fluencing the mind, medicin might help, but the patient must take himself seriously and earnestly in hand, and learn to control himself. He must favor his general health in every possible way, and in helping to do this the physician can best serve his patient. Proper food, proper habits, hygienic surroundings, etc., are necessary to make the body healthy and strong. Then the mind should rule supremely over such a body, controlling every action and function. This is the only way to get sexual health and vigor. If case number one will practice self control he will soon be able to continue copulation the normal time before emission. He should begin by introduction and immediate withdrawal without emission. Soon he will be able to copulate longer without emission, but he should still continue to withdraw before the moment for emission arrives. After awhile he will be able to control emission until orgasm is produced in the female, which is the proper time for emission to occur. Resolution and practice along this line will soon give him control over himself. The wife should be instructed as to the object sought and how it must be done, so she can give both moral and physical aid.

Much of the above applies also to case number two. Good general health, courage, resolution and confidence are needed, rather than medicin. Don't worry about a small organ. Such an organ properly used and controlled can give eminent satisfaction to all concerned. Much more marital unhappiness and dissatisfaction comes from the male organ being too large than too small. The entire secret lies in the proper control and use.-Ed.]

Is the Medical Profession Overcrowded? Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-Is the medical profession overcrowded? and if so, what is the remedy for this undesirable state of affairs?

Such is the question that many a struggling medical student or young practitioner has forced upon him.

A leading Canadian daily, a short time ago, concluded that the profession of mediein was much overcrowded and went on to say that "death from starvation of a few young practitioners, or their being driven to commit highway robbery " would probably lead young men to take up mechanical or agricultural pursuits instead of medicine. It would be interesting to many young men, I think, if some of the

DR. RICHMOND'S SAMARITAN NERVINE. This preparation is intended to cure not alone fits and all nervous diseases, but also the defects of moral character. Below we give a few of their absurd statements:

"A bad temper can be treated just as successfully with a dose of medicin as a cough or a headache. Dishonesty in a servant need not be punisht by discharging him; you have only to give him some of this marvelous medicin. If your son will not study his lessons, do not send him to bed early, or threaten him with more severe correction, but give him Dr. Richmond's Samaritan Nervine for one week, and he will become the most studious and diligent child in school. There is certainly no end to the benefits which this specific has conferred upon mankind. As a peace-maker it acts like magic. A wife who had for twelve years been abused and neglected by a morose and violent husband, askt the doctor what she should do. He told her to put every day a few drops of Samaritan Nervine in his coffee. She did so, and in a surprisingly short time the morose grumbler became a lamblike, effectionate, docile spouse. When so simple a remedy as this is at hand, there is no longer any reason why domestic discord should continue. A miserly father refused to sanction the attentions of a poor, but respectable young man to his daughter. The loving damsel surreptitiously inserted a few drops of the Samaritan Nervine into her father's coffee each meal, and

ROCHE'S HERBAL EMBROCATION.

An effectual remedy for whooping-cough, without internal medicin.

This is the only discovery affording a perfect cure, without administering internal medicin, the difficulty and inconvenience of which, in all disorders particularly incident to children, are too well known to need any comment. The inventor and proprietor of the Embrocation can with pleasure and satisfaction declare that its salutary effects have been so universally experienced, and so generally acknowledged, that many of the most eminent of the Faculty now constantly recommend it as the only known safe and perfect cure, without restriction of diet or use of medicin.-Extract from manufacturer's circular.

Oil caraway Oil turpentine

2 parts. .2 parts.

And add a few drops of oil gaultheria. -Western Druggist.

On the wrapper enclosing the vial it is stated that the Court Circular says: "We find that so invaluable is it regarded by those who know most about the subject, that it is not lookt upon as a patent medicine, since so many medical men prescribe it, not only in England, but in all parts of the world, including the United States, where its healing power is universally recognized; and we are now of the same opinion as those who, after a lengthened experience of its merits, pronounce it an absolute specific for this disease."-Secret Nostrums and Systems.

SEXUAL DISORDERS AND SYSTEMATIZED

QUACKERY.

The increast number of quacks and quackagencies in this city, appealing to victims of sexual troubles and venereal disease, and the boldness and offensiveness of their advertising methods, are working an injury which demands more than ordinary notice. In late years the older methods have changed, and from a business point of view, improved, and it has become the practice for these quacks to work under the

guise of agencies or companies. They have laboratories," consultation-rooms, and most elaborate methods of advertising by circulars, hand-bills, and thru the lower grades of newspapers. So complete is the system that there is hardly a young man or growing youth in the city who does not get hold of some disgusting, or, to him, terrifying notice, picturing the horrible results of self-abuse and seminal losses. Thousands are thereby frightened into a mental state half approaching insanity. Many of them go or write to some of these advertising firms, put themselves under treatment until every spare penny has been wrung from them, without, as a rule, any good being done. On the contrary, an increase in their troubles often results, and even a permanent state of mental and nervous depression is brought about.

