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Materia Medica and Therapeutics, including the Preparations of the Pharmacopoeias of London, Edinburgh, Dublin, and [of the United States,] with many new medicines. By J. FORBES ROYLE, M. D., F. R. S., late of the Medical Staff of the Bengal Army, Member of the Medical and Chirurgical Society of London, of the Medical and Physical Society of Calcutta, and,the Royal Medical Society of Edinburgh, &c., Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeutics, King's College, London. Edited by Joseph Carson, M. D., Professor of Materia Medica in the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, Member of the American Philosophical Society, &c., &c., with ninety eight illustrations. 8vo. pp. 689. Philadelphia, 1847. Lea & Blanchard.

Of the various works that have from time to time appeared on materia medica on the plan of the one before us, there is none more deserving of commendation. From the examination which we have given, accuracy and perspicuity seem to characterize it throughout, and as a book of reference to the student of medicine, and especially of pharmacy in its applications to medicine, none could be better. But arranged as the lectures are in our medical schools, with sessions of a duration of not longer than four months each, it would manifestly be impossible for a professor on materia medica and therapeutics to embrace the relations which drugs bear to other subjects than medicine proper; and hence the best constant accompaniment to a course of lectures on materia medica and therapeutics in our schools is one that treats of the articles as medicines chiefly. In this relation we would not place Dr. Royle's work in the very first rank, to which position it is unquestionably entitled amongst treatises which are more adapted perhaps for the pharmaceutist than the physician.

From the station, which Dr. Royle occupied in the East India service, he was enabled to collect a vast amount of information in regard to the natural and commercial history of various drugs, on which but little precise knowledge was possessed previously; and every future work on materia medica and pharmacyevery new edition of dispensatories-must be esteemed imperfect, unless it shall have culled extensively from the valuable materials contained in his pages. Dr. Royle adopts the natural ar

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rangement, and treats, in succession, of the operations of pharmacy, pharmaceutical chemistry, mineral materia medica, vegetable materia medica, medicinal plants from ranunculaceæ to fungi; products of fermentation; animal materia medica from porifera to mammalia,—concluding with remarks on a physiological and therapeutical arrangement of the materia medica.

We think that every one who can afford it should possess this excellent work, the value of which has been greatly enhanced by the additions of Dr. Carson, than whom no one is more competent to estimate it correctly, and to make such additions as may adapt it for American service.

It is well "got up," and the wood cuts are better executed than in any work of the kind that has issued from the American press. The cause why certain plants have been selected rather than others is not apparent, but the author, we doubt not, could assign one that is satisfactory. Belladonna, Hyoscyamus and Stramonium, for example, have xylographic illustrations, whilst Digitalis, Tabacum, Rheum, Camphora, and numerous others are neglected. The number of illustrations mentioned on the title page shows, indeed, that a large proportion of the plants must go unrepresented.

Lecture Introductory to the Course on the Theory and Practice of Medicine, in the Medical Department of Pennsylvania College. Session 1846-47. BY WILLIAM DARRACH, M. D. The excellent temper and good feeling exhibited in this lecture of the amiable Professor is in strong contrast with the ebullitions of spleen and mortified vanity, exhibited on like occasions by. some grey-headed occupants of chairs in older and more pretending institutions. For the edification of such, we copy the opening paragraph.

"The topic, which I have been induced to select as an introductory lecture, is Life. Before I discuss it, permit me to tender you the usual, and, at the same time, most heart-felt welcome to all our Philadelphia Medical schools. Hitherto, we have been the youngest of them; and now there is yet a younger-the Franklin Medical College of Philadelphia. Prosperity to her laudable efforts! Long life to her! In her name and our own we welcome you. In that of our elder sister, the Jefferson Col

lege, in her beautifully remodelled edifice; in that of the University of Pennsylvania, the venerable and beloved mother of us all; in the name also of the departed and never to be forgotten worthies, Rush, Wistar, Barton and Physick, patriarchs of American medicine-and higher yet, we welcome you in HIS Name, the Source of life, in whom we live."

Such sentiments disarm criticism, even when invited to the task by assailable doctrines and inconclusive reasoning.

