XX President's Address 



under certain conditions, and I have no doubt it will still be 

 resorted to in nearly every case of snake bite where the life 

 seems in imminent danger. The question naturally sug- 

 gests itself in every case that survives after the treat- 

 ment b}^ ammonia, " Would death have occurred without 

 it ?" This, of course, cannot be proved ; but the same may 

 be said of all remedies used in medicine or surgery. There 

 can be no doubt, from what transpired at these discussions, 

 that in many cases treated with ammonia the patient was 

 poisoned with alcohol ; but who shall say whether the snake 

 or alcohol poison was killing ? and if ammonia wiU save 

 from both, so much the better. However important the 

 intravenous injection of ammonia may be considered in the 

 treatment of snake poison, I think its value as a therapeutic 

 agent in other cases of endangered human life, as shown by 

 some of the collateral evidence given in the discussions 

 referred to, gives broader significance to the whole question 

 than was apparently involved in the late experiments and 

 controversy; and it is to be hoped that both Professor 

 Halford and other of our medical men will extend their 

 investigations and experiments, not only with the view to 

 obtain a more precise idea of the modus operandi of this 

 and other agents introduced directly into the circulation, but 

 also with the view of thoroughly testing the value of this 

 method of applying remedies in urgent cases. The com- 

 para,tively modern method of endermic injection has become 

 an inestimable blessing to suffering humanity, and enables 

 the physician and surgeon to confidently use remedies which, 

 administered in the ordinary way to enter the system by 

 digestion, often only afforded relief at the expense of after- 

 exhaustion of vital powers. If, therefore, further investiga- 

 tion should prove that the intravenous injection of remedies 

 can be as safely and as advantageously used in some cases 

 as the hypodermic injection is in others, it will constitute 



