I think there is an erroneous impression, even in the professional mind, in regard to the horizontal and vertical range of malaria. I have known instances where innocent swamps and ponds have been accused of being the cause of malarial diseases in a locality where such ponds and swamps were, in some instances, one or two miles away, and were covered and surrounded with trees and undergrowth. It is unusual for malaria to move far from its source; even at times a few feet will circumscribe the area of its potency; this fact, if it be one, and I think it is one in the main, is of great practical value to all who reside in a malarial district of country, and its general dissemination as a truth among country denizens and village people may enable them to rise to a higher level of health, and enjoy the countless blessings that accrue to a vigorous development; enable them to enjoy an exemption from chills, fevers, neuralgias, aches, redundant bile, pecant humors, and dwarfed intellectual and physical propor ions.

Dr. Tebault states that-"Malaria is somewhat heavier than atmospheric air, but under certain hygrometric conditions it rises and floats in the air, and obeys its currents. Its horizoutal range is more limited than what one might have supposed, being seldom conveyed by ordinary winds beyond a distance of 500 yards over land, and still less over water, which latter, in all probability, has a tendency to attract and absorb it. Its vertical ascent, under usual circumstances, does not appear to exceed 300 feet before it is rendered innocuous by dispersion. Should it be arrested by hills to leeward, it may accumulate there by continued influx, or be propelled even to a height of 500 feet or more.

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The conduction of malaria seems much facilitated by the hot days and cool nights of its appropriate season. Winds, particularly those from the south and west, bear it in their direction, whence places lying to the north and east of infected spots are more insalubrious than those in opposite directions." (Virginia Medical Monthly, September, 1874, pages 333 and 334.)

Dr. Parkes gives a somewhat wider range than Dr. Te

bault, but does it in order to be secure in his statement. He says: "It is well known that even a slight elevation lessens danger-a few feet, even, in many cases-but complete security is only obtained at greater heights. I can

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not help suspecting that 1000 to 1200 feet would generally give security" (in vertical ascent).

"Horizontal Spread.-In a calm air, Levy has supposed that the malaria will spread until it occupies a cube of 1400 to 2000 feet, which is equivalent to saying it will spread 700 to 1000 feet horizontally from the central part of the marsh."

It does not spread so far over water; and it is capable of being wafted farther by strong winds. The virulence, as it were, of malaria varies in different countries, its infecting distance both over land and water being strongest in the tropics.

Prof. Aitken confirms the above statements in the main (see pages 1013 and 1014, vol. ii., Science and Practice of Medicine, Clymer), and makes the following statement, which I regard of sufficient practical importance to embody in this report; the same point has been noticed by writers in this country, and has been utilized by people in constructing their houses and in adapting summer sleeping quarters:

"In towns partially freed from miasmata by extensive drainage, the difference of a few feet perpendicular height makes an almost inconceivable difference in the liability of persons to paludal disease. The barracks of Spanish town, the capital of Jamaica, for instance, consists of two stories, or of a ground floor and a first floor; but it being found that two men were taken ill on the ground floor for one on the first floor, it was at length ordered that the ground floor should be no longer occupied. Dr. Cullen remarked a similar result at Porto Bello, Dr. Fergusson in Santo Domongo, and Sir Gilbert Blane in the expedition to Walcheven. This law is so well understood in the West Indies that in Demerara and many other parts the houses are built on dwarf columns, after the manner of corn stacks, in order that a stratum of air may be interposed between the house and the ground. In Rome

and in other towns in Italy, it is also so well known that the lower rooms of the houses are abandoned, the family occupying the upper rooms as affording a greater protection from the paludal poison."

I have thus, in as brief manner as possible, given a short report of the present view of the nature of the cause of malarious fevers as taught by most medical scientists of to-day. They may be formularized as follows:

1st. That malaria is due to vegetable organic germs or

spores.

2d. That these grow and multiply in a damp soil with superficial ground-water, which has been exposed to a heat at and above that of summer temperature, and which contains in solution more or less vegetable matter. Too much water is as fatal to this process as too little water.

3d. That these germs are heavier than the atmospheric air; that their vertical spread is short, varying from thirty feet to one thousand; their horizontal spread does not often exceed 500 yards (or 1200 or 1500 feet).

4th. That a sure way to prevent the growth of malarial germs is to keep the ground dry; lower the level of the ground or sub-soil water. As surely as that vaccinnation will prevent small-pox, will a thorough system of sub-soil drainage prevent malaria.

It will not be out of place to illustrate in a practical way the value of drainage. Mr. R., living in the canebrake of this State, bought a place at a low price in that fertile section because it had the reputation of being sickly. Every white family that lived there was compelled to move away after much sickness and many deaths. The first summer he occupied it, "the doctor was there every day;" his family suffered the fate of all the others, though, fortunately, there were no deaths. He became impressed with the fact that his ground was very wet, and remained so late in the He determined to try the value of drainage; he encircled his yard with a deep ditch, and had another to run off from this to the neighboring natural drains; in digging

summer.

this latter ditch he was compelled to cut through a vertical dip of crystalized lime-rock. These ditches effectually drained the ground on which his residence was located; it would seem that this lime-rock prevented the water from escaping from the soil; gathered it, as it were, into an earthfilled basin, thus raising the ground-water to a high level. After this the place was as healthy as could be desired; there was no longer any need for the visits of the physician; neither did the condition of neighboring plantations affect him; his little well-ditched residence-grounds were no longer pestilence-producing, but were dry and healthy, and the abode of domestic comfort and happiness.

There is a moral to this report of mine that I would like to impress not only upon those who hear me in the medical profession, but upon every citizen of the State of Alabama-a moral that is no longer within the mystic realm of philosophic speculation, but stands out a beacon truth in the light of sanitary science; a moral that inculcates a procedure that may be complex, that may be costly, that may be laborious, according as to its perfection and completeness, but a procedure that offers the most complete exemption from all malarious diseases in their myriad phases, and would more largely reduce the death-rate in Alabama than any other, thus giving us an enviable and attractive reputation abroad—and that moral is, THOROUGH DRAINAGE.

RECENT PROGRESS IN GYNECOLOGY.

BY F. M. PETERSON, M. D.

There is no department of our profession in which we now have a greater number of intelligent and active workers, and more decided progress, than in that of Gynecology. The dissensions which have existed amongst the honest and capable specialists in this field, may, possibly, have produced greater industry and resulted in greater progress, still, I am inclined to regard them as unfortunate-as tending rather to retard than to stimulate advancement. The human mind appears to be so constituted that there is a constant tendency to the adoption of extreme views and opinions. This seems to be especially so in regard to the art and science of Gynecology. When it was first announced, by Henry Bennet, that inflammation and ulceration, confined chiefly to the lower segment of the uterus, were the starting point in uterine pathology, the profession, especially in this country, almost universally adopted his teaching and practice. When a patient complained of any symptoms, which could be referred to the uterus, a metroscopic examination was at once instituted, and if the os or cervix was the least diseased, or even very red, indicating that it might become so, the application of caustics was resorted to-Nitrate of Silver, Acid Nitrate of Mercury, Potassa cum Calce, Potassa Caustica, &c. The Potassa Caustica was the favorite caustic in hypertrophy of the cervix, "to melt down the tissues." Thus was every woman treated who had any symptoms referable to the reproductive organs;