482 EASTERN COUNTIES VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 
less frequent and less severe, and especially if the case continues 
over the ninth day ; hut even now we must not expect a cure to be 
effected at once; the strength of the patient and the patience of 
the surgeon have to undergo a severe ordeal before this desirable 
result is attained, and from three to six weeks may be considered as 
the ordinary period of convalescence. The above remarks will 
assist us in arriving at a correct prognosis in the majority of cases, I 
fullv believe ; but, on the other hand, it must be borne in mind that 
instances are recorded in M’hich the patient has succumbed so late 
as the fourth week, and also where ten weeks have been occupied in 
effecting recovery. That these are exceptional cases I am ready to 
admit, but they are not the less valuable, and it may be that they 
are of more interest to us as practitioners on that very account. In 
general terms, then, as regards tetanus, we opine that recovery may 
be hoped for after the first week, expected after the second week, 
and confidently predicted after the third week has elapsed. 
Treatment .—The radical change which has been effected in modern 
times in the treatment of disease is probably in no instance more 
marked nor attended with happier results than in the treatment of 
tetanus, which until recently was included in the category of 
incurable diseases, inasmuch as every system of treatment that skill 
could devise or science suggest was found in too many instances 
unable either to mitigate the symptoms or to reduce the fatality ; 
nay, it is rather to be feared that too frequently the former were 
greatly aggravated, and, as a consequence, the latter increased, just in 
proportion as the treatment was adhered to and rigidly enforced, so 
that it becomes a serious question, and one by no means easy to 
decide, whether the greater number of deaths was referable to 
the disease or the system of treatment by which its removal was 
attempted. Many thoughtful men have charged it to the treatment, 
which in general terms may be said to have consisted of bleeding, 
blistering, and physic, the evil consequences of which they denounced 
with unmitigated severity, and which ought no longer to be tolerated, 
much less perpetuated, by the members of our profession. To 
remedy this evil various theories have been propounded, systems 
recommended, and therapeutic agents employed, each of which have 
their advocates and are more or less deserving a passing notice 
here. 1st. Allopathy. 2nd. Homoeopathy. 3rd. Hydropathy. 
And 4th. What may, perhaps, in contradistinction to those already 
named, be termed the negative system of treatment. The allopathic 
system, which until recently was represented by blisters, bleeding, 
and physic for the treatment of tetatuis, is by no means to be under¬ 
stood as correctly interpreting the views of allopathic practitioners 
of the present day, by whom it is generally admitted to be fallacious 
in principle, inadmissible in practice, and injurious in its results; 
and although sanctioned by the usage of at least two generations, 
and rendered venerable by tradition, this is the inevitable con¬ 
clusion at which we shall arrive after a few moments’ calm reflection. 
It has been said that extremes not unfrequently meet, and probably 
this truism is nowhere more palpable than in medicine, where its 
