so highly commended by others. As a general tonic and stimulant, quinine is invaluable in continued fevers, where the head will bear it but so far as I have observed, it has never appeared to shorten the attack. SCARLATINA.-The indication for treatment in scarlet fever, here and everywhere, is, to obviate the great tendency to sink, where the disease is at all severe, usually manifested from the first. Stimulants seem admissible from the very beginning, to prepare the system for the coming struggle, and to assist it in treasuring up strength for the more advanced stages of the disease. Where there is a sudden and violent tendency to swell about the glands of the throat, it may frequently be avoided by the application of blisters; while in cases not marked by such peculiar energy, a plaster of camphorated mercurial ointment will answer every purpose. The scarlet fever has paid us, in the winter just past, its annual visit. Its prevalence here, is not, however, comparable to what it was in Boston and New York. Nor, indeed, has its appearance been marked by the disastrous fatality, with which it ravaged those cities. Although the cases have been more numerous this season than at any former time, there has been a marked decrease in the number of deaths. This seems to be attributable to the mild form which characterized the complaint, rather than to any radical change in the treatment. From what I have been able to learn from my brethren in the profession, their practice has not varied materially from the prescribed system-nor can I find that the new theory of belladonna has made any considerable progress among them. MEASLES, as I before observed, have been so uniformly mild this winter as to require simply to be left alone. PNEUMONIA. The lancet is, for the most part, admissible in our pneumonia and bronchitis in their acute form. I have known, however, that singular typhoid feature to accompany the disease, which has baffled the skill of the profession from Bangor to New Orleans, in which bleeding was but the prelude to rapid and inevitable dissolution. We have not had this type of the disease here for several years-and before that period, not within my memory. I have had to encounter it elsewhere,' however, in its most virulent form, and 1 In Somerset County, on the Eastern Shore. consider it the most uncompromising and malignant disease the physician can ever be called upon to combat. CONSUMPTION. The weekly bills of mortality show a marked diminution in the number of deaths from that fell destroyer-consumption. This fact is referable in all probability to the continued character of the weather, which, during the past winter, has undergone fewer thermometrical and hygrometrical changes than are. usually seen in our climate, in that season. Some of our physicians are beginning to adopt the theory, that consumptives fare better in an atmosphere regularly cold and dry, than in that which is warmer—such an one, for instance, as Havana. This question, however, must be left for time and future observations to settle. There have been fewer cases of croup, this winter, than I have ever known. This exemption is clearly owing to the great cold which has effectually closed the doors against open-air enjoyment and exposure of children. Joined to this fact, is the remarkable dryness of the air, and the prevalence of northwesterly winds. We had but few of those days significantly called weather-breeders, which may be termed so many premiums offered by him of the pale horse, upon the lives of our juvenile population. The cases of pneumonia and bronchitis have also been rare from the same cause, nor have they commanded the attention of the profession previous to the melting of the great snow, which wrapped the earth in vapor, and bore heavily upon the lungs. We have other diseases, to be sure-but those above mentioned are all that seem to me to deserve special attention. The temperature in the month of June, 1856, averaged above 80° Fah.; observations being taken at 12 M., in all cases. There was much rain, in the ratio of one day in four. July. The average was higher-about 85°-for the most part clear. August was singularly equable, average 74°, rising but once as high as 78°. September descended in the scale, having an average of 69°, a cool and clear month. October averaged 62°, for the most part clear weather. November came down to 46°, average, for the most part, clear. 90 REPORT ON TOPOGRAPHY AND EPIDEMICS OF MD. dashes, with occasional rain. For the most part clear and excessively cold. February rises considerably higher, attaining the average of 46°, generally clear, and milder than the same month of last year. E. G. WATERS, M. D. BALTIMORE, Feb., 1856. |