THE MEDICAL EXAMINER.

PHILADELPHIA, MARCH, 1847.

LA LANCETTE CANADienne.

We have received the first and third numbers of a new Medical journal with this title, in the French language, published at Montreal (Canada) on the first and fifteenth of every month. The journal is edited and published by Dr. J. L. Leprohon, and from the ability displayed in the numbers before us, promises to be an able coadjutor in the good work of diffusing Medical knowledge. A considerable portion of the practitioners of Canada speak and write the French as their vernacular language, and to them such a publication must be particularly acceptable; and as many of the younger and more aspiring members of our profession in the United States pay more or less attention to it, they will find the perusal of such a journal to subserve the double purpose of furnishing them with much valuable information in the line of their profession, and of improving them in the knowledge of the language in which it is conveyed. We wish the enterprising editor a full realization of his warmest anticipations, whilst we promise ourselves the pleasure of occasionally gleaning from his labours for the benefit of our readers.

NATIONAL MEDICAL CONVENTION.

From all that we can discover, the Medical Convention to be held in this City in May next is likely to be the largest body of the kind ever assembled. Delegates have already been appointed by most of the Colleges and chartered Medical Societies throughout the Union,

and as the number of representatives from each body is determined. by itself, without any suggestion or restriction emanating from any other quarter, many of them have chosen large delegations, especially the popular bodies. These latter, it seems to us, if the delegates vote per capita, will not only swallow up the schools, but, to use a bull, swallow themselves too-that is, the large number appointed by a few of them in the principal cities will out-vote all the rest. However, if wise counsels prevail so that they vote aright, and benefit accrues to the profession and the people, there will be none to complain.

The number appointed in this city, we believe, is as follows, viz: By the Philadelphia Medical Society, twelve.

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Last year we collected from the Catalogues and Medical Journals published in the different sections of the United States, the number of students and graduates of the season, and published the whole in tabular form, and we are desirous of doing the same the present year. To enable us to perform this task accurately, we respectfully request of the deans or secretaries of the different institutions to forward to us their respective Catalogues as soon as published. Thus far we have received but four, viz: those of the Jefferson Medical College of Philadelphia, the University of Pennsylvania, of the University of Louisville (formerly Medical Institute,) and the Memphis Medical College of Tennessee.

From these it appears that the class of the Jefferson Medical College during the past Session numbered

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493

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In a former number we mentioned that the physicians residing in the northern part of Philadelphia, including Germantown and Frankford, were about to form themselves into a society for the promotion

of science and good-fellowship; since then, we understand that an association has been regularly organized under the title of "The Northern Medical Association of Philadelphia," and that on the 14th of January last the following gentlemen were duly elected officers for the present year:

President-Dr. Benjamin S. Janney.
Vice-President-Dr. Arnold Naudain.

Counsellors-Drs. Uhler, Yardley and Hatfield.
Treasurer-Dr. M. B. Smith.

Secretary-Dr. Remington.

Reporting Secretaries-Drs. Townsend and Bryan.

The association has been judicious in the selection of gentlemen for its officers who are greatly respected in this community, and under such favourable auspices the best results must follow its organization.

RECORD OF MEDICAL SCIENCE.

Observations on the Employment of Compression in Aneurism. By O'BRYEN BELLINGHAM, M. D., F. R. C. S. I., one of the Medical Officers of St. Vincent's Hospital.

Mode in which Nature effects the cure of Aneurism.

When we consider how many writers have devoted their attention almost exclusively to the subject of aneurism, and how much talent has been engaged in illustrating its history, pathology, and treatment, it appears strange that the process which nature herself sets up for its cure should have been so much overlooked hitherto by surgeons; and although this process was daily, I may say, passing under their eyes, that the exact mode in which it was accomplished should have attracted but little attention, and no attempts should have been made to imitate or assist it.

In almost every case of aneurism where the disease has subsisted for some time, we find a larger or smaller amount of solid matter deposited in the sac, which is composed of the fibrine of the blood, arranged in regular concentric laminæ.

Examples of the spontaneous cure of aneurism, in which the sac is completely filled with fibrine deposited in regular concentric layers, are not very uncommon.

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