fancy. An ardent and careful observer, who has made a study of the heights of celebrated men, gives it out as an incontrovertible fact that tall men are the cleverest, and the old adage that "good stuff is put up in small bundles," will no longer pass muster as a truism, at least so far as the brain capacity of the human race is concerned. Here are a few statistics collected by the investigators in question. Tall men first: Burke, five feet ten inches; Burns, five feet ten inches; Sir R. Burton, over six feet; Sir Walter Raleigh, six feet; Peter the Great, six feet eight and one-half inches; Thackeray, six feet four inches; Lincoln, six feet one inch; George Washington, six feet three inches. Medium stature: Lord Beaconsfield, five feet nine inches; Byron, five feet eight and one-half inches; Voltaire, five feet seven inches; Wellington, five feet seven inches. Short men: Balzac, five feet four inches; Beethoven, five feet four inches; Keats, five feet; Napoleon, five feet one and three-fourth inches; Nelson, five feet four inches; De Quincey, five feet three inches.-Med. Mirror.

Foreign Bodies in the Vermiform Appendix. An interesting study of the relative frequency of foreign bodies in the vermiform appendix is presented by Dr. John F. Mitchell in the Johns Hopkins Hospital Bulletin for January, February and March, 1899. Of 1400 cases of appendicitis collected from various sources during the last ten years he found only 7 per cent. of true foreign bodies; while in 700 of the cases, in which a definit statement was made as to the nature of the foreign body, there were 45 per cent. of fecal concretions. In 250 cases of appendicitis in the Johns Hopkins Hospital, in the past ten years, there was only one foreign body,-a segment of tapeworm. Osler, in ten years' experience in Montreal, found foreign bodies only twice; in one instance five applepips, and in another eight snipe-shot. The most common foreign bodies have been gall-stones, round worms, spicules of bone, bristles, and pins.

Pins have been especially frequent. Mitchell has collected twenty-eight cases in which a pin was found in the appendix at operation or autopsy, together with two instances in which a pin had perforated the cecum. It seems remarkable that in no single case was there any knowledge of a pin having been swallowed. Contrary to what might be expected, they occurred more frequently in males than in females (males, seventeen; females, nine). The resulting appendicitis was of a very variable type, in some cases the symptoms were mild, leading to chronic appendicitis, with recurrent attacks, or with long continued pain, and, perhaps, finally ending in an abscess. In the majority of cases, however, there was rapid perforation and abscess-formation following the first appearance of symptoms.

The pin entered the appendix by its head or point, and, except in one or two instances, where it lay directly across the lumen, it was straight, with its long axis parallel to that of the appendix. In seven of the twenty-eight cases the appendicitis was associated with abscess of the liver.

The author concludes from his investigations that foreign bodies at one time thought essential in appendicitis are now known to play a much smaller role than that formerly accredited to them; and fecal concretions are much more apt to be present as an exciting cause. Foreign bodies of light weight, like grape-seeds and cherry-stones, so popularly assigned as the cause of appendicitis, and against which we are forever being warned, are in reality exceptional, and their frequency is much over-estimated on account of the close resemblance of fecal concretions and the lack of careful examination of the bodies. described.-University Med. Mag.

White Men in the Tropics.

The Army and Navy Journal for April 8th says that in an article in the Independent Mr. Alfred Russel Wallace characterizes as a myth the current idea that white men cannot live in good health in the tropics. The trouble is not with the climate, but with diseases resulting from insanitary conditions such as prevailed in Europe a century ago with the same result, and still prevail to a large extent in temperate zones. Mr. Wallace says: "Commonly associated with the tropics are the various forms of malarial fevers, but these also are in no sense due to the climate, but simply to ignorant dealing with the soil.

My own experience has shown me that swamps and marshes near the equator are perfectly healthy so long as they are left nearly in a state of nature that is, covered with a dense forest or other vegetation. It is when extensive marshy areas are cleared for cultivation, and for half the year are dried up by the tropical sun, that they become deadly. I have lived for months together in or close to tropical swamps, both in the Amazon Valley, in Borneo and in the Moluccas, without a day's illness; but when living in open cultivated marshy districts I almost invariably had malarial fever, tho I believe the worst types of these fevers are due to unwholesome food. But here again, malaria was equally prevalent in England less than two centuries ago.

"If we take the great belt, about two thousand miles wide, extending from twelve to fifteen degrees north and south of the equator, we have an enormous area, by far the larger part of which is not only well adapted for European colonization in the true sense-that is, for permanent occupation by white men-but is also, with proper sanitary precautions, the most healthy and enjoyable part of the world, and that in which the laborer can obtain the maximum return with the minimum of toil.

"It is a well-known fact that in Ceylon and India the men who enjoy the best health are the enthusiastic sportsmen who seize every opportunity of getting away from civilization, and who often submit to much privation and fatigue, with benefit rather than injury to their health. The fact is that white men can live and work anywhere in the tropics, if they are obliged, and unless they are obliged they will not, as a rule, work even in the most temperate regions. Hence, wherever there are inferior races, the white men get these to work for them, and the kinds of work performed by 'these inferiors become infra dig. for the white man. This is the real reason why the myth, as to white men not being able to work in the tropics, has been spread abroad.-New York Medical Journal.

A New Decalog.

(1) General Hygiene: Rise early, go to bed early, and in the meantime keep yourself occupied. (2) Respiratory Hygiene: Water and bread sustain life, but pure air and sunlight are indispensable for health. (3) Gastro-Intestinal Hygiene: Frugality

and sobriety are the best elixir vitæ for a long life. (4) Epidermal Hygiene: Cleanliness preserves from rust; the best kept machines last longest. (5) Hygiene of Sleep A sufficiency of rest repairs and strengthens; too much rest weakens and makes soft. (6) Hygiene of Clothing : He is well clothed who keeps his body sufficiently warm, safeguarding it from all abrupt changes of temperature, while at the same time maintaining perfect freedom of motion. dom of motion. (7) Dwelling Hygiene : A house that is clean and cheerful makes a happy home. (8) Moral Hygiene: The mind reposes and resumes its edge by means of relaxation and amusement, but excess opens the door to passions, and these attract the vices. (9) Intellectual Hygiene: Gaiety conducts to love of life, and love of life is the half of health; on the other hand sadness and gloom help on old age. (10) Professional Hygiene: If it is your brain that feeds you, don't allow your arms and legs to become anchylosed. If you dig for a livelihood, don't omit to burnish your intellect and elevate your thoughts.-Dr. Decornet, of France.

Metric System in Medical Colleges.

Dr. H. M. Whulpley recently took occasion to send out letters of enquiry to various medical colleges asking whether they taught the metric system. Out of sixty-seven answers to his query he finds fifty-one in the affirmative. About 50 per cent of the colleges make "a thoro knowledge of the system obligatory on their students before graduating them." As the system is taught in all pharmaceutical colleges it would seem to be but a short step now before its universal adoption is consummated.-Pacific Med. Jour.

A Physician's Gold Fetters.

One of the earliest fees for medical treatmentioned by Herodotus, who says that ment of which there is any record is Darius gave the slave Democedes two pairs of gold fetters. The usual fee at that time in Greece was very small, about sixteen cents in our money, yet there were notable exceptions, as when King Antiochus paid $150,000 for medical treatment, and later, when the Emperor Claudian paid his physician about $20,000 a year. The latter was twice the annual income of the eminent physicians of that time.—

Medical News.

WORLD for four years for $3.