hand in all domestic emergencies. If there is any American man too "stuck up" to follow this program, he ought to be compelled to support his family at a modern hotel.

The girls should expect to help their mother, to the limit of their time and strength, in all the essential feminine operations of the household. The girls in most American households have a tendency to become the domestic drones; and mothers are too apt to encourage this sort of selfish and squeamish idleness. How many novels are read in American homes to the accompaniment of the patient thud, thud of the mother's iron on the ironing-board! Girls who will do things like that are not worth the starch that goes into their ruffles.

What the American household of to-day needs is less monopoly in housework-more coöperation, or even competition, if you choose; anything to keep the uncomplaining wife and mother from monopolizing all the drudgery. Thousands of families where the mother now finds her only relief from excessive drudgery in enlistment of the green and wasteful servant girl could be delivered from such an exigency by the willing, cheerful, hearty coöperation of all the members of the family in the performance of necessary household tasks. Is the Is the scheme altogether Utopian? If so, why? -James Buckham in The Domestic Science Monthly.

A DOCTOR Once presented himself at the Golden Gates for admission, and after passing a fair examination as to his conduct, St. Peter agreed to permanently admit him if he could pick out Adam and Eve from the assembled angels. The doctor looked around and soon found his progenitors. Peter asked him how in the name of the golden harps he had managed to recognize them. "Oh!" said the doctor, "that is easy; they are the only ones without an umbilicus."

MEDICAL APHORISMS OF JOHANN

GEORG ZIMMERMANN.

JOHANN GEORG ZIMMERMANN, a Swiss who flourished in the latter half of the eighteenth century, was a most versatile genius. A physician by profession, Leibarzt (body physician) to Frederick the Great and to George III., of England, he wrote a great many books on a great many subjects-politics, economics, education and medicine-besides two volumes of memoirs, mostly taken up with a narrative of his relations with Frederick the Great. Of his books, it can be truthfully said that all of them are above mediocrity, and in some of them positive genius is displayed. One of the latter class is his work, "Von der Erfahrung in der Arztneiwissenschaft," in which occur passages that deserve the title of aphorisms-such, for instance, as the following, on how medical reputations are made:

"If," says he, "a reputation is to be manufactured for a physician of no learning or parts, they (the vulgar herd) ascribe every beneficent action of nature, in favor of his patients, to his sole skill and learning, and sing of the marvelous cures that he wrought in this one or that one. If the herd determines to destroy the reputation of some really proficient physician, they call attention, as proofs of his incapacity, to the effects of all natural phenomena hurtful to his patients. Every time that nature cures a patient of the ignorant physician the crowd claim that the result was due entirely to his skill and his knowledge; but every time that natural causes led to the death of one under the care of a true and learned doctor. the same lot swear that 'it was the doctor that killed him.'

"This shows how arbitrary are the dicta of the vulgar, how blind is their malice and how passion rules them, instead of reason. It shows, too, with what ease an imbecile may be raised to the rank of a god, while the true physician is damned."

In the following Johann Georg takes a crack at the critics, who had treated some

"It is not true that a man-whether a plain business man, an officer or a physician who has meditated, and published his thoughts on political subjects, military affairs, strategy, or medicine, must necessarily (from the fact that he is a writer) be a 'mere theorist,' an individual of no practical knowledge or value, nor does the fact that he has no! written a book prove a man, whether a cabinet minister, a generalissimo, or a physician, to be 'practical.'

"He who pretends to be a physician because he is an anatomist, appears to me about as ridiculous as a man, who, because he is acquainted with all the rooms in a house, and all the furniture and articles in these rooms, claims to be able to tell all that is going on in the house.

"Theory should be built on practice, not practice on theory.

"I have known physicians who were neither men of deep learning nor brilliant writers, yet of whom my heart said, 'If I were ill, and had lost all hope of recovery, it is in the arms of one of these that I would die.'"

It is better to fence the precipice at the top than to wait with an ambulance at the bottom.-Ellice Hopkins.

THE world turns aside to let any man pass who knows whither he is going David Starr Jordan.

Still o'er the earth hastes Opportunity, Seeking the hardy soul that seeks for her. Be not abroad, nor deaf with household

cares

That chatter loudest as they mean the least; Swift-willed is thrice-willed; late means never more;

Impatient is her foot, nor turns again.
-Lowell.

MADE BY DR. ALBERT C. BARNES OF PHILADELPHIA.

At the Second Annual Meeting of the American Therapeutic Society, held at Washington, D. C., May 8, 1901.

