44  Editorial  Notes  and  Comments.  {A7anuary,Pi902rm' 
In  this  connection  a  note  on  tetanus  as  a  possible  complication  in 
vaccination  might  be  considered.  Cases  of  this  nature  have  arisen 
quite  frequently  this  Winter  in  Camden,  N.  J.,  "  where  the  compli- 
cations were  more  extensive  than  anywhere  else  in  the  history  of 
vaccination."  The  true  cause  of  these  cases  of  tetanus  was  not 
due,  as  many  supposed,  to  the  contamination  of  the  vaccine  virus 
and  consequent  infection  of  the  wound  but  to  the  infection  of  the 
wound  by  the  patient  from  several  possible  sources,  namely:  under- 
clothing, uncleanliness  in  general,  especially  of  bandages  and  sur- 
rounding flesh ;  air,  water  which  may  have  been  used  in  cleansing 
the  wound,  or  it  may  have  come  from  the  unclean  instruments  of 
the  physician,  or  improper  cleansing  of  the  inoculating  area. 
It  must  be  remembered  that  the  possibilities  of  infection  from 
vaccine  virus  are  remote  in  these  days  of  asepsis  and  antiseptics, 
also  that  a  case  of  tetanus  in  a  calf  is  a  rarity. 
The  preventive  measures  presenting  themselves  in  this  connection 
might  be  summed  up  as  follows : 
First,  that  the  point  of  inoculation  must  be  perfectly  clean  (chem- 
ically and  bacteriologically). 
Second,  that  the  instruments  used  in  making  the  scarifications 
must  be  sterile. 
Third,  that  the  inoculated  area  must  be  protected  by  a  sterile 
shield  and  not  a  germ-loaded  bandage. 
W.  S.  Weakley. 
EDITORIAL  NOTES  AND  COMMENTS. 
TO  MARK  DR.  CHARLES  RICE'S  GRAVE. 
The  editor  of  the  Pharmaceutical  Review  (January)  calls  attention 
to  the  fact  that  the  grave  of  Dr.  Rice  is  without  a  suitable  tablet 
to  mark  it,  and  suggests  that,  "  under  the  circumstances,  it 
is  the  duty  of  the  representatives  of  American  pharmacy  to  see 
that  the  spot  where  the  earthly  remains  of  Dr.  Rice  rest,  be  marked 
at  least  in  a  modest  way.  A  granite  boulder  carried  by  glacier 
from  a  distant  state  to  New  York,  no  one  knowing  its  exact  home, 
would  seem  a  fitting  monument  to  the  deceased ;  a  brightly  polished 
surface  with  his  assumed  name,  by  which  the  pharmaceutical  world 
knows  him,  with  the  date  of  his  death,  a  fitting  inscription.  Let 
us  honor  the  man  and  his  memory,  but  let  us  do  it  in  a  way  that 
would  gratify  him.    The  unassuming  man  who  seems  ever  to  have 
