Gastritis. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I would suggest arsenic 3x or higher for the case of sub-acute gastritis reported by Dr. H. C. Leemly, of Schofield, Md., in the April WORLD. Whenever you find stomach trouble with nausea, burning and insatiable thirst, arsenic in the right potency is your best friend. In addition to above symptoms, if the patient's skin has a waxen hue, and is very restless, with fear of death, this remedy will never fail you. Have just cured a case very similar to Dr. Leemly's, which I give you : 66 A. M., age about 60. Has had indigestion for 10 or 12 years. Came to my office . February 21, 1901. Said he had no faith in homeopathy, but as he had given the other doctors a fair trial, he wanted to try some sugar pills." For past two weeks has had insatiable thirst, drinking any quantity of water without any relief whatever. As soon as water got warm he would throw it off and fill his stomach again with ice water, which would relieve pain in stomach until warm, and again would vomit, or rather throw the water off, as he had as good use of his stomach in that respect as he had of his hands. Whenever he eats or drinks too much he contracts the stomach at will, and throws 'off as much as necessary for relief. He had enuf of other symptoms to convince me that arsenic was the remedy. I gave him a powder 30x dry on tongue, and in less than one-half hour improvement began and continued without interruption, and on February 25, he reported his stomach well, and has been ever since. Paris, Tex. G. F. THORNHILL, M.D. Let us all be Brothers and Mutual Helpers. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I am glad that the liberal and broad-minded Editor of THE WORLD invites homeopaths and eclectics, as well as regulars, to contribute articles to it. This makes it a better allaround journal for its regular as well as its irregular subscribers. In this last statement many of the regulars may disagree with me, for a number of them don't believe that the irregular schools have any remedy or method of treatment that is superior to any remedy or method of the old school. We regulars shouldn't be so egotistic and narrow as to believe our school embodies all that is good in the treatment of diseases, and that there is no good in homeopathy and eclecticism, except to enable a number of doctors to become acquainted with the natural tendencies of diseases uninfluenced by medication. Our observation teaches us differently. There isn't a regular but what has a successful homeopathic or eclectic competitor, or knows of one or more that are as successful in their practise as regulars; and not all of them are humbugs either, posing as homeopaths or eclectics and using old school remedies. Dr. Hanson, of Hartville, Mo., a homeopath, has the largest practise in the county, and he built this practise up with two regulars as competitors. Dr. Binnie (April WORLD, page 160) will say that he never practised pure homeopathy. Whether he did or didn't, I never knew a regular to endorse the treatment he advised in a consultation. They would tell him he could have the case and they would quit; and the termination of the case would fail to verify their unfavorable prognosis. The liberal features of THE WORLD makes it one of the most valuable journals publisht in the United States. Its platform is broad enuf for every doctor in the world, of whatever school, to stand on. Its columns are opened to the homeopaths and eclectics, as well as to the regulars; and I hope our homeopathic and eclectic brethren will favor us with some good articles on seasonable diseases occasionally. I wish every issue would contain at least one homeopathic or eclectic article. These articles would add symmetry to our treatments, and we would get some ideas on remedies and methods that would stand us well in some difficult cases. I don't believe there is a single subscriber to THE WORLD that would object to these articles, for the broad and liberal spirit of the Editor, manifested thru his journal, has so favorably imprest itself on the subscribers that they are all very tolerant of ideas and opinions that conflict with theirs; the WORLD family actually enjoys a collision of ideas. I close by asking Dr. S. E. Chapman to explain whether there is a dual action in all drugs, and whether the homeopaths just make use of one end of drug action, that which is produced by the minimum dose? DR. J. S. CANTRELL. Northview, Mo. [The names, homeopathy and eclecticism, are more objectionable than the practise of their adherents. These, or any other sectarian titles, are objectionable because they imply limitation. Every physician should accept the rich heritage of the experience of the ages in all countries. This heritage contains both truth and error. We should eliminate the error and conserve the truth; and to that truth we should add as much new truth as we can. But there is no need of setting up a new establishment based upon a part (only) of the new truth brought to light, and ignoring all the old truth. It seems foolish to do this. The one word, Physician, is