after the injury, with well-formed lines of demarcation, the posterior part of the limb, as high as the middle of the thigh, being in a state of moist gangrene, it was resolved to amputate.

The parts were most favorably disposed for the anterior flap operation, the gangrene having spared much of the anterior tissues of the leg and thigh. Accordingly, assisted by Dr. James S. Carpenter, I transfixed the thigh anteriorly at its middle third, and carried the knife down close to the bone, until it nearly reached the knee, where I completed the flap. A perpendicular cut was next made posteriorly, dividing everything down to the bone, on a level with the base of the anterior flap. After removing the bone, and tying the arteries, the flap was drawn over the bone, and united posteriorly by interrupted sutures.

The progress toward cure was perfectly uninterrupted, and the results are, as may be seen, highly satisfactory."

III. OBSTETRIC.-Dr. Theo. B. Castle, of New Philadelphia, furnishes the following:

"There has been considerable tendency to puerperal fever during the year. The cases seen by me were nearly all of a mild character, yielding to brisk mercurial purges and full doses of opium. One case of uterine phlebitis was rapidly fatal. Symptoms-protracted chill; high fever; tremors of the muscles of the face; dry, brown tongue; vomiting; rapid, weak pulse; incoherence; coma; rapid exhaustion; lochia suppressed; abdomen not tympanitic; no pain, except on pressure from the iliac regions upon the uterus; veins of right leg and of the popliteal space hard and cord-like to the touch; femoral vein normal; right leg painful, if moved, not otherwise.

I have had one case of prolapse of the funis during the year. The cord was well down in the vagina, the head engaged, and the labor very active when I arrived; consequently I did nothing save to notify the parties interested that the child was lost."

Late in the year I had a few cases of puerperal fever which recovered under the usual treatment. Two cases of puerperal convulsions recovered under bleeding, purgatives, and anæsthetics."

Dr. John T. Carpenter reports statistics for the year as follows:

Puerperal convulsions, 3. Prolapsus funis, 1. Adh. placenta, 1.

Chloroform was administered in thirty-six cases, in quantities from one-half to three ounces. No unpleasant symptoms, or any after troubles traceable to its use, have occurred to make me regret its habitual employment in severe labors.

The forceps have been used freely in over forty-two per cent. of the cases. To make it apparent that no undue haste was made, I have constructed the subjoined table of the duration of these labors :

It is to be noted that the use of chloroform to relieve suffering, and the forceps to shorten labor, go together. No death occurred in my obstetric practice during the year, and of the five dead-born children at term, two were lost by puerperal eclampsia, one by prolapsed funis, one is the case of defective development reported above, and the last died, before labor came on, from causes to me unknown. The forceps, in my hands, have been the means of saving many children who would otherwise have been stillborn; and without permission to employ chloroform in every case of severe labor, I would scarcely be willing to practise midwifery."

OFFICERS AND MEMBERS.

President.-Dr. JAMES S. CARPENTER.
Vice-President.-Dr. JOHN G. KOEHLER.

Corresponding Secretary.-Dr. GEORGE W. BROWN.
Recording Secretary.-Dr. CHARLES T. PALMER.
Treasurer.-Dr. D. WEBSTER BLAND.

REPORT OF THE VENANGO COUNTY MEDICAL SOCIETY.

VENANGO lies next to the most western range of counties of the State, adjoining Crawford and Warren on the north, Forest and Clarion on the east, Clarion and Butler on the south, Mercer and Crawford on the West.

Venango County was taken from Alleghany and Lycoming Counties, by an act of Assembly passed March 12th, 1800, and was organized for judicial purposes by act of April 1st, 1805. In 1839, Clarion County was organized from a portion of its eastern territory. The county now forms a very irregular figure, with many angles, and contains about 850 square miles.

The population is about 75,000. The surface of the county is rather broken and rough. The Alleghany River flows nearly through the centre of the county, but such is the structure of the land that it runs toward every point of the compass in its course through the county. Bituminous coal is found in the southern, western, and central portions, and almost in every portion; the hills and high lands abound in iron ore of good quality.

The streams are all rapid and subject to frequent and sudden floodings, inundating the adjacent flats. The Alleghany River and French Creek are the principal streams. The fall in the Alleghany averages about five and a third feet per mile. Besides the Alleghany and French Creek, there are numerous other streams. The most important is Oil Creek, entering the Alleghany seven miles above Franklin. Its tributaries are Cherry Run, Cherry Tree Run, and Cornplanters Run, Horse Creek, eleven miles above Franklin, Pithole Creek, sixteen miles, and Hemlock Creek, twenty-one miles above Franklin. Below Franklin, and flowing into the Alleghany, we have East Sandy, Big Sandy, and Scrubgrass Creeks. As tributaries of French Creek, we have Sugar Creek, Mill Creek, and Deer Creek. Some of these names, although belonging to insignificant streams, are familiar terms from Maine to the great West.

Franklin City, the county seat of Venango County, is located seventy miles above Pittsburg by canal, and about double that dis