of the normal diet that they can not be entirely excluded without disastrous results. A patient on strict proteid diet will rapidly fail in health, strength, and weight, and develop acidosis to such an extent that death will occur sooner than if he were allowed an unrestricted diet. Dieting never cured diabetes, nor is the percentage of cures very large under any treatment yet found. But with moderate care, when glycosuria appears after fifty years of age, the patient may live out his threescore years and ten. In fact, it is not unusual to find sugar in the urine of the aged even to four

score.

When glycosuria comes up from nerve or liver trouble, there is some probability of eliminating the sugar from the urine, at times permanently; but when due to pancreatic lesions the case seems hopeless. This form of diabetes mellitus is the most severe, the most intractable, and the most rapidly fatal, the patient rarely living more than two years.

A diagnosis may be easily made in fat diabetes mellitus, but it is exceedingly difficult to determine at times between the other forms. However, the rapid progress, the severity of the symptoms, and the futility of treatment will lead us to suspect a pancreatic lesion and the destruction of the islands of Langerhans; while the slow progress, the absence of alarming symptoms, and the generally good condition of the patient will indicate that the affection is of hepatic origin, or perhaps due to a nervous complication of some kind.

Four cases here reported are offered more in the light of an experimental nature. Whether the treatment given is of any permanent value remains for the most part to be proven.

CASE I.-Minister, aged seventy-nine. Came under notice about one year ago. The percentage of sugar at that time was from 7 to 8 per cent, varying. The prescription was: R Specific medicine avena, specific medicine chionanthus, cascara cordial, tr. cinchona comp., aa 3j. M. Sig. Dose, teaspoonful before meals. In addition, the patient was given a four-grain chromine tablet after meals. The sugar disappeared from the urine in about three months, and has not since reappeared-about nine months.

CASE II.-Female, aged sixty-five. Had been treated for diabetes mellitus for two years, and had doubtless improved to some. extent. Upon examination, the urine showed 3 per cent sugar.

After six months' treatment with the above remedies her urine was sugar-free and has so remained for six months.

CASE III.—Male, aged fifty-six, with 2 per cent sugar. Well nourished and apparently in good health. He was led to seek medical advice on account of frequent and profuse urination. In ninety days, with similar treatment, the urine cleared up, and there has been no more glycosuria.

In the fourth case, a female aged sixty-one, the results were identical.

A study of these cases and the results of the treatment would rather suggest that they are of hepatic origin.

Two other cases were not benefited in the least by the above prescription. In one of them the urine in the beginning contained 8 per cent sugar. After sixty days' treatment the percentage had increased to 12 per cent. In the other the sugar content did not increase, nor after three months' treatment did it diminish, so the remedies were abandoned.-Ohio State Association Transactions in Eclectic Medical Journal.

EQUISETUM HYEMALE-SCOURING RUSH.

BY JOHN W. FYFE, M. D., SAUGATUCK, CONN.

This perennial plant has been used in medicine for many years, but it has not received the attention and study of which it seems worthy. In suppression of urine equisetum has often been employed with gratifying results, and in irritability of the surfaces of the urinary tract, especially when associated with painful sensations after urinating, it constitutes a medicament of unmistakable corrective power. In dropsical conditions it is frequently indicated, and Dr. F. P. Sinclair, of Lysander, N. Y., has found it a very efficient remedy in the treatment of prostatitis.

The following are prominent among the indications for equisetum thus far obtained from reliable sources: Stinging pain in the glans penis; teasing pain in the base of the bladder and prostate, and anxious, irritable state of the nervous system; suppression of urine.

The dose of specific equisetum is from 5 to 10 drops in water every two to six hours.-The Eclectic Review.

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Alum.-Van Helmont was the first physician to use alum in uterine hemorrhage. This made his reputation.-Critic and Guide.

Pyorrhea Alveolaris. This painful condition may lead to gingival suppuration. Injection of absolute alcohol (or 95 per cent) may give instant relief from the almost unendurable aching. Lysol injected transversely through the gums in the direction of the root of the tooth as it emerges from the alveolar socket may act magically, and causes the pyogenic material to be put in check. -Medical Times.

Scarlet Red in Treatment of Aseptic Ulcers.-The Therapeutic Gazette, June 15, 1911, recommends this treatment. From other sources, notably students in Germany and in Johns Hopkins, we are receiving favorable comment. The chemic formula is that of a sodium salt derivative of disulphonic acid, discovered in 1882, and receiving favorable reports in 1906. An 8 per cent ointment is employed.-Medical Times.

