EDITORIAL. 
r>ua 
prophylactic precautions ignored by the children. What was the 
cause ? Recent researches which had been published on the scep- 
ticity of the perspiration of the hands and the sudoral effect upon 
surgical wounds by the surgeon’s hands, Dr. Piery thought to 
investigate the possible virulency of the perspiration of tubercu¬ 
lous subjects, as being possibly the reason to explain the fre¬ 
quency of the conjugal infection. 
From his investigations and experiments he was brought to 
very important conclusions, amongst which are: that the per¬ 
spiration (pure and free from any extensive contamination) is 
virulent and contains the bacillus of tuberculosis. This virulency 
has been observed in 30 to 76 per cent, (say 4 out of 9 cases) 
amongst tuberculosis affected with surg'ical lesions, tuberculous 
rheumatisms, peritonitis, etc.; in other words, with positively 
closed or slowly developing lesions. 
The perspiration may even oftener, say 41 to 66 per cent, of 
the cases, be the vehicle of the bacillus of Koch, and then an 
agent of contagion, either by direct contact or again by an in¬ 
direct way, such as by soiled cloth. 
This contagious power of the perspiration will impose im¬ 
portant measures of disinfection which will have to be added to 
those already known. 
The observation of this mode of contagion, new I may say, 
may not have in veterinary medicine the same importance that it 
offers in human medicine, and yet deserves our attention. 
» 
* 
* 
Tincture of Iodine and Digestive Functions. —Since a 
short time tincture of iodine as a special therapeutic agent has 
been the subject of much writing in medical and veterinary pe¬ 
riodicals. Without recalling ag*ain, its great antiseptic proper¬ 
ties and the great service that it can render in surgery, whether 
when it is employed in local applications to disinfect the skin or 
again in the treatment of wounds of all kinds where it has proved 
itself one of the best preparations to stimulate the repairing 
process of tissues and hasten the work of cicatrization, it is evi- 
