BIOLOGY. ' 271 



tried in cases of bad tumors, in amputations, in excisions of can- 

 cers, in destruction of wens, for opening cysts, for removing in- 

 ternal tumors, upon wounds by fire, and in numerous other cases. 

 And a recent article in " Cosmos " claims for it the following advan- 

 tages : " The electro-thermic cautery suppresses all pain after the 

 operation; avoids loss of blood; prevents the retention and alter- 

 ation of the liquids ; avoids all putrid and purulent infections ; 

 facilitates the organic reconstruction and healing of the parts; 

 affords a method universally applicable, strong or weak, con- 

 tinuous or intermittent ; capable of sloughing the tissues, of car- 

 bonizing them, of destroying them, of converting them into gas, 

 and must be regarded as one of the most important contri- 

 butions to modern surgery." 



AIR IN TISSUES. 



It is a well-known fact in surgery that when air gets into the 

 tissues in consequence of a perforation of the lung by a punc- 

 tured rib, it does not excite putrefaction or suppuration, as it is 

 apt to do when it acts on an external wound. Professor 

 Tyndall, in a letter to the " Times," connects with this fact his 

 observation, by means of a beam of light, that air expelled from 

 the lungs by a forced expiration contains no floating particles, 

 and considers that together these facts afford a complete demon- 

 stration that germs in the air removable by filtration are the cause 

 of putrefaction and its associated phenomena of animalcular life. 



PULSE-BEATS. 



Dr. Omanza describes a method of registering photographically 

 the beat of the pulse. The apparatus essentially consists of a 

 small inverted funnel, having a long, narrow stem and a caout- 

 chouc base. This instrument is filled with mercury to a certain 

 distance up the stem, and its base is applied to the heart or an 

 artery ; the oscillations of the mercurial column are then photo- 

 graphed by well-known processes. It is said that with this 

 apparatus the apparently single stroke of the pulse is shown to 

 consist of three, or even four, in succession. Nature. 



LIVING ORGANISMS IN LIMESTONES. 



M. Bechamp is the author of an interesting memoir upon this 

 subject, to the French Academy. 



He asserts the presence, in the limestones of various geological 

 periods, of living organisms, to which he attaches the name of 

 microzymas. 



These microscopic beings he has found not only in geologically 

 modern deposits, but even in those of Jurassic age. To their 

 presence, he claims, is due the fact that the various limestones, 

 when brought into contact with starch or sugar solution, cause 



