264 



NATURE 



[June 5, 1919 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 

 [The Editor does not hold himself responsible for 

 opinions expressed by his co-respondents. Neither 

 can he undertake to return, or to correspond with 

 the writers of, rejected manuscripts intended for 

 this or any other part of Nature. No notice is 

 taken of anoriymous communications.] 



Intravenous Injections in Cholera. 



In the address given by Sir Leonard Rogers to 

 the Indian Science Congress at Bombay (Nature, 

 May 29) reference is made to the treatment of cholera 

 by injections of saline solutions, with the object of 

 replacing the fluid lost from the blood, which loss 

 may amount to 67 per cent, of the plasma volume. 

 The distinguished worker found that isotonic sodium 

 chloride solution (0-85 per cent.) was practically use- 

 less, but that hypertonic solutions (1-2 per cent.) were 

 of much greater value. Since the walls of the blood- 

 vessels are freely permeable to salts, there is no per- 

 manent difference of osmotic pressure between their 

 contents and the tissue spaces outside them. Hence 

 there is no permanent force to prevent the escape of 

 fluid from the blood-vessels. So long as the salt- 

 content of the blood, as raised by the introduction of 

 hypertonic solutions, exceeded that of the tissue fluids 

 in his cases, there would be absorption of water and 

 the blood-volume would be maintained ; but before 

 long the salt concentration of the tissues would rise' 

 to that of the blood, and there would no longer be 

 the difference of osmotic pressure necessary to hold 

 the fluid in the circulation against the filtration due 

 to the arterial pressure. This would explain the 

 repeated injections found necessary by Sir Leonard 

 Rogers. In some experiments that I have made, 2 per 

 cent, sodium chloride was found to leave the circula- 

 tion and cause oedema, although not so rapidly as 

 isotonic solutions did. 



Although the walls of the blood-vessels are 

 permeable to salts, they are impermeable to colloids, 

 so that if we could introduce a solution of a colloid 

 which possesses an osmotic pressure, it would not 

 leave the circulation, and its property of attracting 

 water and preventing loss by filtration would be more or 

 less permanent. We have such a colloid in gum-acacia. 

 I have been able to show that a 6 or 7 per cent, solu- 

 tion of this substance in 0-9 per cent, sodium chloride 

 maintains the blood-volume under various conditions 

 in which it was defective. Such solutions were used 

 extensively in France for the treatment of heemorrhage 

 and wound-shock. 



I would therefore venture to recommend the trial 

 of the method in cholera. I understand that some 

 steps have been taken at Aden in this direction. Gum- 

 saline has been used by Dr. Burkitt in Nairobi for 

 black-water fever, and found to raise the blood- 

 pressure permanently and to restore the renal func- 

 tion. Sir Leonard Rogers refers to the last as a very 

 serious factor in cholera, and the state in this disease 

 appears to be such as promises better reaction to 

 intravenous fluids than does black-water fever. 



The calcium bicarbonate contained in gum serves 

 also to neutralise any acid produced in the tissues 

 owing to defective blood-supply, and if the physio- 

 logical action of calcium is required, no further addi- 

 tion is necessary. 



Of course, the treatment by gum-saline is not to be 

 regarded as a cure in the ordinary meaning of the 

 word. It keeips up the normal circulation and allows 

 other means, such as are mentioned bv Sir Leonard 

 Rogers, to be used effectively. W. M. Bayliss. 



University College, London. 



NO. 2588, VOL.. 103] 



A Crocodile on Rotuma. 



Capt. W. W. Wilson, formerly harbour-master of 

 Levuka, Fiji, has sent me a photograph of a crocodile 

 taken by Mr. G. Missen. This animal landed alive 

 on Rotuma in July, 1913, being afterwards speared 

 by the natives. Rotuma lies 260 miles due north of 

 the Yasawas, the most westerly islands of the Fiji 

 group, and 600 miles east of the New Hebrides and 

 Santa Cruz groups; the nearest Solomon islands are 

 upwards of 300 miles further west. 



The photograph represents a full-grown adult croco- 

 dile. Dr. iH. Gadow has identified it as Crocodilus 

 porosurS, Schneider, a species which has the habit of 

 wandering out to sea. It is found from the Bay of 

 Bengal to the Solomon Islands. The British Museum 

 Catalogue of Reptiles mentions Fiji as within its 

 area of distribution, but gives no precise record of 

 any occurrence there. It certainly did not come from 

 Fiji or any lands to the east, as crocodiles do not now 

 exist on them, though native legends of live crocodiles 

 landing were rife in Fiji when I was there in 1896-97. 

 It must indeed have crossed from the west, and 

 covered at least 600 miles of open, landless sea. This 

 occurrence is sufficiently remarkable to be placed on 

 permanent record. J. Stanley Gardiner. 



University of Cambridge. 



Calendar Reform and the Date of Easter. 



As an influential effort is apparently being made 

 in Paris to bring the question of the improvement of 

 the Gregorian calendar before the Peace Conference, I 

 should like to direct the attention of the scientific, 

 commercial, and ecclesiastical authorities who may be 

 interested to the exceptionally favourable opportunity 

 afforded for such rectification by the calendar of the 

 year 1925. 



In recent years many proposals for the improvement 

 of the calendar, or rather for the adoption of another, 

 have been placed before the public, but not much con- 

 sideration has been given to the question of how such 

 an improved calendar is to be coupled to the existing 

 calendar without breach of continuity. 



The Gregorian almanac for the year 1925 offers an 

 unusually favourable opportunity for effecting this. 

 If May 31 in that and all following years were de- 

 clared to be excluded from the weekly series, and if 

 the same rule were applied to the odd day in all leap- 

 years thereafter, it is obvious that the calendar of 

 1925 with the above modification would become the 

 perpetual calendar of the future. 



In this calendar March i is a Sunday, and, without 

 in any way changing the enumeration of the years 

 for purposes of dating, that date could very con- 

 veniently be recognised as the commencement both of 

 the business and financial, and also of the ecclesias- 

 tical, year. Easter Sunday could not be fixed for a 

 more suitable day than April 12, which is the date of 

 its occurrence in the year mentioned, and Pentecost 

 would naturally and appropriately fall on May 31, 

 the day already suggested for exclusion from the 

 weekly series. Pentecost being the anniversary of the 

 foundation of the Christian Church, itsi special 

 sequestration in this way makes a strong appeal to 

 the ecclesiastical authorities. 



Under the above calendar it would be quite unneces- 

 sary to remove the 366th day from its position at the 

 end of February, and the only other change required 

 to equip the almanac with equal quarters and half- 

 years would be to restore the original Julian syllabus 

 of months by removing the odd day so unfortunately 

 added to August by Augustus, and restoring it to 

 February. August, 1919, might appropriately 5e the 

 last to bear the stigma of imperial disfigurement. 



