CORRESPONDENCE. 
443 
materially aided by an article that appeared in the last number of 
the Review, notwithstanding the fact that the M.R.C.V.S. who 
contributes the report referred to, proves that he possesses abilities 
not usually found among veterinary surgeons educated in 
America. 
The anatomy I was taught while at college must be at fault, 
for the gentleman reports a case of an “incised wound of the 
metacarpus,” (presumably metacarpal region), which was deep 
enough to enable him to lay “ two fingers between the bone and 
the tendons touching the integument upon the opposite side.” 
Interesting certainly, but how can he account for the absence of 
the superior suspensor ligament which is generally supposed to be 
situated upon the post face of the metacarpus? 
A few lines further on we are informed that one half drachm 
of chloral hydrate was administered to quiet a very excitable 
animal. Is it possible that European education has some influence 
over the physiological or thereupeutic action of medicines ? 
Presumably so, for although Dunn in the latest edition of his 
Veterinary Medicines gives from 5 i to §ii of chloral hydrate as 
the dose, aDd while I am not aware of its having been ever used 
before in America in smaller quantities than 3 ii, it would in this 
case appear to have had the desired effect. It is a pity that a 
similar result cannot be obtained by the majority of practitioners. 
But in nothing is the distinction between the graduates of the 
two continents so markedly manifest as in surgery. Mr. Plageman 
applied a tourniquet to control the haemorrhage while the meta- 
carpel artery was being ligated, and this having been done, allowed 
the tourniquet to remain without being slackened for twenty-four 
hours; nay, still more heroic, reapplied it for thirty-six hours to 
control “a slight continuous haemorrhage!” 
By what symptom was such treatment indicated ? 
There are other points of interest in the report of this case 
teaching me to look with still greater pride to an American 
school as my alma mater. 
Respectfully, 
Nemo, 
