NEW FORM OF ACTUAL CAUTERY. 
317 
dates no further back than 1736. His words are — “ In the 
above year, however, a property of it was discovered by ac- 
cident, as usual, which rendered it an object of more atten- 
tion. John Belchier, an English surgeon, having dined with 
a cotton-printer, observed that the bones of the pork which 
was brought to the table were red. As he seemed surprised 
at the circumstance, his host assured him that the redness 
was occasioned by the swine feeding on the water, mixed with 
bran, in which the cotton cloth was boiled, and which was 
coloured by the madder used in printing it. Belchier, to 
whom this effect was new, convinced himself by experiments 
that the red colour of the bones had arisen from the madder 
employed in printing the cotton, and from no other cause.” 
He communicated his observations to the Royal Society, and 
they are printed in their f Transactions. 3 
NEW FORM OF ACTUAL CAUTERY. 
M. Bonnafond, who is strongly persuaded of the excel- 
lence of the actual cautery as a means of treatment, has 
endeavoured to obviate some of the inconveniences of its 
application. To this end he has invented the following 
caustic, which burns slowly, and admirably replaces the 
actual cautery when the cauterisation is not required to act 
very deeply, or to be made on a very wet surface. Dissolve 
five parts of gum tragacanth in a sufficiency of water, facili- 
tating the solution by adding a little sugar, and rendering it 
as concentrated as possible. Then add gradually fifteen 
parts of vegetable charcoal, and two of nitrate of potass, and 
thus form a homogeneous paste capable of being rolled into 
cylinders of various sizes. These must be well dried, and 
when wanted for use may be lighted either by a candle or the 
fire. The eschar is usually detached in five or six days. 
Latterly, M. Bonnafond has used a mixture of the gum and 
charcoal without the potass . — Medical Times and Gazette . 
MULBERRY RENAL CALCULI PROM THE HORSE. 
At a late meeting of the Pathological Society, Dr. Gibb 
showed to the members three perfect specimens of this form 
of calculus taken from the kidney of three different horses 
dying of chronic disease : thus, one died of pulmonary 
