when the soft parts sloughed off, it left a large hole, with nearly all of the cheek gone. The bowels were constipated, skin dry and hot, pulse from 100 to 125 in a minute, with restlessness, and a con stant thirst. Treatment.

B Ol. Terebinth,
Ol. Sassafras,

Tr. Myrrh,

Tr. Opii,

3ss.

3ij,

3i,

3ii.

All well shook up, and applied on the outside, by wetting cotton as often as it dried in, and applied to the inside of the mouth, diluted with a strong decoction of the inner bark of the root of Sumach, until the effect of the mercury was checked, after which I applied slippery elm poultice, until the soft parts sloughed off, and then I used the black healing plaster, until it was well. My internal remedies were as follows: I gave senna and manna in decoction, with sulphur, until it operated well as a cathartic, which discharged a large quantity of black fecal matter, very offensive, which continued for several days before it became anything like natural stools. Then I gave diaphoretic powders until the fever ceased, after which I gave mild tonics and sulphur, to keep the bowels open.

When I saw her last, some two years since, she had enjoyed good health, with the exception, that whenever she took cold her gums would become sore, and that she had a deformed face, which she will carry to her grave.

I can recommend the above course of treatment without the least hesitation, for I have used the same ever since, and I never knew it to fail where it had a thorough trial."

ECLECTIC PRACTICE.

WILLIAMSPORT, Pike Co., O., Dec. 17, 1849.

Prof. T. V. Morrow:

When I returned home last spring from your able lectures, to spend the summer in perusing my notes and books, I found my preceptor unable to ride, so in the place of reading theories, I went to practicing. Since that time I have treated upwards of three hundred cases of disease, and many that were thought to be incurable. Among the incurable (so called) diseases, I have treated four cases of cancer, and one of rattlesnake bite. On the last of June I was called to see Amos Howard's child, that had been bitten by a rattlesnake some five hours before. When I got there, her leg was very much swollen. She was bitten on the fibular side of the right ankle; the foot and ankle were so distended that it appeared it would burst; it was of a purplish blue color, dry and husky. The child was in great pain, with some little nausea at the stomach. I well remembered hearing Prof. Hill speak of the Philadelphia M. D.'s letting one of their faculty die, after that

monster had stuck his fang into his flesh. I thought of the Doctor's treatment. I first scarified and cupped; then I directed a poultice of plantain and catnip, and to give a tea of the same, with the addition of broken doses of Lobelia and Sanguinaria, (my preceptor has cured several cases that were given up to die, with the Sanguinaria.) The family were much alarmed, but I told them not to be scared, I would cure her. In three days she was up, in six days was well.

I cured a lady in Circleville, of cancer, who had it cut first out of her breast, and in place of one, three returned, one under the arm, and two in the breast. They were taken out by a Reformer, with caustic, but he gave no constitutional treatment, and within three months after he left, four returned, three in the breast, and one under the arm.

I commenced the treatment with but little faith, but knowing there was great efficacy in the Eclectic system, I followed it up as you taught me to do, and succeeded. It has been some four months since I extracted the last one; no symptoms of any return exist. She thinks she is cured for the first time. I have had some 50 cases of Diarrhoea and Dysentery. Out of these I lost one patient; and about the same number of cases of intermittents with entire suceess. I will not give all the cases here; suffice to say, I have lost but this one case myself. I attended a young man that died through neglect, but he was under the treatment of Dr. Griswold, an Allopathist, when he died. G. W. HURST.

CHOLERA REMEDY.

Dr. BENEDICT, of Bloomington, Indiana, writes as follows:

"I see much said in the Journal on cholera medicines, but there is a superior remedy for diarrhoea, growing in the length and breadth of the land, of which I see no mention. That is Redbud. My cholera mixture, which has won for itself an unparalleled fame, was thus formed: Redbud root, four bushels, or of the bark of the root one bushel; Dewberry root, half a bushel; Cranesbill, (Geranium Mac.) one peck; Witch hazel leaves one bushelboil till all the strength is extracted; strain, and boil down to three gallons-add one gallon best sugar house molasses, one gallon best brandy, and one gallon No. 6, (Thomsonian.) Of this mixture

I have sold, since July 7th, upwards of sixteen gallons, nor has it failed to put a final check to diarrhoea, flux, and summer complaints. This compound possesses one advantage over every other I have ever used, and I have used some. It leaves the bowels in a healthy state, the succeeding discharge always being of a healthy character. Of this I could get hundreds of certificates, among which is Elder J. M. Mathes, Editor of Christian Record, and Tribune and Farmer. Dose from a table-spoonful to two ounces, according to the urgency of the case."

