This is the reward for not less than seven long years of the hardest kind of work and, in many cases, of positive hardships. Most of the medical journals that come to my hand are teaching the doctor business methods. Some state that the higher schooling is for the protection of the deer peepul. There is lobbying in all the legislatures to increase the term of years and arise the standard of the profession, but not one move is made by the political doctor toward the making of laws whereby the physician can collect his fee for services. South Dakota is the only state

family through a pneumonia and a cholera infantum, besides one or two lesser ills, and when I asked for my pay he said he was building two houses and could not afford to spare the money to pay me. He works

in the Union, that I know of, that recognizes the rights of the doctor. In that state nothing is exempt from collection by the doctor and the undertaker.

So far as it lies in my power, I shall use every effort to discourage students from taking up preparation for the medical profession. I am a successful doctor-that is what all would call me because I cure my patients, seldom having a failure, and yet the great mass of them have no intention of paying my bills. All medical literature recognizes this sad state of affairs, yet makes no effort to remedy it.

Years ago, when I had a good trade, I thought I would give it up and become a DOCTOR-it was such a respected and respectable profession-only to find, at this late date, that I was never more grievously mistaken.

Who is the doctor, anyway? Oh, nobody, only the "doc;" and the deer peepul dock him whenever they get the chance. They enjoy calling him out of a good warm bed at midnight, to ride fifteen or twenty miles to relieve a man suffering with renal colic, cussing him for not getting there quicker, and then swearing that he shall be paid at once, only to forget all about him. and his discomfort as soon as the patient's belly quits aching. And we have no law to enable us to collect. About sixteen months ago I had taken care of a man's

at good wages every day and makes no attempt to do justice to me. This is one great reason why I will not encourage bright young people to follow in my footsteps.

My second great reason for not encouraging young men and women to study medicine is summed up by The Medical World for July, where it is estimated that many doctors make $750 per year, the majority make from $1000 to $3000; more between $1000 and $2000 than between $2000 and $3000. What inducement is this pittance to a young man desiring to have a home and rear a family. A woman doctor having a husband who is making something might be willing to accept this, but either to man or woman on whom the cares and responsibilities of this life lie as a heavy weight the meagre sums mentioned would not be an inducement.

Now, when it is morally certain that they will not be able to collect more than fifty percent of what they earn, no matter what business method they pursue, how is it possible to make ends meet? Will the Owen bill now before Congress help them collect their fees? No! The laws of most states encourage the thief? Oh no, but they do shield the man who puts his hand in your pocket and steals your medicines, your appliances, your time and your strength. He is not a thief, but more often

as a first mortgage either on real estate or on chattels. Until this is done, it is useless to encourage young people to take up the profession, and I consider it an injustice to them to suggest it.

My third reason for not encouraging the young man or woman to take up the medical profession is the lack of medicalboards reciprocity between the states. It frequently happens that a doctor must, for private reasons, move to a different climate. This move must necessarily be into a different state. We know that the examinations before the health boards are not always "on the square"; that you may

be flunked and never know the reason why. There should, by all means, be a law compelling the board to return to the examined his examination sheets.

Remove these obstacles; and by so doing raise the respect of the deer peepul for the profession. (They will always respect that for which they MUST pay.) Then we shall all take pleasure in inviting young, bright minds to enter a profession wherein they will be enabled to shine and where ability finds its greatest reward. At best a doctor is necessarily the most charitable individual in his neighborhood, for rarely is a case refused when the patient acknowledged his inability to raise a penny. We would not see him suffer, but it is for those who systematically beat us that we would have these laws made and enforced.

Crowell, Tex.

LEWIS H. FREEDMAN.

[You are dead right.. Every word you say and it comes from your heart-is a protest against the preposterous relation of the doctor to the community. Read the first editorial in our June number, and tell us why the plan there suggested would not meet the difficulty. But don't blame the medical colleges. The moment you begin to restrict the influx of new doctors by the regular portals, the number of people increases who break into medical practice without a medical education. Look at Germany and California.-ED.]

DIPHTHERIA-BACILLUS CARRIERS

Nishino reports, in the Zeitschrift für Hygiene (abstract in Wien. Med. Woch., 1910, col. 1897), the result of his examinations in many families in which cases of diphtheria had occurred, stating that in those members of the families not attacked he found diphtheria bacilli with relative frequency a fact of great importance for the question of the spread and limitation of the disease. The throats of such bacillus-carriers contain the bacilli, usually for about ten days, and according to Nishino, their presence is not influenced either by

subcutaneous injections of serum or by local treatment.

