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Vol. XVI. 



NEW YORK, November 14, 1890. 



No. 406. 



CONTENTS: 



LiGHTHODSE IlLUMINANTS 267 



The Army- Worm ik Maryland .. 269 



Wheat-Smct 270 



Dried Brewers' Grains 271 



Notes and News 27] 



Health Matters. 



Treatment of Consumption 274 



Medical Treatment of Fractures 274 

 The International Medical Con- 

 gress at Rome 274 



Color-blindness among the Chi- 

 nese 274 



Possible Dangers of Hypnotism. 274 



Letters to the Editor. 

 Origin of Right-handedness 



William James ! 

 Mount St. Elias. Wm. H. Ball.. I 

 Chalk from the Niobrara Cre- 

 taceous of Kansas 



George M. Dawson '. 

 Book-Reviews. 



Races and Peoples i 



The Trees of Northeastern Amer- 



The Antiquities of Tennessee i 



Among the Publishers 



HEALTH MATTERS. 



Treatment of Consumption. 



From the Lancet of Aug. 30 we learn that Koch's views on the 

 treatment ot phthisis p2ilmo7ialis have received interesting support 

 from the experience of a chemist. Hen- Renter, made public in 

 April last at a full meeting of the Lower Austrian Industrial 

 Union. Koch, it will be remembered, maintained at the Berlin 

 congress, that, among the remedies capable of bringing the mal- 

 ady to a standstill, the salts of gold and silver are of the greatest 

 value, and that among these the first place must be given to 

 "cyan-gold." Renter, who, as director of the great fabriques of 

 metallic wares at home and abroad, paid particular attention to 

 those in which the articles in question were galvanically gilded or 

 silvered, observed that in the latter industry the employees who 

 had consumptive or tubercular symptoms, some indeed who suf- 

 feied from hemoptysis, found marked relief in their work, and 

 continued to improve so rapidly that in a few weeks their return 

 to health w-as assured. The favorable impression made on Renter 

 as to the curative effects of the gold and siher industry on phthisis, 

 he found confirmed by the testimony of employees of every age in 

 these establishments; men, young and old, who had the well- 

 known symptoms of pulmonary consumption, even at an advanced 

 stage, rapidly getting well as they continued from week to week 

 at work. Further investigations strengthened that impression 

 still more, till he had satisfied himself that for the disease in 

 ■question a healing virtue resides in the prussic acid generated 



particularly in those workshops where "cyan-metals" dissolvecl 

 in " cyan-kalium " are used. Impressed by Koch's views, the 

 Medical Association of Vienna fias since bestowed special consid- 

 eration on Reuter's experiences embodied in the paper read before 

 the Lower Austrian Industrial Union last April, and, while ad- 

 mitting the confirmation given to those views by Renter, it is of 

 opinion that the honor of priority in discovering the eflicacy of 

 gold and silver salts in the treatment of phthisis pulmonalis be- 

 longs undoubtedly to the latter. 



Medical Treatment of Fractures. 

 In a graduation thesis in Havana an author discusses the advan- 

 tage of prescribing various forms of phosphorus for patients suf- 

 fering from fracture. As given in the Lancet, he carried out a series 

 of experiments on dogs and fowls by breaking the femur by means 

 of an osteoclast, and putting up the limb in splints. He then 

 divided the patients into two groups, the first group being treated 

 with phosphorus in various forms, the second being left without 

 medication. The result was that the callus was more abundant 

 and firmer in animals treated with phosphide of zinc than in those- 

 treated with phosphate of lime or than in those not treated at all. 

 These results were confirmed by observations made in the surgical 

 wards, where it was found that patients with fractures who took 

 from a quarter to an eighth of a grain of phosphide of zinc daily 

 made exceptionally good and rapid recoveries. The only un- 

 pleasant effects produced by this treatment were that one out of 

 the eighteen patients on whom it was tried suffered from slight 

 diarrhoea, and in one thfe pulse became slow and hard. 



The International Medical Congress at Rome. 

 Dr. Guido Baccelli, president of the Accademia Medica of Rome, 

 and professor of clinical medicine at the Sapienza, took the chair 

 at a recent meeting of the Societa per il Bene Economico di 

 Roma, to consider the means of insuring the success of the Inter- 

 national Medical Congress to be held three years hence in the 

 Eternal City. Among the adjuncts to that congress, as we leant 

 from the Lancet, it was decided to form an international exposi- 

 tion of hygiene in connection with the sanitary department of the 

 progrnmme, and, with that object, to appeal to all the leading 

 industrial and professional centres throughout the peninsula to 

 contribute their best and latest additions to the " Armamentarium 

 Hygienieuni," so as to place Italy at as great an advantage as 

 possible in the inevitable contrast between her own sanitary work 

 and that of the other powers represented on the occasion. Florence,, 

 whicli has hitherto led the van in hygienic progress in Italy, has. 

 already promised her energetic co-operation ; and other cities, like 

 Turin and Milan, are expected to do likewise. Concurrently" 

 with the medical congress, an international exposition of the in- 

 dustries of all nations is also being organized; so that Rome will 

 be the busy scene of quite a gathering of the peoples, on a scale 

 she lias not yet known since she ceased to be mistress of the 

 ^vol•l1 The early summer months (May or the beginning of 

 June), or the early autumn months (the latter half of September 

 or the beginning of October) are likely to be those selected for the 

 medical congress, all risk of malaria at either time being im- 

 f>robab'e. 



Color-Blindness among the Chinese. 



Six hundred men and 600 women were examined by Dr. Thom- 

 son's stick of Berlin wool-tests. In this number, according to 

 y'he Medical Analectic and Epitome, 30 color-blind were met (19 

 men and I woman). Of the 19 men, 13 were completely green- 

 blind, 5 were completely red-blind, and 1 incompletely red-blind t 

 the woman was completely green-blind. The 19 color-blind men 

 were divided thus: 11 farmers, 2 teachers, 1 hospital assistant, 1 

 preacher, 1 mason, 1 boatman. There was almost a universal 

 lack of discrimination between green and blue. The tests were 

 not well adapted for proving what was suspected, — that many 

 Chinese are violet blind. 



Possible Dangers of Hypnotism. 

 As long ago as 1784 some of the dangers of hypnotism were 

 pointed out by De Puysegur, a pupil of Mesmer. The danger to 

 which he referred more" particularly was the criminal use which 