The young man, once in the toils of these unholy "agencies" is subjected to influences tending to keep him there. There seems to be a list kept of those applying at one place, which is circulated among quacks all over the country. Consequently the once victimized party is in constant receipt of new circulars describing the virtues of new "pearls," or pills, or special apparatus. Many of the circulars contain grossly inaccurate descriptions and illustrations of the sexual apparatus, the bladder, stomach, brain, etc. etc.

We have before us a specimen circular, depicting with equal force the despairing future of the masturbator, and the unequaled virtues of a certain suppository. It has also cheap wood-cuts of a "brainless child born of a masturbator," a hydrocephalic child with the same ancestry, and of a half-naked man behind the bars of a cage, representing a person "made insane by selfabuse!" No words can tell the agony, the shame, the despair, which such publications cause in a large class of half-educated youths who get hold of them.

A young man subsequently found to have a fine physique, no actual sexual weakness, and to be suffering only from two or three emissions monthly, wrote to a physician: "Altho I am able to work, yet every day the constant thought of my condition, my blasted and miserable life, is with me always, and keeps me in a constant despairing state of mind."

This is the "state of mind" which it is the aim of the quacks in question to produce to as large an extent as possible. The more morbidness and despair the more money in their pockets, for they fatten on the distress of their victims. Here is the foulest possible prostitution of medicin, a systematized attempt to create disease, and then get money from it.

These individuals and companies do not confine their practice to sexual troubles, but plaster the telegraph poles and other places with announcements of "swift cures" for "private diseases," and send circulars advertising cures for all kinds of chronic troubles. Blanks are furnisht, to be filled out with information regarding the person and the disease; descriptions of how to send urine by mail, price-lists for different sets of pills, or different courses of treatment, are also furnisht.

In fine, these establishments have become a public nuisance for the intelligent community,

Abortion is, according to the various authorities, "the expulsion of the product of conception before the fetus is viable." Miscarriage is usually applied to an abortion after three months. That abortions are becoming more numerous every day must be apparent to every practicing physician. Their causes are so varied that it is really amusing and at the same time very provoking to the attending physician. This peculiar state of affairs seems to multiply during housecleaning time, one woman claiming she was hanging curtains, another lifting heavily, while others have numerous and plausible excuses for their condition.

The methods which many women employ themselves have often been a wonder to me that they survived the operation, some using hat-pins, some crochet-needles, lead pencils, pointed pieces of wood, and a case to which I was called recently, the woman had inserted the nozzle of a Davidson's syringe and flushed her womb with a quantity of hot water, and in this way got rid of a three months' pregnancy. When I saw the case she was in a pretty bad condition, having a temperature of 104° F. and a weak and rapid pulse, with profuse hemorrhage.

These abortions are not always self-inflicted, old women and others having frequently a hand in the matter, and fight the cases along until finally a physician is sent for to carry the case thru.

There are also certain physicians in our city, I am told, who make a specialty of the dastardly work or business of committing abortions for a consideration, and seem to thrive in their illegitimate practice. How these things can be carried on

without being noticed is deplorable. It is bad enuf if the act must be committed in order to save the life of the mother, but when carried on exclusively for monetary reasons, it should be condemned in the strongest language. It is unfortunate, however, that physicians are often misled by shrewd women to pass instruments in diagnosing womb troubles and denying in the most strenuous terms that they are pregnant; of course, they well know when once a sound has been passed that an abortion is inevitable.

I once attended a lecture given in the University of Pennsylvania by the late Dr. Goodell, in which he gave his experiences in this manner: A patient, covered with a white sheet, was brought before the class, and when Professor Goodell had concluded some remarks upon the subject he had the woman placed in position for examination. While this was going on, Dr. Goodell happened to look under the sheet and at once recognized the patient as having been before the clinic about a year before. He simply made a digital examination and ordered the woman's withdrawal. After she was taken out, ne said that this same woman fooled him once, but this time he was going to fool her. He said it was simply impossible to tell a pregnancy in its early stages, and that this woman had been shrewd enuf to know this, and he having passed a sound for diagnostic purposes, she aborted in a few days. He concluded that this woman was there for the same purpose the second time.

Professor Goodell took occasion then to tell the students that they could not be too careful in making examinations and could be easily misled by shrewd women, who seem to be equal to the occasion.

Of course, in such cases the physician is placed in a very dangerous position. It would be a good idea for every physician, especially those who make a specialty of diseases of women, to employ trained nurses in their offices, and have them hear the conversation and see the patient's treatment, in order to protect themselves. There is constantly a set of women who are bent on making trouble for the doctor, and, if they can, fleece him out of money and ruin his reputation and practice. The case against one of Philadelphia's most prominent physicians some years ago, in which he was fleeced out of $15,000, is a fair sample of what may happen. The rights of women in such matters is entirely

too one-sided and offers too much protection in one direction only.

This is, of course, a little digression from our subject, but can be mentioned as a good point for all to observe.

Now, as to the matter of treating these abortions. I have not the least doubt but that nine-tenths of the ovarian diseases in our day are due to abortions, many of which have been improperly treated.

