ARTICLE XIV.

On the Internal Use of Turpentine Oil in Cases of Hemorrhage. By L. PERCY, M. D.

The author, after noticing the fact that several writers— Adair, Nicol, Johnson, Warneck, Copland, Ashwell, and Pereira-have spoken of the efficacy of the essential oil of turpentine in hemorrhagic diseases, observes that this remedy seems nevertheless to be little used by practitioners. In the cases in which he first made trial of it, hæmaturia of two years' standing, in an old man of eighty, was stopped in 24 hours by eight drops of oil of turpentine, and did not return. He has since used it in cases of hemorrhage, and always with a favorable result. The cases in which its use is indicated are those of passive hemorrhage. It must not not be employed in cases where there is an active determination of blood, and where the pulse is full. When the discharge of blood is the cause of organic disease, as of disease of the uterus, or of tubercular disease of the lungs, the action of the remedy is not so efficacious; but the author has seen a case of scirrhus of the womb, in which the hemorrhage was for some time stopped by this remedy. The author has found the action of turpentine oil very rapid, an effect being manifest in a few hours, often after one small dose. In order to better ascertain its power, he used it alone, without having recourse to local astringents or cold applications, where he could do so without fear of endangering the life of the patient. He has used it most frequently in cases of menorrhagia and epistaxis; but he mentions, that it appears to him to be particularly applicable in cases of hemorrhage attending typhus. He noticed the fact that turpentine exerts different actions on the body according as it is taken in large or small doses, being more readily absorbed in the latter case; as he remarks, that as its beneficial action in cases of hemorrhage must depend on its being absorbed, the inference would be drawn, that the doses in which it is given in such cases ought to be small. His experience confirms this conclusion. He has always found a dose of from eight to thirty, drops sufficient. The best vehicle for it is almond emulsion, with a little gum arabic. When there is pain in the abdomen, a few drops of laudanum may be added.-London Med. Gazette in Ibid.

ARTICLE XV.

Remarks on the Bearing of some Modern Doctrines of Pathology and Animal Chemistry on the Treatment of Tubercular Consumption. By E. J. MARSH, M. D.

Tubercular Consumption has always claimed and received a large share of the time and attention of the profession; the wide extent of its ravages, the insidious nature of its approach, the character of its victims, the usual fatality of its attack, and the confessed inability of medicinal agents even to stay its progress, have all contributed to invest this malady with a high degree of interest both for the profession and laypublic; and every attempt to throw light upon its nature and treatment, has been received with kindness and attention.

Some recent investigations and discoveries of European pathologists and chemists appear to me to have a bearing upon this subject, and I have thought that a brief statement of these doctrines and facts with inferences drawn from them, may not be without interest and profit.

Bennet, and other morbid anatomists have stated as the result of numerous dissections, that cicatrices of ulcers of the lungs were found more frequently in the bodies of spirit-drinkers dying of other diseases than phthisis, than in persons of different habits. These cicatrices were proofs of the existence of former cavities which had become healed up; and they were met with, and that not rarely, for the most part in persons who had been spirit-drinkers, proving conclusively that ulcers of the lungs may become healed.

It is well known that the blood is more highly arterialized and abounds more in fibrine in phthisis pulmonalis than in most other disorders of the economy; and this condition of the blood continues through the whole course of the disease, when it proceeds to a fatal termination. Rokinstansky, one of the most profound and distinguished of the German pathologists, states that tuberculosis depends upon a fibrinous trasis of the blood, and that all attempts at staying the procress of the disease will be vain and futile, unless this condigon of the blood be changed: and that if this crisis of the tilood be changed the disease will be checked, and in many eases the ulcers will heal, It has long been known to practibal physicians, that certain conditions of the system suspendcd the progress of consumption, as pregnancy; and that cercain diseases such as chronic bronchial affections, and some

diseases of the heart prevented or stayed the pulmonary affection. The cause of this has not been well understood, and has received different explanations. Rokinstansky states that these conditions and diseases present mechanical obstacles to the transmission of the blood through the lungs, and prevent its arterialization, keeping it in a venous condition. This venosity of the blood prevents the formation of that fibrinous crasis, on which the developement and deposit of tuberculous matter depends.

Intermittent fever also prevents the developement of tuberculosis, probably by some action on the blood, as this poison appears to exert a specific effect on the liver and spleen, organs particularly connected with the venous circulation.

To prevent or cure tuberculosis, it should be our endeavor to change the fibrinous condition of the vital fluid; and causes which produce and maintain a venosity of the blood, will effect this.

It has been proved by the experiments and facts of Brodie, Paris, and others, that alcoholic drinks taken into the stomach, pass undecomposed by absorption, or endosmose, into the blood vessels, and circulates in a free state of the blood.

Leibig, our highest authority in animal chemistry, states that alcohol circulating in the blood unites with the oxygen in that fluid, and forms with it carbonic acid, keeping it in a venous state, and preventing that fibrinous crasis which is the origin of tuberculosis; carbonic acid, it is well known, is the element which causes the venosity of the blood. Such are the results of the investigations of different and independent laborers in the vineyard of truth. Bennet finds that tuberculous cavities are found more frequently healed in the lungs of spirit-drinkers than of any other class; Rokinstansky shows that an altered condition of the blood is necessary for the cure of tuberculosis, and that this altered condition is a state of venosity; and Leibig teaches that the alcohol which spiritdrinkers take into the stomach passes into the blood vessels, and there uniting with oxygen forms carbonic acid, and produces a venous condition of that fluid.

Without wishing to give any countenance to intemperance, ay I not ask the profession, whether in view of these stateents, the total prohibition of spirituous drinks to all persons, pecially to those pre-disposed to tubercles, is not likely to attended with ill effects?

Whether the moderate use of alcoholic drinks ought not to e recommended to persons disposed to consumption, and

the more free use of them be recommended to persons laboring under the disease?

Whether consumption of the lungs be not more prevalent than formerly, and whether the disease be not increasing in those communities, and among those persons who most strictly abstain from all spirituous beverages?

Whether the fibrinous condition of the blood can be altered by any system of diet?

Paterson, June, 1848.

[New Jersey Med. Reporter.

Two new medical schools have been advertised to go into operation the present fall in the North-West; one at Rock Island, Illinois, and the other at Iowa city, Iowa; and we hear that it is proposed soon to establish one at Indianapolis, Ind., and one at Ann Arbor, Michigan. Neither of these points presents the advantages of a Hospital in which might be given clinical instruction; nor is it probable that any of them save, perhaps, Indianapolis, can have facilities for prosecuting the study of practical Anatomy, sufficient to justify a dissecting class of twenty-five students.

Then, in reference to the demand for them by the profession, it certainly cannot be found far beyond the learned few who enter into the faculties, and we think a few years' experience will teach them that the demand that is thus created upon their time and means will more than compensate for any urgency in the necessity for the schools.

The history of all efforts to sustain medical schools in small towns, shows that it is done, if done at all, at great expense and by the most labored exertions. And even when with these they attain to any degree of prosperity, it is quite transient. Look at the school at Fairfield, New York. Although having a strong faculty, the disadvantages of the site were such as to cause its suspension. Look at the Willoughby Medical School in Ohio. It struggled on through many years and finally removed to a larger town. We might enume

rate many others.

Nor is this all. Men of good abilities are not much disposed to continue a lame institution, even in a large town.