Pasteur's Birthplace at Dole has become a place of pilgrimage for the people in the neighboring departments, who go to contemplate the modest dwelling where, on December 27, 1822, one of the very greatest scientists of modern times was born. The Municipal Council has purchased the house, for which, up to the end of his life, Pasteur ever showed the greatest affection, and which he every year visited.-Medical Times.

Hot Oil for Sterilizing Instruments.-Conradi, in the Pacific Pharmacist, calls attention to hot oil as the most certain means of destroying all germ life on instruments and catheters; it is much more effectual than boiling water. The vessel holding the oil is heated to 200° C. or over, and then set in a vessel of cold water to cool, and the instruments are soon ready for use, without the possibility of harm, while the hands are lubricated with the oil, but not rendered slippery. As the boiling point of oil is above 300° C., there is no loss of oil below this, and the supply can be used over and over again for the purpose.

Fruits in the Diet. This truly magistral essay by Marcel Labbe, in the Paris Medical, 10 June, 1911, opens with a study of the qualities and kinds of fruit, which are divided as: 1. aqueous acidulous; 2. sweet, either moist or dry; 3. oily, fatty or starchy. This, says Labbe, is the schema of Prof. A. Gautier, while in culinary art there are recognized four red fruits: the strawberry, the cherry, the red-currant, and raspberry; aud four yellow, as, the orange, the lemon, Spanish or Seville orange, and citron or lime.

1. The aqueous acidulous fruits are many: plums, pears, grapes, apples, red-currants, lemons, limes, citrons, oranges, strawberries, melons (here the writer placed bananas: we would class the banana anywhere else).

This group is composed of proteid as albumin from 0.25 to 1.5 grams per 100. Fat about 1 per cent of total weight. Water constitutes their bulk, and the sugar may amount to 25 per cent, as in grapes, while in citrons it is as low as 1 per cent.

Gums are present and exercise a favorable action upon the respiratory mucosa. Dates, jujubes, figs and raisins are in the group of gum-bearing fruits.

The cellulose is indigestible.

Acids are found. Malic, citric and tartaric, united with potassium. This causes the sour taste of a fruit, and its diuretic action.

Minerals, such as potassium, act as tissue activators, heart stimulants and diuretics, while manganese acts as a fermentative accelerator, and is present in lemons, limes and grapes. Iron is found in strawberries and in some grapes. Iodin exists in grapes, according to Gautier and Bourcet.

The dry and sugary fruits, such as dates, figs, prunes and raisins, contain often 80 per cent sugar.

The oleaginous fruits are: almonds, nuts, olives, chestnuts, walnuts, hazelnuts, and contain 16 to 24 per cent albuminous matter and about 54 to 62 per cent of lipoids or fatty derivatives. They have about 15 per cent carbohydrate elements. The chestnut contains 40 per cent starch.-The Medical Times.

The Adrenals regulate and inhibit the pigment metabolism of the skin, states Meirowsky (Muench. Mediz. Woch., May 9, 1911); they work upon such albuminous cleavage products of the epidermis, as tyrosin and its derivatives. Should this process be disturbed through functional or structural disease of the adrenals, the cleavage products of the epidermis are transformed by oxydases into pigment before they can be absorbed into the circulation. Thus is explained the pigmentation of Addison's disease.-Medical Times.

Cantharides in Epithelial Nephritis.-Lancercaux insists that before undertaking any therapeutic measures in nephritis a clear anatomo-pathologic diagnosis should be made. Then, when the scantiness of urine and the presence of casts shows that we have a case of epithelial nephritis it will be of advantage to employ tincture of cantharides. Lancercaux gives 5 drops of the tincture a day and increases progressively to 12 drops. He has obtained excellent results from this treatment.-La Medecine Orientale, 1909, p. 139.

An Irregular Pulse may have an important bearing in disease; during an attack of pneumonia it may be the first sign of a fatal termination. An irregular pulse may be a family peculiarity. A pulse may appear quite regular to the palpating finger; but the heart may be grossly irregular-as in certain cases of heart block. The factors which govern the normal heart-beat are stimulus formation, excitability, contractility, conductivity and tonicity. In a normal heart these five properties of heart muscle fibers are interdependent; but in pathological conditions they may be affected independently of one another.-The Medical Times.

Bromide Intolerance and Bromide Poisoning.-L. Casamajor (Jour. Nervous and Ment. Dis., June) warns that the toxicity of the bromine salts is oftentimes overlooked. They may excite delirious states. No weak or anemic patient should receive even small doses without a full realization of the danger; in such cases the use of the bromides as local sedatives is contraindicated. Thicktongued speech, bromide breath and psychic dullness are the poison symptoms, upon the appearance of one or the other of which the drug should be discontinued and large doses of sodium chloride given to replace the bromide; this with vigorous elimination should prevent the drug intoxication.-The Medical Times.