EDITORIAL 
257 
EDITORIAL. 
Amongst the progress made for the last few years in the 
appliances for the diagnosis and prognosis of disease, the applica¬ 
tion of the thremometer must take a first rank. 
Indeed, it is only a few years since, that the use of this in¬ 
strument by physicians first, and afterwards by veterinarians, was 
called into extensive and general practice. 
American veterinarians were not the last to see the benefits to 
be derived by the use of this little instrument, and though many 
old practitioners smiled at the idea of the new toy , as some called 
it, it soon became, in the hands of the conscientious observer, an 
excellent means of assistance, and it soon was found, that both the 
practictioner, as well as the student, could scarcely do without 
their thermometer. 
True, its use has been overstretched and often misplaced, 
specially by young practitioners, who in many instances no doubt, 
have applied it when there was no need for it, and many young 
graduates will remember forgetting it in the cavity where it was 
placed, and when returning to find it in the bedding or amongst 
frnces broken in many pieces; but with all that the thermometer 
has established its place in the general practice of medicine, and 
to-day it is rare to read a report of a case without careful observa¬ 
tions of the temperature. 
We give our readers in this number of the Review the begin¬ 
ning of an article on thermometry, translated from the French by 
Mr. G. A. Banham, M.B.C.V.S., who is now completing his 
studies in Germany, and also a copy of the table which is used 
by many practitioners to record the variations which are to be 
noticed during a disease. These tables can be printed and bound 
in book form, and thus careful record be kept. As it is yet a 
new study, much remains to be done in the history of the ap¬ 
plication of the thermometer, and every veterinarian may in his 
own practice help to build up positive data which, every one will 
