688 
Analyses of Books. 
[November, 
A New Departure in Medical Electricity. By S. A, Mortimore 
Foote. Morton and Burt, Printers, Edgware Road. 
From this little work we' extradt the following passage : — “ I 
assert that Electricity acting on flesh deprived of blood or fluid 
is a deadly poison. This is a very strong statement. Bring it to 
the test of experiment. Nothing is easier. The writer would 
not dare to try it on his own person, so confident is he that the 
statement is perfectly true. Pass a piece of tape or string round 
a finger so as to press backwards all the fluids in the vessels. 
Then apply to the bloodless flesh a very feeble current, say from 
one cell, for a fradlion of a second, and note the blood poisoning 
that ensues, and I venture to assert it will not invite repetition. 
Mind, this is not a theory. Everyone can test it at his own cost. 
This I claim as my great discovery .” (The italics are the 
author’s own.) 
We are not going, in comment, to assert what might or 
might not be the consequence of applying an eledlric current to 
“ flesh deprived of blood or fluid.” We have never made the 
experiment. Nor would it be at all easy. A ligature applied to 
the finger greatly checks the circulation, but it does not expel 
the fluids from the vessels. If the author doubts this statement 
let him tie a tape tightly round a finger, and then plunge a needle 
into the flesh below the ligature. He will find that it is by no 
means <c deprived of blood or fluid.” We do not give any opinion 
as to the results of applying an eledtric current to the extremity 
of a finger thus tied. They may possibly be disastrous ; but in 
any case they cannot be due to the absence of fluid. 
Mr. Foote’s contention that eledlricity is often ignorantly ap- 
plied no one can gainsay. The medical eledfrician is too often 
a quack of a very dangerous grade, and, if not altogether igno- 
rant of eledtrical science, is often utterly unacquainted with 
physiology. 