sufficient to designate one who devotes himself to the healing art. Those who adopt modifying terms, as homeopathic or eclectic, deliberately shut themselves from a large amount of accumulated and accumulating truth, and from the main body of workers. The regular profession is sufficiently tolerant to admit all honest and earnest workers in the healing art, but the line is drawn at sectarian schools, with dogmas on their banners. The temple of medicin need not, ought not, to be divided into sects. In this noble temple there is room for all, but no room for dogmatism nor separate and exclusiv camps. We hope that our friends will drop all sectarian titles and become simply physicians. As to practise, each individual practitioner is guided by his own light and judgment any way; in the regular profession there is no attempt at curtailing personal freedom in practise. All useful ideas are welcome in these columns, whether the contributors are sectarian or not.-ED.] The Thirtieth Potency. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I have read with much interest the articles in the April WORLD on homeopathy. I could never understand potencies or similare, and the prescribing for symptoms in place of the disease. As Brother Chapman leaped into the light in a single hour, I think he could make it plain to me. As the thir tieth potency of aconite is a favorit remedy with the homeopaths in my vicinity, I would like to ask Professor Watt how much of the thirtieth potency I would have to give a patient so that the patient would get one drop of the officinal tincture, or how much of one drop of the officinal tincture is contained in one drop of the thirtieth potency? Wurtsboro, N. Y. C. W. PIPER. [The following subject having been given such generous space in the last several issues, we feel compelled, in justice to other subjects, in the interest of our readers, to put further matter upon this subject in small type.-ED.] Small Pox. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-Having just past thru a siege of small pox, some observations may be of interest to the WORLD readers, especially to the large part of them who still believe small pox to be small pox. We have had the disease in the city for four months, in spite of the vigorous measures taken to stamp it out. In that time twenty families have been afflicted with the Scourge. So far as known only thirty-two persons have been sick with the disease. Of this number ten were as sick as I have seen them in former epidemics. While the other cases were of a milder type, the sickness previous to the eruption was pretty severe. All were treated at their homes, with one exception. This man having no home to go to was sent to the pest house, but in due time made a good recovery. It not being practicable, little effort was made to separate the well from the sick, but all being well vaccinated, were assured that they were entirely safe from the disease. This feeling of certainty is the result of the very many cases in the last fifty years where children and others have been left to mingle freely with the sick; the only requisite being that we have good and recent vaccine or bovine virus with which to vaccinate the well. In the early years we seldom used other than the humanized virus. In these later years we seldom use other than the bovine. In a few cases I have preferred to use the former. Going to a house where the disease existed of some days' standing, and finding six or eight children and others who had no previous protection against the contagion, I have felt a greater certainty of protection in using from a selected crust but recently taken from a person's arm. A very efficient quarantine has been kept up, and there has been no spread of the contagion from the place so quarantined. Great pains were taken to vaccinate at once all persons in the family of those afflicted, and all who had been exposed to the contagion. There were two sources of supply that kept the disease for so many weeks in the city. First, the men coming home from time to time sick with the disease from the lumbering camps in the northern woods, and then the houses where the people succeeded in keeping the knowledge of the presence of small pox from the health authorities. There was spread of the contagion that could be directly traced to each one of these houses. The readiness with which the community submitted to vaccination, especially the younger portion and all who had been in any way exposed to the contagion, did much to break the force of the epidemic. We heard little of Cuban itch or other Cuban nonsense. When the eruption appeared the physicians readily recognized the disease as small pox, and at once reported the cases to the health authorities who turned them over to the physician having their treatment in charge. In the treatment of the disease at this and at former times I have become convinced that the disease is not contagious previous to the eruption, and little if at all contagious during the first two days of the eruption; further, that it is far less contagious in the open air than in close or crowded