EDITORIAL OBSERVATIONS. 
407 
explained either by lecture or otherwise. We contend that 
the medical practitioner ought not to be altogether igno¬ 
rant of these things. If the Veterinary Surgeon has not 
made toxicology his study, how would he be able to act 
when called to a case of } oisoning, the deleterious agent 
being ascertained, or at any rate more than suspected? 
Unacquainted with the counter-agent necessary to prevent 
its influence on the system, the animal dies; whereas, had 
the antidote been timely given, such a result would not 
have taken place. All hap-hazard and guess-work here, it 
need not be said, is of little use; sometimes, indeed, it is 
prejudicial, while at all times it gives proof of the lack of 
scientific education. We say nothing of the conclusion that 
is too often “jumped at,” when the symptoms are both 
unusual and urgent, and when, likewise, there is an absence 
of those lesions in the tissues or organs, by which the action 
of poisons is commonly recognised. 
This does not, however, apply alone to the Veterinary 
Surgeon; the practitioner of human medicine has to con¬ 
tend against the same, and whole communities often become 
thus erroneously and morbidly impressed, as history abun¬ 
dantly records. Of course the most searching and careful 
analyses of the chemist are here altogether futile, since it is 
mere suspicion, and has no basis in truth. Suspected 
poisoning, we fear, is frequently only a scapegoat for igno¬ 
rance. 
In poisoning not only are the lesions produced charac¬ 
teristic, but there are certain unmistakeable signs indicative 
of their action during life, with which the practitioner should 
be familiar, and these alone can be known by having devoted 
some portion of his time to the study of this important 
subject. 
We have been induced to write thus much as prefatory to 
a new mode of chemical analysis, recently discovered by 
T. Graham, Esq., F.R.S., and designated by him “Liquid 
Diffusion applied to Analysis,” an account of which appears 
in the ‘Transactions of the Royal Society for 1861.' The appa¬ 
ratus is called by him ‘ The Dialyser, 1 and consists, according 
to Mr. Griffin's description, of a species of sieve, having gutta 
