son. The number of graduates will be between sixty and seventy. Next month the Journal will contain the list of questions asked the candidates for graduation-it will be remembered that this Institution has for some years pursued the plan of written instead of oral examinations and also, we hope, Prof. Graham's address.

ARRANGEMENTS are being made, and will be completed in time to be announced in our April issue, for conveyance on some first class Mississippi steamer of those desiring to attend the meeting in New Orleans next May, of the American Medical Association. At present we can only announce that the time from Cairo to New Orleans will not exceed four days, and the fare, going and returning included, will not be more than thirty-five dollars. Our friend, Dr. Hibberd, has the matter in charge, and it could not be in better hands.

THE LATE Dr. Addison, (A Collection of the Published Writings of the late Thos. Addison, M. D., Physician to Guy's Hospital, Sydenham Society's Publications, London, 1868), concluded an article on the Diseases of Females connected with Uterine Irritation, thus:

"But, gentlemen, if you really require an apology for detaining you so long, I find ample material for that apology in the lively interest which we must all feel in the comfort and happiness of the other sex, doomed as they are, both by the decrees of Providence and by human institutions, to drink deep of the bitter cup of suffering. Whatever may be her lot in this world, we, as men, must at least acknowledge that whilst Infinite power gave us being, Infinite mercy gave us woman.'

This extract from a paper-(it was originally prepared as a clinical lecture a paper that will especially delight the venerable Dr. Hodge, for so much of it is in correspondence with what he has taught in his own lectures and writings), we give partly as an answer to a criticism which was made by a most competent critic upon some of our own expressions as to the special interest and importance of the study of diseases of women.

THE BRITISH AND FOREIGN Medico-Chirurgical Review, January, 1869, is not at all complimentary in its notice of Thomas on Diseases of Females:

"Thomas' work on the diseases of women is simply a compilation. The surgery, illustrations as well as matter for the text, taken from Sims, the medicine and pathology from various well-known authors. Like all books of the kind, its real practical use is limited to giving the student some superficial information, acting as a kind of hand-post pointing out the direction which must be taken to arrive at real knowledge.”

Now this is unjust. Dr. Thomas has written on many surgical diseases of women upon which Dr. Sims has never written a line, nor are his medicine and pathology exclusively derived from various wellknown authors, and we must regard the book as an excellent compend, and, in some respects, in advance of any similar work from an American pen.

EXSECTION OF THE KNEE-JOINT, IN 1825.-(In the Lancet, January 8th, 1825, there is quite a racy sketch of the late Mr. Crampton given, and in the course of it the author refers in the severest terms to an operation performed by Mr. C., which is now established as perfectly judicious.)

He invariably performs the numerous experiments that are daily put forward in the world for well-known purposes, but which are very often nurtured in ignorance and propagated by credulity. While we profess ourselves the ardent admirers of rational experiment, we shall never countenance, by a concealment of our feelings, an innovation which would give one moment's pain to a fellow creature, without a well-grounded prospect of ameliorating his condition.

We happened to be present, some time back, at one of those scenes of scientific butchery at the Meath Hospital. The patient was a female; the complaint, if we recollect rightly, open scrofula of the kneejoint. A great concourse assembled to witness the operation: it was quite a gala day with the dissectors-a festival, seemingly, held in honor of the virtues of "Steel." It was the first time, we believe, that the removal of the knee-joint was attempted here; we earnestly hope it will be the last. The operator, of course, accomplished his purpose with his usual dexterity. But could he have beheld, as we did, the contorted countenances of the spectators, the knife would have fallen from his hand, never to be resumed where it was not more imperiously indicated. To be present was indeed to be in torture. One man vented his feelings in a wink; a second in a hem; a third overcame his sympathies in a forced fit of langhter; a fourth put his fingers in his ears to shut out the wretch's screams; all, to be sure, admired, yet all disapproved; and before the performance was entirely finished, Colles cried out, in rather an audible tone, *" by J-s!"-drew the door after him, and vanished. We saw this poor creature a long time after, endeavoring to drag her limb with her, by means of sundry wooden contrivances. How much more preferable would amputation have been in this ease? A wooden leg to a useless member, kept from falling asunder by bandages and splints. And, forsooth, this is called cleverness! admirable surgery! Very well, let it be called by whatever name the sanguinary desperadoes of the profession choose, but we shall never be cheated out of our judgment, or fear to expose such practice when it falls under our observation.

*Colles was as famous for this oath as a late President of the United States for "By the Eternal," or as a noted New York obstetrician is for “By Jove."

IT PAINS US to announce the death of Dr. William Hays, of Covington, Kentucky. Dr. H. had been a contributor to this journal, and he was one of its warm friends. Only a short time before his untimely death, we received a most kind and encouraging letter from him. Personal acquaintance with him, though not intimate, led us to appreciate him highly. We regret that the action of the Covington profession, in reference to their late associate, which ought to have been received ere this, has, so far, failed to reach us; we hope, however, it will appear in our next issue.