THE paper of Dr. Reyburn just read merely reiterates the well-known fact that petroleum, when administered internally, is not absorbed from the gastro-intestinal tract, but, as is equally well known, a remedy may have the most pronounced physiologic effects purely on account of its mechanical properties. Dr. Robinson of Philadelphia states in the Medical News of July 14, 1900: "In over fifty selected cases where nutrition, digestion and body weight were impaired and the purest oil administered in one or two dram doses, four times a day for periods of from three to six months, there was in every instance increase in weight and improvement in health, strength and the feeling of well-being. The gain in weight was five and a quarter to twenty-three and a half pounds. There was no other change in living conditions or medication which might have caused these improvements." These clinical effects have been noted and recorded by a number of other observers. The manner in which petroleum accomplishes these results is shown by the laboratory experiments described in detail by the speaker. It was found that the addition of petroleum to albumen digested by an artificial gastric juice under exactly the same conditions as prevail in the human system, very materially hastened and facilitated the process of digestion; it was more rapid and complete than in the same experiment conducted without petroleum. Furthermore, it was shown experimentally that the mechanical influence of petroleum upon the churning, peristaltic movements of the upper portions of the small intestines favorably influenced the processes of absorption. In view of these experiments, it can be safely concluded that the manner in which petroleum

beneficially effects nutrition is by facilitating, expediting and completing the processes of digestion and assimilation of food. Another experiment described by the speaker was that conducted upon a man with marked malnutrition, in which the changes in metabolism were accurately studied for a period of three weeks by feeding the patient upon a normal diet and then determining the daily elimination of nitrogen in the urine and feces. It was found that under the influence of petroleum the retention of nitrogenous matter in the system was increased. As is well known, the only method of determining the influence of any agent upon nutrition is by determining the daily body elimination of nitrogen in the urine and feces; if a patient's retention of nitrogen is increased, the most important element of the tissues is conserved, and nutrition is correspondingly improved. Furthermore, the facts that petroleum passes through the intestines in its original form, and that it is a solvent of many remedies administered for their antiseptic and astringent influence upon the intestines, indicate a useful field for petroleum as a vehicle. Robinson states (ibid.): "I have extensively given from five to ten grains of salol in two drams of this oil, four times a day, and reclaimed the oil from the feces and found it to contain some salol and its components, phenol and salicylic acid. This proves the carrying of a chemical antiseptic and antiferment through the entire canal." This work has been corroborated by numerous other observers. The speaker stated in conclusion that the bulk of experimental and clinical evidence tends to show that petroleum is entitled to a wider field of application in medicine.

In Michigan they assess a dog one dollar for being a dog. In Tennessee they assess a man fifty cents for being a doctor. It costs half a dollar more to be a dog in Michigan than a doctor in Tennessee. Don't be a dog.

TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS.

THE editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association is to be congratulated. He knows how to acknowledge a typographical error, and to get out of it neatly. This is a rare virtue and much more commendable than the cry of the editorial Pharisee, who claims that he makes no errors and who thanks God that he is

not as other men are. A paper devoted to "The Cause, Prevention and Cure of Poverty and Pregnancy" will doubtless excite curiosity until the world reads the editor's graceful announcement that that the author meant "Poverty and Degeneracy." This is not quite so bad an error as the one that occurred in an old edition of the Bible (a copy of which is preserved in the Bodleian Library at Oxford), in which the little word not was left out of the Seventh Commandment. The few rare copies that were preserved when the edition was suppressed, now command a premium among bibliophiles. Perhaps this will yet be so in the case of our contemporary.

The editor who proclaims that he never makes any typographical blunders is on dangerous ground. With his own types he is likely to be condemned. Thus an editor who makes a specialty of being typographically immaculate, recently made one of his contributors speak of "a hemi-anesthesia of the conjunctiva of the arms and body." This was a great stretch for the conjunctiva, but as the editor is an eye-specialist, the world probably accepted the statement as authentic. Again, an author recently wrote a paper on Spinal Cocainization, but the title was printed in large letters by this same editor as Special Cocainization. Such an error is not strictly typographical -it is, rather, an editor's blunder, for an editor should see at a glance that such a title is a misnomer. The Lancet recently spoke of "a sour correspondent" (as some of them really are), when it only meant to say "as our correspondent."

But editors have good precedent in this. field. Disraeli tells us (Curiosities of Lit

erature, Vol. I.) that when Pope Sixtus V. issued his edition of the Vulgate he prefixed to the first volume his bull excommunicating all printers who should make any alterations in the text; but the work was found to be so full errors (although the Pope himself had corrected the proof) that scraps of paper containing the corrections had to be pasted over the errata. This should be a warning to our infallible editors who proclaim constantly that they never make a mistake.

The great trouble that can come from a little misplaced comma was illustrated once in a small New England seaport. A clergyman read a notice from his pulpit that "Captain Jones, going to sea his wife, desires the prayers of the congregation." And so may all editors, going to print, desire the forbearance of their readers.

A DOCTOR in Texas claims that immediate relief from the desire for whiskey can be obtained by dropping a few drops of the tincture of cinchona on the root of the tongue. The common belief of the profession, a few years ago, was that the tincture of red cinchona was a specific to the whiskey habit.

