indirectly exerted on the superior cervical ganglion. (Archives Générales de Méd., Dec. 1876.) Aspiration in Strangulated Hernia.-M. d'Outrelepont has practised aspiration in two cases of strangulated hernia. The first case was that of a woman, aged forty-eight, who had a femoral hernia that had been strangulated for two days. The taxis had been tried without effect. A puncture was made with the needle of the aspirator (No. 1 Dieulafoy), and about fifty grammes of serosanguineous liquid was withdrawn; the hernial tumour, though softened, could not be reduced. The symptoms calmed down and the patient left the hospital. Six months after the hernia again became strangulated, but this time taxis was applied within twenty-four hours, and reduction was effected. The second case also occurred in a woman, aged forty-eight, affected with crural hernia. A puncture was made with a No. 2 needle, and a quantity of bloody serum removed, smelling strongly fœculent. The hernia could not be reduced. The symptoms continuing, an operation was performed. On opening the sac the contents of the intestine were seen to escape from the opening made by the needle. The stricture was divided, but the intestine was not relieved: the patient died in a fortnight. D'Outrelepont concludes that in small and tense hernia, in which gangrene is apt to supervene early, aspiration ought not to be tried, except during the first few hours. In large herniæ, in which the progress of the malady is not so violent, aspiration may be tried at a more advanced period. (Niederrheinische Gesellschaft f. Natur-und Heilkunde in Bonn, November, and Archives Gén. de Méd. December, 1876.) Antipyretic Action of Cresotinic Acid.-Buss has selected cresotinic Acid, CHO, as an antipyretic agent on à priori grounds (namely, that, like salicylic acid, it is converted into phenol by carbonic acid gas, and that it is formed by the action of carbonic acid upon cresol), and found his anticipation corroborated by experiment. Kolbe has demonstrated its antiseptic properties. Buss employed soda cresotinate in his researches, and observed that doses of two drachms completely removed the congestive stage-an effect which is also produced by salicylic acid; some degree of singing in the ears was noticed for some hours. He considers it to be as effective as quinine. It lowers the temperature and the frequency of both the pulse and respiration. It produces a sudden fall of temperature in fever, whilst the diminution produced by quinine is slow and gradual. (Berlin klin. Wochensch. 1876, No. 3.) Notes and Queries. NOTES AND CORRESPONDENCE. HAY'S AERATED WATERS.-We have received from Mr. Hay, Hull, specimens of soda, potash, and seltzer water, lemonade, and ginger-beer. The two latter are especially good, having the pure flavour of lemon and ginger without the unpleasant taste sometimes perceptible in these beverages. This ginger-beer is made with essential oil from which the resin has been separated, and its taste is thus much improved. Hanbury and Flückiger, in their Pharmacographia, state that it is to the resin that ginger owes its burning taste, but the oil used by Mr. Hay, though pleasanter than the B. P. tincture, with which we have compared it, is still sufficiently pungent to make his ginger-beer slightly stimulant to the stomach as well as the palate. ULCERATION OF THE TONGUE IN HOOPING COUGH.-Dr. Blake informs us that his remarks on this subject in the December number were not intended for publication, but merely to indicate to us that the symptom was not new. Had his notes been intended for publicity he would have had the greatest pleasure in making the amende honorable to the writer he criticised. AUSTIN'S POCKET INHALERS.-These consist of a tube filled with hollow rolls of paper, on which the substance to be inhaled is dropped. One end of the tube being then held to the nose or mouth, air charged with the vapour is inhaled at every breath. They are so small as to go into the waistcoat pocket, yet they appear able to charge the inspired air completely with any desired vapour. LIME-JUICE. We have received from Messrs. Evans, Lescher and Evans, a sample of lime-fruit juice, which appears to us to be of excellent quality. It has a purely acid and aromatic taste, without any of the mawkish flavour which lime-juice sometimes has. Bibliography. Introduction of the Metrical System into Opthalmology. By E. Landolt, M.D. 8vo. pp. 30. 1s. 6d. London: Churchill. Statistics of Vaccination at the Greenwich Station. By John P. Purvis, M.R.C.S. 8vo. pp. 30. 1s. 6d. London: Churchill. Public Health a Concise Sketch of the Sanitary Considerations connected with the Land, with Cities, Houses, and Individuals. By Edmund A. Parkes, M.D., revised by William Aitken, M.D. Crown 8vo. pp. 80. 2s. 6d. London: Churchill. Post-Mortem Examinations, and How to Perform Them. By Professor Rudolf Virchow. Fcap. 8vo. pp. 86. 