June 25, 1897.] 



SCIENCE. 



911 



remembered that Oliver and Schafer* 

 have shown that the active principle (or 

 pi'inciples) is non-volatile and that its ac- 

 tivity is not destroyed by mineral acids or 

 gastric digestion, while alkalies gradually 

 diminish it. According to Marino-Zuco,f 

 the toxic action is due to the presence 

 of neurin glycerophosphate. There are 

 also some grounds for believing a brenz- 

 catechin-like body to be present, J which 

 may exert some physiological action. 

 Lastly, in extracts of the testis a peculiar 

 nitrogenous body has been detected, free 

 from oxygen, known as spermin and which 

 is claimed by Poehl § to have a marked in- 

 fluence upon metabolism and to act as a 

 true physiological stimulus. Further dis- 

 cussion of these points at the present time, 

 however, would have little value. 



R. H. Chittenden. 

 Yale Univeesity. 



A CASE OF PRIMITIVE SURGERY. 



During the first period of my residence 

 among ZuQi Indians, in the autumn of 1890, 

 I was called in to assist two medicine men 

 or priests in the performance of a peculiarly 

 interesting surgical operation. 



A man belonging to the clan into which 

 I had been adopted had for several months 

 been suffering from the effects of either a 



naire snr I'action des extraits de capsules surrenales. 

 C. E. Soc. de Biol., 1896, p. 14. 



* The physiological effects of extracts of the supra- 

 renal capsules. Journal of Physiol., Vol. 18, p. 370. 

 See also B. Moore: On the Chemical Nature of the 

 physiologically active substance occurring in the 

 suprarenal gland. Ibid., Vol. 17. Proc. Physiol. 

 Soc, March, 1895. 



t Archiv. d. Biol. Ital., Tome 10, p. 325. 



JBrunner: Chem. Centralblatt. , 1892, I., p. 758. 

 Miihlmann: Deutsche Med. Wochenschr., 1896, No. 

 26. 



I Compt. rendu. Tome 115, p. 129. Zeitschr. f. 

 Klin. Med. Band 26, p. 133. Centralbl. f. d. Med. 

 TVissensch., 1892, p. 950. See also Bubis: Sperminnm 

 Poehl in ehemischer, physiologischer nnd therapen- 

 tischer Beziehung. Ibid., 1894, p. 703. 



contusion or a strain of the right foot, 

 caused by a throw from his horse. This 

 had at first given little trouble, then had 

 appeared as an ordinary stone-bruise on the 

 right side of the foot just below the instep. 

 The inflammation had, however, extended 

 until the whole foot and the lower part of 

 the leg had become excessively swollen, so 

 much so as to cause the skin to glisten from 

 stretching, save at a point over and around 

 the original injury, at which point a malig- 

 nant and putrid sore had developed, the 

 odor of which was extremely offensive, and 

 both the foot and the leg were now of livid, 

 purplish-red hue in places, suggestive of 

 actual decay. As a layman in medicine I 

 should have said that the case was now one 

 of advanced mortification, and from the 

 general condition of the patient I should 

 have inferred that blood poisoning was 

 likely soon to ensue. 



I gathered from the conversation of the 

 two old surgeons who had been called in, 

 and who had in return requested my at- 

 tendance in order that I might give ' ease 

 medicine ' and ' add with (my) breath 

 strength and endurance to (my) clan- 

 brother,' that it was these appearances, 

 this apparently ' decaying condition ' of the 

 man's extremity, that had determined them 

 to perform the operation. 



When I entered the room the patient was 

 Ijdng on the floor and, although in extreme 

 agony, turned his face toward me expectantly 

 and with a smile, uttering the customary 

 words of welcome. His head was pillowed 

 in the lap of his little old white-haired 

 mother, who was gently stroking his fore- 

 head and talking to him in the endearing 

 phrases of mothers to little children. At his 

 side was a small bowl containing a clear 

 but bright red liquid (made, I afterwards 

 learned, from an infusion of willow-root 

 bark) in which half floated, half stood, a 

 cane sucking-tube about six inches long. 

 The old sui-geons were removing certain 