rooms. While a nurse or a person much in the room with a person sick with the disease may carry the contagion outside, I do not think a person going in the sick room for a few minutes will carry the disease outside for any considerable distance. Further, while varioloid will give regular small pox, it is far less contagious than is small pox. Successful vaccination will for a variable length of time render one absolutely immune to small pox, and for a lifetime to any but the milder form of that disease. Persons in no degree immune to that disease may by being vaccinated two, three or four days after thoro exposure to small pox still avoid the disease; but if vaccinated seven or eight days after such exposure they are liable to have both diseases running their course at the same time, the vaccine disease greatly modifying the small pox, leaving it to finish its course in the form of varioloid. Hence it would seem the proper thing to do to be vaccinated even tho a week or more has elapst since the exposure. For a few years back small pox has been widely disseminated in many States and in many locations in the different States. This has been brought about in part by the soldiers returning from Cuba, and in the States where much lumbering is done by the disease being carried over from year to year in the bedding and in the camps where the disease had previously existed. But this is not the only reason, nor the worst, why the disease continues to exist and to spread. In many locations will be found a physician who will insist that the disease is not small pox. Having made a mistake in diagnosis in the early stage of the disease, he stubbornly sticks to it (physicians are not noted for changing their diagnosis). Just recently I was at a location where I saw several typical cases of small pox, one a woman, mother of five or six children, the worst case that I have seen for many years. Thickly broken out all over, literally from the soles of her feet to the crown of her head, the pustules unusually large and well filled, and there could hardly have been less than 8,000 in number; and still the local physician was insisting that this was not small pox; which resulted in many exposures. The previous history of the disease in this locality was about as follows: A man came too near this locality from the woods and was sick with an eruptiv disease, communicating the disease to the family. A young girl, daughter of the woman so very sick, went to help take care of the sick man, in due time becoming sick herself. She returned home and gave the disease to her mother and several other relativs, who were having the disease in a typical form at the time of my visit. With this history, and with the disease existing in this aggravated and confluent form, the physician was still insisting that these cases were not small pox. Even in THE MEDICAL WORLD a physician will write giving a close description of a typical case of small pox, and finish up by saying this is not small pox. What is it? Now these men, along with a few cranks who go up and down the world making themselves everywhere present, insisting there is no small pox, and condemning vaccination, are largely the cause of and responsible for the spread and long-continued existence of the disease. The local boards of health are reluctant to quarantine or to take the other necessary steps so long as physicians are found who insist there is no small pox, or that the cases brought to the notice of the health authorities are not cases of small pox. And then the antivaccinationist frightens the people by his overdrawn stories of terrible blood-poisoning, the loss of an arm or the loss of life, in this way frightening people from taking the most efficient means of stamping out the disease. Now if all physicians and all communities would give their aid and their full influence to the health authorities to do their full duty the disease would become as nearly unknown as it is in some European countries where they have enforced vaccination at one year of age, and at some additional periods, such as when joining the army or the navy. This paper has doubled in length what I had intended, so I will leave to a future time the writing up of a few cases illustrating some of the views I have concerning the disease. Stevens Point, Wis. JOHN PHILLIPS, M.D. Hemorrhagic Small Pox-Determination of Sex. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I was called to see a railway laborer one day and found him suffering with severe headache and pain in back; temperature 105 degrees. The coal tar remedies made scarcely any impression on either pain or fever. On the fourth day an eruption appeared, not more than fifty on whole body, mostly on face and hands, a few on feet. Some never reacht the pustular stage. No secondary fever. I had the health officer call, and he refused to quarantine, and the man went to work on the sixth day. In fourteen days I was called to see his oldest daughter, who was 10 years old. Symptoms same as father's, only not so severe. Again health officer refused to quarantine. On the morning of the fifth day I noticed rash, hardly perceptible on palpation. Toward evening small hemorrhagic spots began to show on the body, and in spite of the best treatment I could devise the patient died at 2 next morning. At time of death almost all of the extremities and face and about half the surface of body was discolored by hemorrhages into the skin. Twenty minutes after death the entire body was a dark purple color. Three other children contracted the disease, which ran a typical course on them and all recovered, I found one pit on the father, and not more than four or five on each one of the children. None of the pits were well marked, but they are there as permanent marks at present. These cases occurred over a year ago. The Cuban itch" theory don't go with me. I had one case of "black small pox" develop from a case such as Dr. Hall describes in the February WORLD. I have been amused at the theories advanced to beget male and female children. I will give you an incident that occurred under my observation. Mr. A., who has a family of six, three boys and three girls, was approacht by Mr. B., who has a family of six girls. B. askt A. how he managed. A. responded, that is easy; my next will be a boy. The trouble with you is, you attend to your family duties in the early part of the night. Walt until morning if you want a boy." The next arrival at B.'s was a boy. Mrs. A. also in due time gave birth to her seventh, which was also a boy, as A. said it would be. I simply record this as a curious coincidence. J. R. SCOTT, M.D. Garnett, Kan. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I am always glad when THE WORLD Comes, and have been very much interested in the articles from the different physicians on the disease that so many call small pox. We have had the disease here in Eastern Kentucky this winter. I have treated some cases of it (about nine or ten) and while it in some ways resembles small pox, yet there are many ways that it does not resemble small pox. The first case of it that I was called to see was a lady, age 59 years, widow: previous health good, color white. When I first saw her I found the eruption on her lower limbs from about four inches above the knees down. It remained there two days before spreading over the entire body, and until it spread over the body she had no constitutional symptoms at all, not even a rise of temperature or headache; but as the eruption spread over the body her temperature rose to 100°, with slight headache, which continued for a few days, then subsided as the eruption dried up and the scales fell off. After the eruption did spread over the entire body it became so thick that the skin was almost completely covered. The eruptions were about the size of a split pea, and consisted of blebs filled with a clear fluid which never resembled pus. There was no induration or redness at all at the base of the blebs. The eruption resembled that of chicken pox more than anything else. There were some few cases that had some headache and a slight rise of temperature before the eruption made its appearance, but none of them were ever sick enuf to be confined to bed. Out of 150 persons exposed to the disease only 16 of them had it, and they all had time to take it before we began vaccinating. E. J. POPE, M.D. Foxport, Ky. Small Pox-Malarial Hematuria. Editor MEDICAL WORLD.-Having seen so much written about small pox lately I will add my mite. Will give two cases which I think will convince the most skeptical that it is small pox: 1. Mr. E, 60 years old, fourteen days after exposure had chill, fever lasting three days, at which time temperature went to normal. Then appeared an eruption, first on forehead and chest, then over the entire body, with the typical shot-like feel. This was accompanied by sore throat. In 36 to 48 hours the eruption had become vesicular, and on thru various stages, papule, pustule, scab. The eruption was from size of half a pea to a dime. After pus formed they turned brown on top, then became umbilicated. Temperature rose to 101° to 1020 as soon as pustulation began, and remained there until the formation of scabs. The characteristic odor was present. The scars pitted. The patient fully recovered in about 24 days. 2. Mrs. E., wife of first patient. Being exposed to husband and objected to being vaccinated, I put her on Dr. Coleman's (of Texas) treatment, as I saw publisht in Alkaloidal Clinic some time ago. This is calcium sulfid, 5 to 10 grains daily; strychnia arsenite, do to grain four times a day. This I put my patient on as soon as I was certain that her husband had small pox, but in fourteen days the same symptoms developt as in first case, and it went thru the same course, only a more severe type. Hope Dr. Coleman will pardon this adverse showing of his abortiv treatment, but I followed it faithfully and continued it to pustulation without the least possible effect. We will soon have prevailing in our malarial districts the worst of all types of malaria-malarial hematuria. I have seen much written on this subject, many panaceas offered, but have never yet seen a treatment that would to my mind stand a