682 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



hours longer than milk not so treated. In like manner a litre of beer, 

 containing one gramme of the acid, and exposed to the air, did not 

 become sour after standing for a considerable time, nor was there the 

 slightest trace of mould. As a means of keeping water sweet on 

 shipboard it is specially valuable. 



Eggs immersed for an hour in a solution of salicylic acid were at 

 the end of three months as fresh as at first. Flesh-meat dusted over 

 with the acid keejDS its freshness for weeks. When about to be used, 

 the meat may be dipped into water, to remove the acid. 



Dr. Thiersch, of the Leipsic Hospital, has used this substance 

 " with very favorable results " in his surgical practice. Kolbe has 

 employed it as a wash for the teeth and mouth, and asserts that it is 

 very effectual in purifying the breath. In a communication published 

 in the Journal fur praktische Chemie, he says : " As a medicine foi 

 internal use, salicylic acid does not seem to have been much employed 

 hitherto, and yet, owing to its antiseptic properties, it is indicated in 

 all diseases of the blood, especially in those which are developed by 

 contagion." Among the diseases likely to yield to this treatment he 

 names scarlatina, diphtheria, measles, small-pox, syj^hilis, dysentery, 

 tyi^hus, and cholera. Further, he is inclined to think that it might 

 be effectual in dealing with pysemia and hydrophobia. 



Dr. Karl Fontheim, writing to the same journal, says: "This new 

 remedy has been found of very special benefit in treating diphtheria ; 

 I have employed it in thirty-two cases ; of these none have proved 

 fatal, and the worst cases recovered in eight days." Prof. Zlirn, of 

 Leipsic, has employed salicylic acid in veterinary practice, both medi- 

 cal and surgical, and it is his opinion that " for internal and external 

 use in domestic animals, as an antiseptic and destroyer of living con- 

 tagia, it is destined to occupy as honorable a position in veter-inary 

 practice as it does in human medicine." 



Kolbe has experimented on his own person, to determine whether 

 or not salicylic acid is injurious to the animal economy. For several 

 days in succession he took daily, in four parts, one half-gramme (solu- 

 tion in water 1 : 1,000), without the slightest bad effect. After an in- 

 terval of eight days, he for five successive days took double the former 

 dose, and for two successive days he took one and a half gramme. 

 In the mean time his digestion was entirely normal ; there was no 

 feeling of oppression in the stomach, nor did he experience any incon- 

 venience whatever. Other physicians who, at his request, made the 

 same experiments, confirm these results. Still the remedy must not 

 be taken in tbe form of a powder, for in that shape it attacks the 

 mucous membrane of the mouth and oesophagus ; it must be taken in 

 solution. 



F. von Heyden, of Dresden, manufactures salicylic acid on a large 

 scale, according to the process of Kolbe and Lautemann. The product 

 is a yellowish-white powder. This is the crude acid, which may be 



