376 Proceedings of the 



The first ten were employed in perforating, and the last four in re- 

 ducing the stone into small fragments, which were passed off with 

 the urine. No ill effects whatever attended or followed the opera- 

 tion, and the patient is perfectly recovered. The detritus, passed off 

 with the urine, was exhibited to the Academy, (having been collected 

 into small masses by means of a solution of gum,) and excited uni- 

 versal astonishment and admiration. The patient was present at the 

 meeting. 



Cure of Fever. At the same meeting M. Magendie made a very 

 favourable report on the use of powder of holly leaves, recommended 

 by Dr. Rousseau as a cure for fever (vide page 148}. The reporter 

 stated that the new remedy had been tried in the hospitals in thirteen 

 different cases of fever. The doses administered were from one to five 

 gros per day, and in every case the patients were cured after about 

 twenty days treatment. The effect of the holly is not so quick as 

 that of the quinia and silicine, but it is a sure and excellent febrifuge. 

 The only thing necessary to make it thoroughly useful, was to extract 

 its essential properties, so as to avoid the necessity of administering 

 it in such large quantities. We have already mentioned that this 

 has been done ; and M. Magendie concludes his report by stating 

 that ilicine may now take its place with quinia and silicine in the list 

 of febrifuges. 



Cholera at Mecca. On the 12th of September M. D'Arcet com- 

 municated to the Academy a letter which he had received from M. 

 Mimaut, the consul-general of France, in Egypt, containing an 

 account of a contagious disease, which ha<J carried off at least 12,000 

 pilgrims at Mecca, and was still raging there with great violence. 

 The individuals attacked fell down in the street, without any previous 

 illness, and, after violent vomitings, died almost instantly. This 

 visitation was at first considered to be the plague ; but the Imans 

 repelled this idea, on account of the promise of the Prophet, that 

 pestilence should never visit the Holy City. They preferred attri- 

 buting it partly to the want of soft water, which had existed for some 

 time in Mecca, and partly to the vengeance of the Deity, at his holy 

 house having been so long violated by the infidel drums and trum- 

 pets of the regiments in garrison at Mecca : the latter cause has 

 been removed by the colonel of the regiment imposing silence on 

 his band. There appears, however, every reason to believe that the 

 disease is no other than the cholera ; and the immense influx of pil- 

 grims from every quarter, including Persia and India, added to the 

 intense heat (31 deg. Reaumur), furnisli sufficient causes for the 

 propagation of the epidemic. During the three days devoted to 

 religious ceremonies, previous to the Bairam, the whole body of pil- 

 grims remain agglomerated in a dense mass, and do not move even 

 when the rain descends upon them in torrents and numbers fall dead 

 around them. During these three days the mortality was terrific, 