Part 2.---Miscellaneous Selections.

SIMPSON ON ANESTHESIA.

Anesthesia, or the Employment of Chloroform and Ether in Surgery, Midwifery, etc. etc. By J. T. SIMPSON, M. D., F. R. S., E. Prof. Midwifery in the University of Edinburg, Physician Accoucheur to the Queen in Scotland, &c. &c. 1 vol. 8vo. pp. 248. Philadelphia, Lindsay and Blakiston, 1849.

More than two years ago, Dr. Forbes, in a very able article in the British and Foreign Review, wrote as follows-and every operator who uses these agents confirms his account—

For the purpose of obtaining information on all the points of this most interesting subject, we personally questioned all the patients in the London hospitals, who at the period of our visits, still remained in the wards after the ether operations. They were in all fifty-four, and the great majority had been the subjects of capital operations. They were unanimous in their expressions of delight and gratitude, at having been relieved from their diseases without suffering. In listening to their reports it was not always easy to remain unmoved under the influence of the conceptions thereby communicated, of the astonishing contrast between the actual physical condition of the mangled body in its apparent tortures on the operating table of a crowded theatre, and the really happy mental state of the patient at the time. The old story of the magician in the Arabian Tales seemed more than realized before us, the ether being like the tub of water, one moment's dip of the head into which, produced a life-long vision in the dreamer's mind.

But, furthermore it is asserted that not only does the use of anesthetics abolish the pain attendant on surgical operations, which, we repeat, is no "trivial matter," but that it conduces largely to the restoration of the patient, and gives him a better chance of ultimate recovery. The proof of this is two-fold. First, the authority of a multitude of intelligent, experienced and candid observers concurring in the assertion, that after severe operations, the constitutional disturbance is less and convalescence more rapid in patients who have been etherized, than in those who have not: and second, statistics of a sufficient number of cases to render this view of the case extremely probable, though, of course, not absolutely certain.

Chapter V. of the work now under notice, is headed "Value and Necessity of the Numerical Method of Investigation as applied to Surgery"-and chapter VI. contains some interesting statistics in regard to etherization. We wish we could transfer both of them in full to our pages-we are sure they would amply repay perusal; but we must content ourselves with the concluding pages of the latter:

No. VI.-Table of the Mortality of 618 Amputations of the Thigh, Leg and arm, without Etherization, performed during the last few years in 30 British Hospitals.

No. VII.-Table of the Mortality of 302 Amputations of the Thigh, Leg, and arm, under Etherization.

Seat

of

PRIMARY.

SECONDARY.

Amputation No. of No. of Per-centage No. of No. of Per centage Cases Deaths of Deaths Cases Deaths of Deaths

I shall now proceed to contrast these results with the results of the same operations in the same class of hospitals, and when performed upon patients not in an etherized state.

Before doing so, however, let me observe in passing, that the data I have adduced in Tables No. I. and V., (pp. 72, 76) have been objected to, on the ground that they are collected from too many different hospitals, and too many different sources. But, on the contrary, I believe all our highest statistical authorities will hold that this very circumstance renders them more, instead of less trustworthy. Professor Chomel of Paris, after pointing out the first requisite for a successful statistical comparison of therapeutic or other results-viz: a sufficient similarity between the number of collated cases-adds, as the second condition, "that the data be numerous, collected at different times, in different places, and, if possible, by several observers. It is easily seen (he adds) that the results of a number of facts too limited, collected in a short space of time, in a single place, and by a single observer, however exact as regards that individual series of data, may yet be very different from, or even the reverse of conclusions drawn from a larger series, and one collected under various circumstances."

COMPARISON OF THE MORTALITY FOLLOWING THE LARGER AMPUTA

TIONS OF THE LIMBS, 1. WITHOUT, AND 2. WITH ETHERIZATION The major amputations of the limbs, including those of the thigh, leg, and arm, are generally fatal in hospital practice in the proportion of about one in every two or three operated upon. In the Parisian hospitals, the fatality according to Malgaigne, amounts to upwards of one in two. In Glasgow, it is two and a half. In British hospitals, I found that under these amputations one in three and a half died. The same operations, performed in the same hospitals, and upon the same class of patients, in an anesthetic state, present a mortality of 23 in 100, or 1 in 4, only. The following table shows the amount of the individual cases, and the percentage of death in the different collections, with the corresponding proportion of deaths in those operated on in an etherized state. No. VIII.-Table of the Mortality of Amputations of the Thigh, Leg, and Arm.