THE BRITISH CONGRESS ON TUBERCULOSIS AND THE PREVENTION OF THE DISEASE.

AT THE final meeting of the Congress held on July 26, the following resolutions were unanimously adopted:

1. Tuberculous sputum is the main agent for the convevance of the virus of tuberculosis from man to man. Indiscriminate spitting should, therefore, be suppressed.

2. All hospitals and dispensaries should present every out-patient with a leaflet on the prevention of consumption, and insist on the use of a pocket spittoon.

3. Notification of tuberculosis should be established, when possible. If compulsory

notification is impracticable, voluntary should be encouraged.

4. The provision of sanatoria is an indispensable part of measures for the diminution of tuberculosis.

5. Medical officers of health should use all their powers and relax no effort to prevent the spread of tuberculosis by milk and meat.

6. In view of the doubts thrown on the identity of human and bovine tuberculosis, the government be requested to institute an inquiry into the subject.

7. The educational efforts of the great national societies for the prevention of tuberculosis are deserving of support.

8. A permanent international committee be appointed to report on the measures for the prevention of tuberculosis in different countries, to publish a popular statement of these measures, and to keep and publish a record of scientific research in relation to the disease.

9. Overcrowding, defective ventilation, and the damp and insanitary dwellings of the working classes diminish the chances of curing consumption and are predisposing causes of the disease.

10. The attention of governments and charitable persons he called to the necessity for establishing antituberculosis dispensaries.

Why not antituberculosis Reservations, as urged in the September Gazette?—Ed. GAZETTE.

CAN CLOTHING CARRY DISEASE?

"THE popular ideas on this subject," says The Hospital, "appear to be much exaggerated. The notion that infection is carried by clothes is held by almost every one, and wonderful tales are told about bits of flannel, old petticoats, and other articles of clothing, which, after being exposed to scarlet fever, have been put away for years, only to set up fresh outbreaks of disease when restored to service. The daily life of every doctor appears to give the lie to any such idea, as a paper read recently by Dr. Doty,

health officer of the port of New York, before the American Public Health Association, would prove:

"As a matter of fact these views are apparently not indorsed by the medical profession both in private practice and in matters relating to public health, inasmuch as physicians daily visit infectious diseases and go from them directly to other patients without disinfection or change of clothing. Moreover, health departments throughout the country permit their inspectors and diagnosticians to visit infectious diseases in the same manner. . . . In families where scarlet fever exists the adult members, who are actively employed outside, are allowed to continue their business without interruption. Of course they are usually admonished not to enter the apartment of the sick when at home, but in a large percentage of cases the patient roams about the house or apartment at will. Therefore, if the clothing worn by well persons were a medium of infection to the extent which is commonly believed, we would certainly and surely have indisputable evidence of it, which we do not.'

"Dr. Doty admits that infection may, in some cases, be transmitted through clothing, but he holds that this does not commonly occur, and that in making regulations for the protection of health we must not give it undue consideration.

.

"We think that on the whole Dr. Doty is right. It is obvious enough that infection by the clothing of 'well people' only rarely occurs, and we take it that in this matter the element of time and the amount of exposure have much to do with the result. We are constantly being asked by nurses, Why all this fuss when the doctor goes in and out without taking any precautions? and if we were to admit the theory of mediate contagion in its extreme degree it must be confessed that no answer would be forthcoming. But we must consider the shortness of the doctor's visit and the comparatively small opportunity of direct infection of his clothes, compared with the prolonged exposure and intimate con

tact with the patient which occurs in the case of the nurse. Still it must be confessed that the possibility of infection being carried by the medical attendant has always been somewhat of a nightmare to us, and although it is a relief to find that Dr. Doty with his undoubtedly extensive experience is able to speak as strongly as he does, from the practical point of view, about the improbability of infection being often carried from case to case in the clothing of 'well persons,' we cannot but feel a certain sympathy with the "walking doctor," or the one who on horseback, or on a cycle, or even in an ordinary "doctor's gig," does at least get some aëration between his cases; and a little doubt about the comfortable person who, in furs and brougham, carries with him little whiffs of sickroom atmosphere from case to case."

CUTTING THE NAILS.

THERE is an old formula for paring the nails that runs as follows:

Cut them on Monday, cut them for

health.

Cut them on Tuesday, cut them for wealth.

Cut them on Wednesday, cut for a letter. Cut them on Thursday, for something better.

Cut them on Friday, you cut for a wife. Cut them on Saturday, cut for long life. Cut them on Sunday, you cut them for

evil.

For all of that week you'll be ruled by the devil.

Believe the adage or not as you will, but on whichever day you cut your nails let them at least be cut in the right way. They should each be pared off in one long slice, if possible, not in "chips." Special curved scissors are sold which enable us to cut our nails in long strips quite easily. Before the nails are cut they should be soaked in hot water until they are soft and pliable. this mood they can be cut and trimmed to better advantage than when they are hard.