ON THE ANTISEPTIC PRINCIPLES 281 



case of strangulated inguinal hernia in which it was neces- 

 sary to take away half a pound of thickened omentum, heal 

 without any deep-seated suppuration or any tenderness of 

 the sac or any fever; and amputations, including one imme- 

 diately below the knee, have remained absolutely free from 

 constitutional symptoms. 



Further, I have found that when the antiseptic treatment 

 is efficiently conducted, ligatures may be safely cut short 

 and left to be disposed of by absorption or otherwise. Should 

 this particular branch of the subject yield all that it prom- 

 ises, should it turn out on further trial that when the knot is 

 applied on the antiseptic principle, we may calculate as 

 securely as if it were absent on the occurrence of healing 

 without any deep-seated suppuration, the deligation of main 

 arteries in their continuity will be deprived of the two 

 dangers that now attend it, viz., those of secondary haemor- 

 rhage and an unhealthy state of the wound. Further, it 

 seems not unlikely that the present objection to tying an 

 artery in the immediate vicinity of a large branch may be 

 done away with; and that even the innominate, which has 

 lately been the subject of an ingenious experiment by one 

 of the Dublin surgeons, on account of its well-known fa- 

 tality under the ligature for secondary haemorrhage, may 

 cease to have this unhappy character when the tissues in 

 the vicinity of the thread, instead of becoming softened 

 through the influence of an irritating decomposing sub- 

 stance, are left at liberty to consolidate firmly near an un- 

 offending though foreign body. 



It would carry me far beyond the limited time which, by 

 the rules of the Association, is alone at my disposal, were I 

 to enter into the various applications of the antiseptic prin- 

 ciple in the several special departments of surgery. 



There is, however, one point more that I cannot but ad- 

 vert to, viz., the influence of this mode of treatment upon 

 the general healthiness of an hospital. Previously to its in- 

 troduction the two large wards in which most of my cases 

 of accident and of operation are treated were among the 

 unhealthiest in the whole surgical division of the Glasgow 

 Royal Infirmary, in consequence apparently of those wards 

 being unfavorably placed with reference to the supply of 



