1S89.] 329 



[Hoffman. 



l^eared in tlie same place about three weeks since and promised 

 to be very abundant this season. 



Oral communications were made as follows : 



By Prof. Henry F. Osborn : 



1. Upon the Displacement of the Foot-bones in the Mam- 

 malia. 



2. Upon the Perissodactyla of the Uinta 

 By Prof W. B. Scott : 



1. Upon the Relations of the Uinta to the Bridcrer and 

 White River Fauna. 



2. Upon the Artiodactyla of the Uinta. 



Th^ question of printing the old minutes of the Board of 

 Officers and Council was deferred until the next stated meet- 

 ing of the Society. 



Pending nominations 1183-1187 were read. 



And the Society was adjourned by the President. 



Folk-Medicine of the Pennsylvania Germans. 



By W. J. Boffman, M.D., Washington, D. C. 



{Read before the American Philosophical Society, May S, 1SS9.) 



Reverting to the period in the history of Pennsylvania, when the home- 

 steads of the colonists were remote from one another, it may readily be 

 conceived that ordinary social intercourse was impracticable. One ofthe 

 first duties was considered to be the erection of a house of worship so lo- 

 cated as to be accessible to the greatest number of people within a given 

 area. Thus it generally happened that the gatherings before Sunday ser- 

 vice were of social importance and were looked forward to with o-reat 

 interest as a means of exchanging the news and incidents of the prece'ding 

 week. This practice still obtains in the rural districts. 



Except in the villages, and larger towns, professional medical services 

 were scarcely to be had, and hence in other than simple cases it was the 

 pastor who was called upon to administer to the bodily as well as to the 

 spiritual welfare of the members of his flock. Common complaints were 

 treated by the application or administration of household remedies the 

 collection and preparation of which formed no insignificant part of the 

 wife s dunes. For this purpose various plants, roots, barks and blossoms 



PKOC. AMEK. PHILOS. SOC. XXVI. 129. 2p. PRINTED MAY 10, 1889. 



