AN ADDRESS ON A NEW ANTISEPTIC DRESSING 319 



that the double cyanide, like the simple cyanide of mercury, though very efficient 

 as an inhibitor, cannot be trusted as a germicide. There are different ways 

 in which absorbent gauze such as this may be charged. One is to pass it folded 

 in about sixteen layers through a trough, such as the one before me, which 

 I have myself used, having a bar near the bottom to ensure the gauze being 

 kept well under the liquid. It is then, as soon as you please, squeezed to press 

 out superfluous liquid, and then, if wanted for immediate use, a simple way 

 is to place the masses of gauze — say, six-yard pieces — in a folded sheet, turn 

 the folded sheet over them, and roll it up. The folded sheet then absorbs the 

 still redundant liquid, and you have moist gauze ready for use in five minutes. 

 For the use of the ordinary surgeon it will probably be best to have the gauze 

 dried, on the understanding that it is again moistened with i to 4,000 sublimate 

 solution before being used. Here is a sample of the gauze in the dry state, 

 which, you see, does not give off dust even when freely handled. 



Other articles may be charged as well as gauze with this substance. The 

 double cyanide being perfectly unirritating in its own substance, there is no 

 objection to having an excess of it. If you take, therefore, some of the pre- 

 paration and stir it up with i to 4,000 sublimate lotion, so as to produce an 

 opaque liquid, and put linen rags into it, and then place them in a folded towel 

 to take out the excess of liquid, you have your dressing ready prepared then 

 and there. It can thus be very easily worked on an emergency. 



We have seen that the double cyanide requires about 3,000 parts of blood 

 serum to dissolve it. If, therefore, it is present in a gauze in the proportion 

 of about 3 per cent., you will easily understand that blood-serum may soak 

 through such a gauze time after time without washing the ingredient all out ; 

 so that it is a material which is admirably stored up in the dressing. That is 

 one of its three great advantages, the others being that, while trustworthy as 

 an antiseptic, it is completely unirritating. In actual practice the few layers 

 placed next to the wound are washed in a solution of carbolic acid i to 20 ; 

 this washes out the corrosive sublimate, which, though present in small amount, 

 might irritate the wound to some extent. The carbolic acid soon flies oft", and 

 there is left in the application next the wound merely the unirritating double 

 cyanide, and under this we find that not only do wounds, the edges of which 

 are brought accurately together, unite beautifully by fiist intention, but even 

 granulating sores heal by the gradual process of cicatrization from the edges — 

 heal bv scabbinir in a wav that wo liavo never seen so satisfactorv under anv 

 other dressing. 



Having satisfied myself that this was really a useful material, I proceeded 

 to request a manufacturing chemist to provide it for me on a large scale. Messrs. 



