against capital, for it is here that its carelessness, rapacity, and greed, show themselves at the worst.

There are rampant in the profession many false notions regarding the proper feeding of the sick. When I first began my medical career, almost every person who had a fever got whisky and beef-tea-starvation diet, so far as the latter is concerned, unless something additional be given. Beef-tea, as such, I never prescribe, but order prepared what is known as essence of beef. My cooking recipe is very simple, to wit: Take a choice piece of beef, wash it and throw away the water, next place it over a very gentle fire, sufficient to warm it through, then cut the beef into small squares, and let the lemon-squeezer do the rest.

Now, you must concede that we have a great mortality among our children-is the adjective "fearful" too strong to express its dimensions? I scarcely think so. Wherein lies the root of the evil? I answer, in the abject ignorance of the parents. Why I have known a child, who was hardly able to hold himself up without being cushioned with a pillow, given beef, and a mouthful or two of potato, all duly moistened with beer! "Oh, it won't hurt him," says the mother, "I always bring up my babies that way." There seems to be in such instances a disposition to evolute these atoms of humanity as rapidly as possible into maturity. But, unfortunately, the penalty falls upon "the innocents." The rule that no child should have anything stronger than milk until it has all its teeth may be conceded, but it is seldom observed, as it should be, to the letter.

Perhaps it may be not strictly relevant, but then I beg to be excused on the score of its importance, if I refer to the matter of clothing the infant. My rule is to have the new-born child put into flannel as soon as it is washed; this method of equalizing the body-temperature I would, if possible, have continued through the period when diarrhoeas are imminent; attention to this little matter will rob the grave of many a victim. If the diarrhoea is taking on a chronic form, and the fashionable mother has already discarded the use of flannel in the case of her child, then I advise recourse to a bandage made of the material mentioned, to be applied with a moderate degree of snugness. My next step, then, is to insist that fresh milk be the exclusive diet, and, mind you-no meat, no vegetables.

As we know that milk and butter are most powerful absorbents of atmospheric impurities, I insist that due precautions be taken. I do not allow the milk to be put into refrigerators; I instruct the mother to deposit the pitcher or bottle upon a piece of ice, enveloped in flannel.

In dysentery, I rely upon the subnitrate of bismuth-grs. v to grs. x-given as an enema as often as there is an evacuation; and, when there is pain, add the tincture of opium in small doses; but, above all, I look well to the diet. The polypharmacists may smile, but you save the children.

DR. C. G. POMEROY, of Wayne County.-Will the last speaker favor us with his views upon the dietetic value of oatmeal in weak digestion ?

DR. GARRISH.-Oatmeal I do not recommend. If we eat our three meals, and nothing between, with an eye to variety in the menu, in my opinion we answer all proper cravings of the appetite. I do not see any necessity for a habit which requires so much assiduous cultivation.

DR. POMEROY.-I desire to say that it is fashionable now to prescribe oatmeal. The epidemic commenced only a few years ago, and I have always opposed it. I was very much gratified last winter in finding no less a man than Professor Roberts Bartholow condemning it in toto, as being inimical to all weak digestive organs.

DR. DARWIN COLVIN, of Wayne County.-A word on this oatmeal question. For fifteen years my health has been poor, but for more than two years past I have eaten oatmeal and milk twice a day. This has been an inflexible rule, and I must say that I have not been in better health for ten years. With Dr. Garrish, then, I fully coincide, except with reference to oatmeal.

Now, as regards milk, it is told that the famous Professor Meigs once said to a lady, "Your child has no teeth; you ought to know that a child should have nothing but milk until it has its full set of teeth." I do not object to the use of barley-water, in health or in intestinal irritation.

I must protest against giving cathartics in intestinal catarrh, with all due deference to my friend who has read so good a paper, but I can not refrain from asking him why keep up a peristalsis when the indications are for rest as nearly absolute as possible?

I propose an easy solution to some of the problems. I would not allow a child to go to the table with its parents. I have in mind a woman who kept this rule until her children were three years old, and no larger or more robust men are now to be found in Wayne County.

DR. WILLIAM GILLIS, of Franklin County.-I hope in the consideration of this subject that we do not lose sight of the appetite, which ought to be a trustworthy guide. As in debate we are not expected to agree, so pardon me for my flat-footed statement that oatmeal under ordinary circumstances is, perhaps, the best food for man. I will refer you to my own condition. I am a Scotchman, fed on oatmeal from my birth, and, without vaunting my prowess, have, perhaps, as much muscular energy as any man in the Association. Still, I think in children with weak digestive organs oatmeal is not a proper food. As a laxative in that form of indigestion in which constipation is a marked feature, it has no superior.

DR. ISAAC G. COLLINS, of Westchester County.-We have had an individual instance of the efficacy of the use of oatmeal, and I should like to draw a national one. Let us look at the Scotch, fed on oatmeal; at the Irish, fed on potato; and then at the English, fed on beef and ale. None of them are contemptible as specimens of humanity; none of them are puny, weak, and emaciated. All of them seem to be well-nourished; in fact, they thrive upon the food best adapted to their habits and condition. Acclimation, heredity, and the kindred factors, have done all that was necessary to enable all these races to maintain their foothold upon the globe. It may be that the familiar doctrine of "the survival of the fittest" comes into play, and that those who can not withstand the severest tests early fall out of the line, or at least do not have the opportunity to perpetuate their kind. May we not lay it down as an axiom that what we eat with a gusto is most likely to do us good? We have to trust our stomachs just a little at least. May we not say with truth, that the question between the demands of a given constitution and the proper food-supply can never be settled? I can not indorse Dr. Jamison's paper as a whole, although most, perhaps all, of his suggestions are excellent.

DR. JAMISON. A part of my paper seems to have been misunderstood. The Fellows will notice that in speaking of the use of

the compound extract of colocynth I referred to chronic cases merely, where the mucous membrane had been so changed that, to use a common word, it was "numb," and you would have to use powerful measures to excite peristalsis.

In regard to oatmeal, I do not pretend to feed it to a child under a year old. The pancreatic organ is not developed enough to throw out its diastatic fluid at that stage of life.

A CURSORY REVIEW OF THE EPIDEMIC AND
ENDEMIC DISEASES OF SULLIVAN
COUNTY DURING THE LAST
THIRTY-FOUR YEARS.

BY ISAAC PURDY, M. D., of Sullivan County.

Read November 18, 1886.

HAVING been committed by a promise, which I feel compelled to fulfill, albeit at least to me in an unsatisfactory manner, but, perhaps, what may seem unimportant to me may be of some value to the Association, I therefore present a brief history of certain personal experiences. As the title of my paper foreshadows, you can not expect more than a cursory review.

In the early part of my career of general practitioner, which began in 1851, most, if not all, the diseases were of an inflammatory, or as you may choose to style them, of a sthenic type. The views of the profession have since undergone some change, so that what I may have to say may not pass unchallenged, but, as the form of our constitution is essentially republican, I am privileged to state my convictions without fear or favor. My methods of treatment may savor of the antique, but you must admit that they were a reflex of the times, and that, therefore, I may have merely clinically adopted what I had been solemnly taught as constituting the only legitimate way, from which there could be no departure. I found pneumonia, pleurisy, quinsy (now regarded by some as essentially rheumatic), meningitis, and peritonitis common, and I treated them by the free use of the lancet, cathartics, emetics, and blisters. I also affected small doses of calomel, and believe me that my therapeutic axioms gave good returns for my fidelity-may I not say that my success was marked? Fever commonly designated as bilious remittent prevailed, the type, however, was continued, and may be rec