This is a very important finding and demonstrates the justice of the ruling of the boards of health according to which all members of the families in which diphtheria cases occur must be quarantined. This quarantine should be as strict and thorough or complete as possible, and nobody who is in a house at the time diphtheria is diagnosed should be allowed to leave it until no longer diphtheria bacilli can be found in the secretions from the nasal and nasopharyngeal mucous membranes. of any member of the household.

This report brings to the mind of the writer a case which only recently has come to light in a city near Chicago. Within four years there have occurred six cases of diphtheria, three terminating fatally, in pupils of one of the public schools of that city; all of them from one of the primary

rooms..

Investigation showed that a single pupil, a mentally defective child, with adenoids and enlarged tonsils, had been in that room for five years. This child had been frequently indisposed, presumably mainly from "colds." Its illnesses, an examination of the records showed, corresponded closely to the time when the cases of diphtheria developed. This child was out of school the major part of one school-year; during this year no diphtheria was present in the school.

These facts, when brought out, two or three months ago, suggested so strongly that this child was a diphtheria-carrier, that a culture was made from the throat. The Klebs-Loeffler bacillus was found. A few weeks later another culture was taken, with the same result. As operative measures, to clean out this throat, have been refused, Dr. Biehn of our laboratory suggests inoculation with staphylococcus aureus.

THOSE PRIZE PAPERS

In the November number of CLINICAL MEDICINE We shall announce the prize winners in the contest for the most helpful paper in our September issue, as promised editorially in that number. If you have

not sent in your vote as yet on that issue, please do so at once. The response has not been nearly as large as we expected it would be. We hoped there would be hundreds of votes.

The contest will be continued this month. Do not fail to let us know which of the papers in this issue of THE CLINIC you consider the most helpful. The one who gets the largest number of votes will be awarded a prize of $25, second $15, third, fourth and fifth smaller amounts, possibly payable in books or other articles of value. Remem

ber that members of the editorial staff of CLINICAL MEDICINE are excluded from this competition. Let us hear from you at

Dear Sir as I have had you recommended to me as a good Dr by Mrs R-- I have decided to write to you and explain my condition to you & get you to send me some medicine as she says you can cure me I have tried several Dr. & have taken all kinds of medicine and none has seemed to help me but very little & I want you to do all you can for me I will explain my condition to you as best I can I am in a bad fix and want something done at once for me I have missed four months I guess I am in the family way so I will tell you as to keep you from giving any medicine that will hurt me I have a bad weak feeling & my blood will not circulate & my hands & feet are cold & swear a cold sticky_sweat & my heart will beat so fast I cant speak are get my breath & my hands will draw & every nerve in me will draw & I am so nervious I can hardly be still at times & my head is in an awful fix my

brains is wrong I feel like I am addled in my head all the time my mind is not on one thing at a time five minutes my ears will stop up & I can hardly get my breath then and nothing I eat agrees with me I have indigestion gas around my heart pain around my heart & under my left shoulder blade & in the fork of my breast these pains are most all the time now here comes the worst my womb presses down & it is all out of fix I want you to send me a wash for it & something that will heal it up and bring it to its place the left side of it is eat in to are perished away I done no what has caused it and it is just like a road leading off from a hill on one side and nothing seems to be there on that side a space about as big as your finger the rest of the mouth is round except there and it is out like a sink please send me something for it I got whites I guess a yellowish & white corruption looking stuff will pass gradually I have neuraligia all time send me med & your price & I will send your money by return mail I want you to give me med to build me up all over and to work on my stomach as I have stomach trouble to be sure to give something for the blood & brains be as light as you can I am a poor woman I beg to be your friend.

Can any of our readers beat these? Who can submit something more unique?

DISPENSES HIS OWN DRUGS, PRINCIPALLY THE ACTIVE PRINCIPLES

After twenty-five years of practice and silence in the grind of medicine, I want to say that I have never been overenthused, but rather slow to be convinced.

I have carried a 26-bottle pocket-case filled mostly with alkaloidal granules for over twenty years. Why?

I noticed, recently, that five tons of olive pits were imported into New York port. Uncle Sam struck the trail and reports that the analysis of powdered drugs from one firm in New York showed from 30 percent to 40 percent of ground olive pits. Is it to be wondered at that fluid extracts and tinctures should vary in strength?

To illustrate: Aconitine, 1-134 grain, a definite amount of the alkaloid, is a unit of measure, like a yardstick, and does not contain cheap adulteration. From this I have never failed to get the physiologic effect of aconite. When I want any assistance from aconite, I use the granules, and have done so for twenty years. I have not prescribed a drop of fluid extract of aconite or of the tincture during this time.

What is true of aconitine is equally true of a large list of the other active principles.

