DR. SANSOM'S OBSERVATIONS. 307 



of a number of practitioners that the real value of 

 remedial measures can be certainly tested. In the 

 following pages I have given a summary of Dr. San- 

 som's paper on the sulpho-carbolates, published in 

 No. XVII of my " Archives." The results will also be 

 found in detail in his own book on " The Antiseptic 

 System," just published, and to this work the reader 

 is referred for a full account of Dr. Sansom's interest- 

 ing observations. 



Dr. Sansom remarks that a great number of anti- 

 septics are capable of ready absorption into the blood. 

 Such are carbolic acid, alcohol, sulphuric acid, sul- 

 phurous acid and the sulphites, many metallic salts, 

 &c. It seems, however, that when these have been 

 employed in times past, the rationale of their action 

 has not been attributed to septicidal power. When in 

 1857, P r f- PUi, of Milan, introduced sulphurous acid 

 and the sulphites, for the treatment of contagious 

 fevers, he expressly declared his conviction that they 

 did not act as poisons towards the supposed morbific 

 ferments. It seems to have been accepted as a doc- 

 trine that it would not be possible to destroy such 

 ferments, or to neutralise their influence, within the 

 living organism, without modifying the character of 

 the blood to such an extent as to imperil its power 

 of sustaining life. If antiseptics acted in a purely 

 chemical way, such an inference would be justified ; 

 but there is strong evidence against this chemical 

 doctrine. The sulphites administered to living animals 