Before treatment, however, we may mention some of the causes of abortion, outside of those mentioned above, as due to chronic endometritis and metritis, cellulitis, disease of the tubes or ovaries, lacerated cervix and especially syphilis.

The treatment of threatened abortion should be by perfect quiet and rest, and such drugs that will diminish nervousness and weaken muscular contraction. The latter seems to be controlled best by opium, bromid of potassium and chloral. Opium must, however, be given in large doses, as women about to abort seem to display a tolerance for this drug. Given in suppositories is probably the best method of administration. Viburnum prunifolium seems to be a specific in some

cases.

In inevitable abortion the best plan is to empty the uterus as quickly as possible, as delay is positively dangerous. The method of removing the contents of the uterus with the finger is, in my opinion, in many cases, impracticable, for the reason that it is too painful, and the finger is too short an instrument to accomplish this, especially in corpulent women, and without an anesthetic would frequently unnerve the patient. The best method is to dilate, when indicated, and extract the fetus or its remains. Hemorrhage must, of course, be controlled, as may be necessary, by packing, tamponing, etc., and the administration of ergot in dram doses every four hours after the uterus has been emptied, and enjoining rest in bed for several days, and tonics such as quinine, iron and strychnia, Blaud's mass with extract of nux vomica are among the best. The bowels must be carefully watcht that they are at all times free.

The treatment of cases in which an abortion has been prolonged, and in such cases in which the advice of a physician is invoked, is more radical. The treatment of some physicians is to wait, while life seems to be ebbing away by profuse hemorrhages, and septicemia playing havoc. They make no examinations on

account of the nauseating smell, which in such cases is certainly sickening. But why wait any longer and endanger the life of the patient and risk the irreparable damage likely to follow any degree of degree of delay and procrastination?

The uterus and the condition of the patient is now such that not enuf vitality is left for nature to perform the work of freeing them of the foreign and poisonous mass, and radical measures only are left to be invoked. As a prominent professor once said in lecturing to the class in surgery, "Nothing is too menial for a physician to do, provided he does not do it in a menial way," and I have often thought how true this expression is. I was told some time ago that a prominent doctor who was attending a lady, who knew she was suffering from some womb trouble, being askt if he did not think an examination should be made, replied that such things were so distasteful to him. This doctor was at once dismist for his "distastefulness."

My plan is to at once dilate the uterus, if not already dilated, and with a douche curette begin emptying the uterine body of its offending contents, using a solution of one to eight thousand or ten thousand of bichloride of mercury. This usually lowers a temperature of 104° F. to nearly normal within a few hours. After curet ting and flushing the intra-uterine cavity with a gallon of the above solution, pack the member thoroughly with an antiseptic gauze, cut about an inch in width. This is left to remain for about twenty-four hours, then it is removed and usually the result is all that can be desired. Delay in these cases I am sure is the cause, as I have already stated, of the majority of uterine troubles, and they can all be avoided by prompt action.-DR. J. M. BERTOLET, in Maryland Med. Jour.

Criminal Abortion Across the Atlantic and on This Side.

This form of crime is very frequent in most parts of the world, and has been greatly in evidence of late in England, where, within the past six months, there have been tried three qualified medical men for performing an illegal operation with fatal results. One of these was sentenced to seven years' penal servitude, while another has just been condemned to death. It is stated in a reliable English medical journal that the police have full knowledge of a ring of medical men

in a certain quarter of London who regularly practice as abortionists, and that active steps are being taken to bring them to justice. In this country, altho there has been no great public scandal for a considerable time, the fact that abortion prevails to a large extent is well known. Dr. Storer, of Newport, who has for many years been an active anti-abortionist, referring to the matter a few months ago, said: "Much has been written on the subject from various standpoints, but fetal murder still prevails, a dreadful monster that, wounded at one point, evinces but fresh strength at others. The decrease of the rate of increase still goes on.” It may then be taken for granted that the practice is a common one. What are the reasons for this state of affairs, and what means will most effectually put a stop to its continuance. The reasons are as clear to read as an open book, and are simply that the well-to-do woman of the present day is, for the most part, averse to undertaking the duties and responsibilities of maternity, probably believing, too, in the majority of cases, that before the fourth month or thereabouts the fetus is but a part of its mother and is not endowed with separate life, and that, therefore, in procuring abortion, she is not guilty of any deadly sin. How to effectually prevent abortion is a most difficult problem to solve. With many women even the knowledge that in undergoing an illegal operation, they were conniving at murder, would not act as a deterrent, while it would be difficult to convince many more that in procuring abortion they were committing a sin of any magnitude. only course open would, therefore, seem to be to punish those who are detected in the crime, with the utmost severity, the path that is now being pursued in England, altho we agree with the following remarks of the Medical Press: "We trust, however, that the action of the authorities will not be limited to the arrest of medical men alone; the 'smart' women who seduce needy practitioners into relieving them of the troubles of maternity are equally guilty, and they should not be allowed to escape. If a few examples were made of these women it is quite possible that the work of the abortionist would soon undergo a serious diminution." Altho the obstacles in the way of altogether preventing abortion are probably insuperable, yet some steps should be taken to check its widespread practice.