80 
PROCEEDINGS OF THE SCIENTIFIC ASSOCIATION. 
We may congratulate ourselves that the Association has at 
last obtained some standing in respect to the publication of 
its papers. We have decided to publish our papers, to- 
gether with a detail of the proceedings at the Meetings 
and Notices of Scientific Memoirs published elsewhere, in 
the form of a half-yearly Journal, of which the first number 
is already in your hands. 
The first paper contained in the Journal is one by Dr. 
Mitchell on the Use of Sulphites in Medicine. As Dr. 
Mitchell has brought forward a subject which cannot but 
be of interest to all who value health in this island, having 
reference as it does to the proper remedies for the peculiar 
diseases of a tropical climate, I shall introduce some re- 
marks on investigations of a similar tendency which have 
been made elsewhere. We learn from the researches of 
Dr. Salisbury in the United States that it is highly proba- 
ble that intermittent fever is caused by the action on the 
system of microscopic vegetables which have their origin in 
swamps, (and particularly in those swamps it would seem 
which are formed by an admixture of fresh and salt water *■). 
But it is further interesting on this point to notice the in- 
vestigations made by Dr. Wood of Philadelphia, who has 
found that the air of large towns has a remarkable effect in 
destroying miasmata. It is suggested that the amount of 
combustion may be the cause. Of the fact itself we have 
some confirmation in the observations of M. de Tournon, 
Prefect of Pome at the commencement of the present cen- 
tury!, which have been brought forward by Dr. A. Tripier 
of Paris. According to these observations the liability of a 
*De Vert'euil, Trinidad, p. 152. 
t Etudes Statistiques sur Rome et la partie occidentale dcs Etats 
Romains. Paris. 