We are today confronted with one of the most trying and important crises in the history of medicine. Imitation, substitution, dishonesty and graft seem to be the watchword of many (happily, not all), from the oldest and largest drug firms down to the smallest. Yet, on the whole, the world has advanced and grown better and stronger.

The doctor pushed the pepsin fad, predigested foods, coaltar derivatives, breakfast foods, muds, and many other things. Then the fakers followed and reaped the harvest.

My plan has always been to keep and dispense all my own medicines. I never tell a patient what medicine is given. I keep a record of my cases on cards. Buy and dispense pure drugs. Never give a bad pill. If I give medicine, it is for some definite purpose. By following this plan, if my patients are benefited, they come back, or if they are not benefited, I know it and can then look up some of my own weak imperfections.

In these strenuous times, when the doctor has a large army of medicine venders, the newspapers, and prescribing druggists to contend with, we must show our independence; ask no questions and answer none; keep and prescribe our own medicine; trust to purity of drugs; utilize everything that is proven to be safe, sound and sane; and keep our own house in order. It would be a great step in advance if the government would expose these fraudulent firms by publishing their names.

Marengo, Ill.

ROZEL M. CURTISS.

THE DOCTOR'S DREAM

Illustrating the spirit of the true friend of man.

Dr. Sophia Brunson, St. Mathews, South Carolina, says: "Please print this poem with a note of explanation, stating that the last five stanzas only are mine. I thought that the first version was unworthy of our noble profession, even though it was only meant for a little bit of pleasantry."

Last evening I was talking
With a doctor, aged and gray,
Who told me of a dream he had-
I think 'twas Christmas day.

While snoozing in his office

A vision came to view; He saw an angel enter

Dressed in garments white and new.

Said the angel, "I'm from heaven;

The Lord just sent me down

To bring you up to glory,

And put on your golden crown.

"You 've been a friend to every one, And worked hard night and day; You have doctored many thousands, And from few received your pay.

"So we want you up in glory,

For you have labored hard, And the good Lord is preparing Your eternal, just reward."

Then the angel and the doctor Started up toward glory's gate, But when passing close to hades The angel murmured: "Wait,

"I've got a place to show you;

It's the hottest place in hell, Where the ones who never paid you In torment always dwell."

And, lo, the doctor there beheld
Old patients by the score.
But when he saw familiar forms
Of those he'd known before

Amid the sad and suffering throng,
And heard their moans and cries,
He could no further go; and tears
Unbidden filled his eyes.

At once he felt a strong impulse
To go to their relief;

For doctors find their greatest joy
In 'suaging pain and grief.

So turning to his angel guide
He said: "You go alone
And join the happy hosts who sing
Around the Great White Throne.

"I'll stay and aid these helpless souls
As strength to me is given;
I'd rather do good deeds in hell
Than wear a crown in heaven."

MOSQUITOES

In the last two issues of CLINICAL MEDICINE we have some items (both complimentary and otherwise) regarding the fly.

As an evidence that we do not show undue favoritism, we print herewith a tribute to the mosquito, contributed by Mr. P. Chalmers Mitchell, F. R. S., to The London Saturday Review. He says:

"I like mosquitoes; they do not creep or run, swarm into food or drink or pour down from the lamp in writhing disablement, but go about their

bloodthirsty business with the clean grace and lively intelligence of a carnivorous, predatory animal. It gives me no horror to be attacked by mosquitoes; they have their annual tribute from me as part of the holiday routine. Some thymol pounded in vaseline for the face and ankles, a little hole scraped with a needle in the white center of a smarting bite and filled with a grain or two of wet table-salt; these are my simple and satisfactory remedies. Confident in them, I find the silvery trumpets in the room blend in a drowsy harmony with the louder singing of the grasshoppers that shrills through the open window. For me mosquitoes are part of the warm South, and I have no heart in the matter of their destruction."

We wish that Mr. Mitchell might "resort" with us some summer, near some of our stagnant streams and quiet lakes, and have an opportunity to commune with a few millions of the real American mosquito with unappeased tourist appetites, so that he might experience the acme of ecstasy of his culexian elysium.

A number of years ago I came to the conclusion that it was rarely necessary to lose a pneumonia patient; yet, reports from hospitals and physicians throughout the country-including our large cities, the centers of teaching and schools of medicine -continue giving us a high mortality-rate, a rate little less than murderous. Many of these professors and authors to whom we, and especially the younger members of our profession, look for guidance, tell us that pneumonia is a self-limited disease, and that medicine is of but little or no use.

"Keep up the strength of the victim: feed, stuff, and give digitalis." That is their litany. As to medicine, they have no faith in its efficacy. Then why do these men pretend to practise medicine, and why, indeed, do they set themselves up as teachers? It is nothing less than humbuggery. Is it that they are too lazy or are incom