THE NEW YORK Medical Gazette, after being in a state of suspended animation for several weeks, makes its appearance again, and is sprightly and vigorous as ever. We hope it will meet with liberal patronage.

BARON ANSELM DE ROTHSCHILD has given the sum of two hundred thousand florins for the erection of an hospital for Jews, to contain one hundred beds, in Vienna.

MORTALITY FROM SNAKE BITES IN INDIA.-It appears from the Oude Administration Report, that during the past year, one thousand, one hundred and twenty-seven persons died from the effects of snake bites in that province; and from the Central Provinces Administration Report, that one thousand, eight hundred and seventy-four deaths had occurred in them from the same cause, during the three preceding years.

THE Neue Presse states that eleven men and three women died in Ickutsk, in 1867, all of whom were over one hundred years old; of these, six are said to have been over one hundred and ten, one being one hundred and twenty-six, and another one hundred and thirty-one years of age.

IN REFERENCE to the failure of the attack lately made on the fac ulty of Paris, by the Bishops, Ricord is said to have remarked that it was an evidence of mitral insufficiency.

WANTED-A few copies of the Cincinnati Journal of Medicine, for February, 1866, and of the Western Journal for April, 1868.

FOR SALE. An order for an artificial limb.

WE CALL attentiou to the advertisement of Practice for Sale-an excellent opportunity for a physician with a little capital and some experience.

THE WESTERN JOURNAL OF MEDICINE,

(Formerly, "CINCINNATI JOURNAL OF MEDICINE.")

Thus it will be seen that if man has passions which impel him to the destruction of man, if he be the only animal who, despising his natural means of attack and defence, has devised new means of destruction, he is also the only animal who has the desire, or the power, to relieve the sufferings of his fellow citizens, and in whom the co-existence of reason and benevolence attesta a moral as well as an intellectual superiority.-GRAVES' CLINICAL MEDICINE.

VOL. IV.

INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1869.

No. IV.

ADDRESS BY THE HON. WM. M. DICKSON, AT THE ANNUAL COMMENCEMENT OF THE MEDICAL COLLEGE OF OHIO, MARCH 1, 1869.

GENTLEMEN: It has been customary upon these occasions, for the President of the Board of Trustees to address a few words of congratulation and advice to the graduating class. Perhaps it is a custom that were better broken than observed; yet homilies and platitudes. have their uses, and a kind word from your Alma Mater may make your separation the more agreeable.

The profession you have chosen opens to you a wide field of usefulness. More than either of the others, is it allied to, and connected with that which particularly marks the age in which we live.

pro

The law can not, in our time, claim any particular preeminence over the past. It is a question whether we have made any real gress-whether, indeed, our law, as a system of remedial jurisprudence and a rule of property, equals that of the old Roman law. Nor in the domain of theology, have we any to equal the great names of the past. Even in metaphysics, modern speculations it is said are but chips knocked off the original granite rock of Plato.

In the department, however, of experimental science, our age is specially distinguished. In this, the ancients made comparatively little progress. Cicero writes that "the investigation of nature either

seeks after things which nobody can know, or after such things as nobody needs to know."

Now, to this department of knowledge, your profession is closely related. To it mainly, in certain branches, must our country look for the maintenance of its rank among the nations, in the generous rivalry of the developments of science. For example: Your profession involves a knowledge of chemistry and its kindred subjects, electricity, magnetism, &c. These introduce you to investigations, in which the greatest results have been reached, and the end is yet afar off. Almost while we are speaking, in the wonderful revelations of the spectroscope, we have a striking illustration of the kinship and inter-dependence of the sciences. With the vapors of chemistry and the spectrum of optics are revealed the constituent elements of the heavenly bodies; and thus the boundaries of astronomical science are enlarged. Nor have these discoveries been a thing of chance, but the result of intelligent, well directed effort.

By a happy coincidence, the investigations of the Frenchman, Janssen, made in India, and those of the Englishman, Lockyer, made in England, were crowned with success at about the same time, each independently making the same discovery-the nature of the red flames. of the solar eclipse. Nor did the coincidence stop here. M. De LaRue had scarcely finished the announcement of Lockyer's discovery to the French Academy, when French patriotism was gratified by the reception of Janssen's letter announcing his own independent discovery of the same thing.

To come more closely to your own profession. A French chemist discovers chloroform, and the inquiring genius of a Scotch physician utilizes it in the discovery of its anæsthetic properties. Thus one discovery prepares the way and leads to another. This fact is also illustrated in the progressive discoveries in electricity and magnetism, utilized in the invention of the telegraph.

Again. Your profession requires a knowledge of anatomy, physiology and zoology. These bring you into close connection with the inquiries now pressed with unwonted zeal and almost startling results in the departments of comparative anatomy, pre-historic archæology, biology, involving the questions of "the origin of species," and "man's place in nature." These inquiries relate to the most hidden things in nature, yet of surpassing interest. For "to search out the whence and whither of existence, is an unquenchable instinct of the human mind." But I will not detain you longer on these matters.