2s. 6d. London: Churchill. A Manual of Percussion and Auscultation: of the Physical Diagnosis of Diseases of the Lungs and Heart, and of Thoracic Aneurism. By Austin Flint, M.D. Post 8vo. pp. 255. 6s. 6d. London: Churchill. Lectures on Orthopaedic Surgery. Second Edition. By Bernard E. Brodhurst, F.R.C.S. 8vo. pp. 268. 12s. 6d. London: Churchill. The Climate of Jamaica. By James C. Phillippo, M.D. Crown 8vo. pp. 82. 3s. 6d. A Systematic Handbook of Volumetric Analysis, &c. Third Edition. By Thomas Sutton, F.C.S. 8vo. pp. 430. 15s. London : Churchill. Chemia Coartata; or, The Key to Modern Chemistry. By J. Cecil Kollmyer, M.D. Roy. 8vo. pp. 111. 7s. 6d. London : Churchill. Clinical Lecture on a Case of Cataract Extraction. By Charles Bell Taylor, M.D. 8vo. pp. 16. 1s. London: Churchill. Manual of Dental Anatomy, Human and Comparative. By Charles S. Tomes, M.A., M.R.C.S. Crown 8vo. pp. 406. 10s. 6d. London Churchill. : * Any of the foreign works may be procured on application to Messrs. Dulau, of Soho Square, W.C.;-WILLIAMS and NORGATE, of Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, W.C.; or BAILLIÈRE, of King William Street, Charing Cross. Department of Public Health. NINE PROPOSITIONS BEARING ON THE ETIOLOGY AND PROPHYLAXIS OF CHOLERA, DEDUCED FROM THE OFFICIAL REPORTS OF THE CHOLERA-EPIDEMIC IN EAST INDIA AND NORTH AMERICA. BY DR. MAX VON PETTENKOFER, II. THIRD PROPOSITION. Cholera dejecta coming in contact with and drying upon any objects, such as articles of clothing, bedding, and furniture, will retain indefinitely their power of infection. That in this manner a sure transmissibility of the cholera infection is effected, and that a distinct outbreak of the disease may occur by such means at great distance from the seat of original infection. McClellan commences his proofs with the unanimous expression of opinion made by the Cholera Conference in 1874 in Vienna to this effect: "Cholera can be transmitted by personal effects coming from an infected place, especially such as have served for the sick from cholera; and certain facts show that the disease can be carried to a distance by these effects if shut up so as to prevent free contact with the air." 1 As I was a member of the conference, and have agreed to this, I may state how I was able thus to vote without abandoning my 1 Procès Verbaux de la Conférence Internationale Ouverte à Vienne, le 1 Juillet, 1874, p. 30. localistic stand-point. I still agree with the proposition of the Vienna conference, but I contest McClellan's third proposition upon the grounds that may be found on pages 27 and 28 of the minutes of the conference. The resolution of the Vienna conference states two facts which may be accepted alike by contagionists and localists. 1. That cholera is transportable from one place to another. 2. That this transportation frequently takes place by the agency both of persons who have suffered from the disease and by those who are healthy. But that the disease can be transported from a focus of infection by those who remain healthy is not doubted even by the contagionists. On the contagionistic view the infectious material proceeds only from cholera patients, whilst for those who hold the localistic view it proceeds from the cholera locality. The reason that something infectious is connected with the sick rather than with the healthy is simply due to the fact that the sick come relatively more frequently than the healthy from infected localities and from the foci of infection of a locality otherwise generally infected. Daily experience shows that even in severely affected towns the several houses are not attacked in equal proportion, and many are not attacked at all. Those who leave true foci of infection consequently not only bring with them more easily and oftener infectious material, but also sicken more frequently during or after the journey, than those who come from the non-infected houses of a place. The latter do not sicken upon the journey even when they have the requisite predisposition to the disease, for they have neither had the opportunity of becoming affected nor of carrying with them the infectious material or germ. I contest McClellan's third proposition, because he considers the dejecta of cholera patients to be requisite for the transportation of the disease, whilst I regard them as wholly innocuous. It may be admitted perhaps that the local infectious material may be better preserved and further transported in such excreta, but they themselves do not constitute the infectious material derived from the sick. The experiment made and adduced by Macnamara cannot be regarded by any inquirer as a proof that in the desiccated excreta of cholera patients there is any infecting power. Macnamara, who is McClellan's highest authority, has |