178 ON MARRIASE AND INFANTICIDE IN CHINA. 



retained those matters which go to form it, in the tissues ; but, when 

 circulation is re-established, ureemic poisoning is soon perceived, un- 

 less the kidneys resume their function, and a tolerably free secretion 

 from them takes place. The amount of urea present in the blood, in 

 reaction, often amounts to 2 per 1000. In this connection, it will be 

 seen how death follows, in cholera, upon a patient with diseased kid- 

 neys — a result so uniform that some have considered the condition of 

 those organs, after death, the result of cholera, when it may be rather 

 inferred that their condition prevented his recovery by occluding the 

 outlets through which, only, uroea could be eliminated. Hence the 

 drowsiness, coma, convulsions, it may be, and death . In less highly 

 marked cases, remedies may be found in the use of diuretics and cho- 

 lagogues — especially such of the former as are believed to have the 

 power of expelling urea from the system. 



The length of this paper precludes any further remarks on other 

 remedies ; but this will be unnecessary even to the junior members of 

 the profession, who (have no personal experience of cholera, if the 

 plan of treatment instituted be rational, and in accordance with the 

 indications of each case. 



MARRIAGE AND INFANTICIDE IN CHINA IN THEIR 

 RELATIONS TO POPULATION. 



BY W. HENRY GUMMING, M.D. 



It is neither possible, at the present time, nor necessary, on the 

 present occasion, to determine the population of China. Whether 

 the proper number be one hundred and fifty millions or four hundred 

 millions, we need not now enquire. For the purposes of this paper 

 it is only necessary to state that in many localities the people are so 

 numerous that they are scarcely able to obtain a meagre subsistence. 

 They "swarm" in every direction. In rich plains the villages are 

 frequent and the cities populous. On the sea-coast, where the soil 

 seems unable to support such multitudes, the ocean yields great quan- 

 tities of food. Fishing-vessels are to be seen along the whole coast. 

 Thousands are driven, by a storm, into a single port. 



