94 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



shapes competed with each other over extensive districts ; iron came 

 in contact with bronze, and both materials crowded upon the hard 

 stone weapons of the earlier time. Steel had gained the predominance 

 over bronze in all Southern Europe in the time of the Romans, and the 

 last remains of stone-age civilization in that part of the world were ex- 

 tinguished in the early middle ages. Thus the same cycle of technical 

 changes was completed in Europe as in the East. Still, considerable 

 differences may be observed in the course of development in the two 

 cases. The metal-working age begins much later in the West than in 

 the East. Semitic civilization attained its highest development under 

 the predominance of bronze, while the higher intellectual life of the 

 Europeans is accompanied by that iron-working art which now rules 

 over the whole earth. Roman iron mastered the East ; but it has 

 gained immensely greater victories of peace in the Western world within 

 a century through the agency of iron roads and wagons, swift steam- 

 ers, and skillfully built and mighty engines. — Translated for the 

 Popular Science Monthly from the Deutsche Rundschau. 



-♦v*- 



OUR NEW SKIK AND CANCER HOSPITAL. 



By WILLIAM J. YOUMANS, M. D, 



THE project recently initiated for establishing in New York on an 

 adequate scale a hospital for the treatment of skin-diseases is 

 of great importance to this community. It has been long under- 

 stood that medical progress can only be best facilitated by the con- 

 centration of thought upon special groups of diseases, and that for 

 this purpose special institutions are demanded. We have in New 

 York four eye and ear hospitals, two for the ruptured and crippled, 

 one for the throat, several for children's diseases, and the great Wom- 

 an's Hospital known the world over for the advances in science made 

 within its walls. But in regard to hospitals for the treatment of cuta- 

 neous affections we are not only behind the age and greatly deficient 

 in this country, but in a condition of almost complete destitution. 

 Something has been done in Philadelphia in this direction in a small 

 way, but nowhere else until the beginning now made in this city. 

 Students have been compelled to go abroad to find adequate facilities 

 for the study of skin-diseases in the large hospitals of Paris, Vienna, 

 Berlin, London, and other places ; although cases of diseases of the 

 skin and cancer are very common in this country, very many occurring 

 among us of the most severe, distressing, and often destructive char- 

 acter. 



In regard to the relative frequency of these diseases in this city 

 and country it may be stated that the number of persons thus afflicted 