crucial clinical test. Nor am I now going to offer anything that I claim will cure any and all cases. I know from past experience that a certain per cent. will die, notwithstanding what some others claim, no matter what the treatment. Taking for granted that the reader knows something of the symptoms and pathology, I will only give my treatment. If any brother wants further particulars they will be gladly furnisht I usually find my patient with temperature of 1020 to 1030, skin jaundiced, incessant vomiting, with history of chill. I at once gave five grains of calomel on tongue and repeat every two hours until four doses are taken. I commence at once giving strychnin hypodermically. Sufficient doses to obtain physiological effect. Don't care how much it takes; if 1-10 grain every two hours, I give it. If patient is restless, I add morphin to the strychnin. I give nothing by the mouth after I get thru with the calomel, except ice. I give all the ice patient wants to eat. If much prostration or jaundice, I put patient in hot pack with mustard added to water, in which blankets are wet. I also give enemata of salt solution every four hours; this keeps bowels open, and it is taken up by the bowels and feeds the impoverisht blood. With this treatment I have treated successfully many cases. I have but little use for astringents, styptics, diuretics, hemostatics, etc. Ewell, Tex. Small Pox? T. SCOTT RAGLAND, M.D. No! Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I see many articles in your journal, pros and cons, on the eruptiv disease now so prevalent in the United States. Since the 15th of September, 1900, over 300 cases have been within the bounds of my practise. I saw over 200 of these cases, and in no instance Could I say it was small pox. I will not take up your valuable time and space by telling of the aches and pains which have been so well defined by other doctors. This is a disease that medical writers know but little about, as they have failed to describe it just as it is. This trouble is the reverse of small pox. Small pox umbilicates; this stays round and full till the fourth day, then as the scab is formed it sinks, by drying in the middle first. Small pox scabs fall off and leave pits or scars; a small nodule or bump rises beneath the scabs in this disease, and pushes the scabs off. In small pox there is a second fever; in this the temperature has a tendency to go below normal, and stay during eruption. The nodules which push the scabs off remain a few weeks, then disappear, leaving the skin smooth with pinkish or bluish spots in the skin showing a destruction or disturbance of the pigment layer of skin: these, in a short time, disappear. and no one could tell that the patient had ever had a skin disease. This is the average course of the disease. Many victims never went to bed; others would not be sick more than two hours with fever, and the pustules would be so thick that they would seem to be stacked one on another. Some would have the other extreme: fever, pains and aches for four days, and only one, two, three, or maybe a dozen pustules would develop. Some would have sore mouths and throats, others would not; five or six out of 30 cases and a pustule develop in cornes of the eye, which would leave a corneal ulcer, which would soon heal. One case, a man aged 45, was told by a physician to get whisky, and when he went to break out to drink freely. making the breaking out appear all at once, and it would be better for him; the sooner he would get over it, the less he would be hurt. So he procured the good stuff, and when the time came he took a pint, and the eruption took his epidermis; he now has a corneal ulcer which, in my opin ion, will destroy the eye. This man and his family of eight or ten had all been vaccinated, and all had this trouble. Other families that were not vaccinated only a part had it, the others escaping. Some who were vaccinated escapt, others did not. With these 300 cases, their variations and no deaths, I can't see how any observant doctor can say it is small pox. I notice an article in March WORLD from the pen of Dr. J. D. Moorhead, of Leveta, Texas, describing a case from the plains of Texas. This case went from my immediate neighborhood. When the young man returned I asked him what the doctor said to him. "Oh, he gave me a terrible blow; tried to scare me to bed when I was then in the woods help. ing my brother-in-law cut a load of wood. He sent for the county health officer, who decided that I had small pox, and put me in a tent back of the field; wanted me to go to bed, and fixt up a lot of medicin, said for me to take it, but I told him that the doctor on the plains did not give medicin, and I was not going to take it nor go to bed, either, and I didn't. They put an old soldier to guard me. That guard and I stayed in the woods most of the time hunting; during the day we would go over to the house and I would sit on the wood pile; my folks would come to the yard fence and we would have quite a talk. We only stayed at the tent at night and meal time." And yet this was "the worst sort of a case of small pox.' Wherever small pox goes, death is the result; wherever this eruption is, death is not known, and the doctor is not needed, except to assure the people that they are not yet in danger. I tell my patients to stay indoors, take care of themselves, eat a light diet, and I will preach the funeral sermon of every one that dies of this trouble free of charge, and I am no preacher, for I know I will not be called upon. Lockney, Texas. D. J. THOMAS, M.D. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-As my humble contribution to the subject, Cuban itch or impetigo contagiosa, which is now under discussion in THE WORLD, I submit the following case: D. K., twenty-one years of age, machinist, came home with shifting neuralgic pains, slight gastric disturb ances and very moderate headache, as prodromal symptoms; temperature rising to about 102° F. After three days an eruption made its appearance, with sudden fall of temperature to about normal, and disappearance of all other symptoms with the exception of an annoying itching As to the character of the exanthem, it started as hard nodules, which developt gradually into rather flat pustules, which, with their vivid red base, closely resembled an ecthyma or impetigo. As to the content of the pustules, it was never transparent (as witness variola in its first stage); it became rapidly opaque, the cheesy, yellow matter drying into a dirty crust. The eruption was distributed over face, arms and upper part of the trunk. Pustules didn't show any depression in the center, so characteristic in variola, nor was there any perceptible smell. Furthermore, histologically, the multilocular construction of the pustules, as in variola, was wanting. While I was bound to report this case to our local Board of Health as an eruptiv-very likely contagious-disease, I couldn't afford to diagnose this affec tion against my better conviction as small pox. I designated it, in want of a better name, as impetigo varioloides, which means something simulating variola. However, one overzealous health officer pronounced it true small pox, removed the patient to the pest house and placed the inmates of the house under quarantine, without even seeing fit to notify me first of such drastic steps! Said health officer is quite a young doctor, to whose opinion I had to submit, as a practising physician of thirty three years of practise and sixty-four years of age. I have in the past seen several epidemics of small pox, treated many cases of the most virulent type, and hundreds of a comparative mild form, and ought to be able to know which is which. Commentary on this case is superfluous. I can only endorse what Dr. O. C. Mastin, in his article, page 137, April WORLD, SO aptly says, by quoting his words: "To quarantine families for this affection, subjecting them to financial loss and other inconveniences, is nothing less than an outrage," etc. As to the treatment I used in above case (as long as patient was under my care), it was very simple. In the beginning, a brisk saline cathartic, with small doses of calc. sulfid for its anti-purulent effect. In the evening a few tonic doses of quinin. Locally I brusht over the pustules with the following, which has rendered me excellent service in similar affections: Small Pox. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-We have small pox here and have had it for a year or more, and it is "Simon pure" in quality, tho a vast number of "the people" call it "Cuban itch" just because it is discrete, and very mild at that, and also because none have died. Just here I wish to say that the cause of so much small pox now is because the above fact leads to carelessness in its dissemination. The people cannot understand why small pox is not the loathesome and fatal disease that it formerly was. The physician should warn the people of the danger of its contagion, and that it is small pox. Dr. Schmidt, in March WORLD, advanced the correct explanation: "This mild form of small pox is due to the immunizing process which one generation hands to another by vaccination." If we would require universal vaccination, small pox would soon become a disease of the past. It would be well if every state should require, by law, that every child entering the public school show evidence of successful vaccination. [This is now done in many places.— ED.] Make that an iron-clad requirement. The greatest treatment in all diseases is the prophylactic. Scooba, Miss. H. W. RENCHER, M.D. Quiz Column. questions are solicited for this column. Communications not accompanied by the proper name and address of the writer (not necessarily for publication) will not be noticed. The great number of requests for private answers, for the information and benefit of the writer, makes it necessary for us to charge a fee for the time required. This fee will be from one to five dollars, according to the amount of research and writing required. Syphilis. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-Please diagnose this case for me: Patient a married lady, age 22; contracted gonorrhea two years ago; seems cured, but has a gleet. Has aching in arms and legs; sore spots on the arm, on the bone, and on the thighs; muscles not sore. Pimples or blotches, fiery red, on the face when near the cook stove or any other heat. Purple splotches on breast, some dizziness, foul breath, lusterless condition of hair. Has Patient never constipation of bowels. had chancre nor sore. Husband had clap at same time that the wife had it. He has red pimples on face, forehead and chest, and aching in long bones. Appetite good at times; not regular. Waukomis, Okla. S. F. SCOTT. Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I wish you would give the most modern form of treatment of syphilis. What form of mercury do you use, and how do you administer it? I have a great deal of it to treat and generally use either biniodid or bicyanid, but I saw in a back WORLD that the gray powder was the best form. Your "Monthly Talks" are all right, and I only wish I was in better shape to disseminate them. DR. A. O. REPPETO. Monta Villa, Oregon. [The protoiodid in such doses as the patient will bear, has the most favor at the hands of combined authorities, yet certain excellent men have held out for the "grey powder." We prefer the protoiodid, but always use the "greypowder" if the former disagrees. It is not so much the form in which you can get mercury into the system, as it is the getting of it in without disturbing nutrition. Mercury is always mercury, and will always produce the desired effect in syphilis if you do not derange the systemic functions; think less of your drug and its name, and more of your patient and his peculiarities. Try the protoiodid first, and hold the "grey powder" in reserve. -ED.] Is a Doctor's Highest Duty to His Syphilitic Patient or to the Innocent Girl? Editor MEDICAL WORLD:-I always am glad to get THE WORLD. It is the most welcome of all the journals I receive. I would like to ask your "family" as to what is a doctor's duty? I have a patient, 28 years old, who has syphilis, which I have been treating. Now, I learned that he is keeping company with, and expects to marry, one of the most charming, pure and innocent of girls, while yet under treatment. The family has heard from other sources that he is taking treatment from me, and they wanted to know about it. What was my duty: to my patient or to the innocent girl? I neither affirmed nor denied the fact; but my way of answering must have had effect, as the engagement is broken. Now the patient threatens to bring suit against me for betraying confidence. My attorney tells me no one can be punisht for telling the truth under any circumstances. How would the other members of the "family" act if they were in my place? Joplin, Mo. M. B. HARUTUN, M.D. [As the engagement is broken, your conscience is stilled; now think of caring for yourself. You know that he had syphilis, and can swear to the fact. You say you never told that he had it. Go to him and tell him that you did not betray confidence, but that if placed on the stand before court you will be compelled to "tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth." This will satisfy him. He will not want the matter publisht to the community. There is no danger of him suing you, and if he should, every court in the United States will uphold you. It is a crime for a man with uncured syphilis to marry. It is assault, and aggravated assault.-ED.] Opium and the Salicylates. Editor MEDICAL WORLD: Will you kindly inform me where I can get information regarding Haig's observations on the treatment of the opium habit with salicylate of sodium? I wish to know dose and method of administration. Denver. Col. A. P. ROWLEY, M.D. ease," by Haig, is publisht by P. Blakiston's Son & Co., 1012 Walnut street, Philadelphia, Pa., at $3.00, from which we make the following extracts: "If salicylate of soda is given along with, or in sequence to the first dose of opium, it prevents the opium causing any retention of uric acid, and then the opium rebound on the following day is greatly modified or fails to appear." "This has led me to suggest the use of the salicylates in aiding to throw off the morphin habit, and I know of many cases where my suggestion has been followed with advantage." "In my own person, a dose or two of salicylates after a dose of opium, completely prevents what I call the opium rebound; and there is no high blood pressure, headache, depression, or other ill effect from the drug next day." He quotes cases in which the salicylates have been used with success.-ED.] Testicle Retained in Abdomen. Dear Editor:- I delivered a boy four months ago. The parents are healthy and so is the baby. A few days ago the father called my attention to the fact that "the left testicle lookt small." Today on examination I could not find any left testicle. The right one is prominent and normal, but no sign of the left one. The baby is, as I said, very healthy, and seldom cries. No hernia nor trouble in urinating. What is the opinion of the readers as to the prognosis, etc.? I cannot find anything about any case similar to it. Joplin, Mo. M. B. HARUTUN, M.D. [Either testicle may be retained within |