- Email: [email protected]
ROYAL FREE HOSPITAL.
329
,
first time that I had heard the veterinary section of the Aca- Into the cavity whence the portion of nail has been cut a little demy referred to contemptuously. By far the most useful of lint is placed, and then the second toe is so strapped up that its. all the functions of this learned body, in a sanitary point of plantar prominence rests upon the hypertrophied cushion, view at least, is one to which I referred in a former letter- exerting a pressure downwards and outwards, which it is said namely, that of examining the various petitions presented to very rapidly remedies the distressing deformation. the Minister of the Interior for the licensing of patent mediM. Mandl, who is at the present moment lecturing at the cines and secret remedies. A permanent committee exists for Ecole Pratique on the maladies of the larynx and the use of the purpose of considering the various applications made to the laryngoscope, makes the following remarks on the treatGovernment by village quacks and bone-setters for permission ment of chronic laryngitis, which are rendered valuable by the to vend their newly-devised pills or plasters; and M. Robinet, great experience of this gentleman in this particularly intractthe actual President, who has not yet abdicated his rôle of re- able class of disorders. This practitioner is not a partizan of porter, deals out to the noisome fabrications his condemnatory the employment of sulphureous water, so generally believed of verdicts in a manner most congenial and consolatory to ortho- service in these cases. He is much more inclined to attribute doxy. One of the most tiresome functions of the Academy, the cures which have been obtained after a sojourn at Eauxin so far at least as the individual members are Bonnes, or Luchon, to the influence of rest, than to any alteramust be that entailed by the weekly receipt of some half dozen tive power possessed by these mineral sources. Of internal or more essays from provincial medical men, who, remote from remedies, the only class to which M. Mandl concedes any cer. the intellectual centre to which all the rays of new light have tain efficacy is that of the preparations of iodine; but, en rebeen for years converging, and not being of Solomon’s opinion vctnche, he believes that much may be done by topical applicain the matter of novelty, are each week stumbling, like the tions. He recommends the neck to be kept warm, and, in order cock in the fable, on a diamond in the dunghill, the purity of to ensure constant preservation of the skin from impressions of whose water they expect the Academy to test. M. Kerga- cold, protects the throat externally with a coating of guttaradec, one of the most patient and conscientious of all the percha collodion; and enjoins the wearing of Jeffreys’ respiacademical committee-men, read his report on one such pro- rator. In some cases the excision of the uvula and tonsils must. duction on Tuesday last, the memoir being entitled " Studies precede all other treatment. The remaining means of cure are the inspiration of vapours or fine powders, and cauterization. on the Causes of Melancholy," by Dr. Corlieu, and the following was his summing up :-" This so-called study ’On the The best vapour for inhalation is the steam of boiling water;, Causes of Melancholy,’ consists in a simple enumeration of the and the powders found most efficacious, either for inspiration influences which may produce this affection-an enumeration or insufflation, are those of nitrate of silver mixed with sugar, which, I may add, is incomplete, as it does not include the or of alum. The caustic applications consist of strong solutions. effects of changes in the blood, as in chlorosis or anasmia. The of nitrate of silver, the acid nitrate of mercury, sulphates of author’s views are, for the most part, perfectly admissible, but copper or zinc, chromic acid, or of a watery solution of iodine possess the defect of being neither new nor original. The diffi- and iodide of potassium (the proportions of the latter preparaculty, in this question, is not to trace melancholy to its cause: tion being-of iodine, sixteen grains; iodide of potassium, two it is to assign some therapeutical means for its removal; and drachms and a half; and three ounces and a half of watery on this latter point the author of this paper is silent. I, there- These remedial agents may be conveyed to the larynx under fore, think his memoir can hardly advance" the cause of science, the guidance of the laryngoscope, either by means of a sponge and do not recommend it for nublication. on a stalk of whalebone, or by the laryngeal syringe (a curved The other Academy, that of Sciences, listened on Monday to tube terminating in a rose like that of a watering-pot, and fitted a report read by M. Deville on an interesting memoir forwardedL to an elastic india-rubber bottle). The lecturer, in concluding, by M. Courbon, a French naval surgeon, regarding certain in- expressed a hope of soon being able to furnish some details dividuals of the Abyssinian Flora; this memoir being the result; regarding the value of the perchloride of iron in this special of an expedition sent out by the Government in 1859 and 1860) branch of therapeutics, the drug in question being at present. for the purpose of exploring the Red Sea coasts. The reporterr the subject of experiment at his clinique. A Convalescent Institution in connexion with the Ste. dwelt more especially upon the properties of a tree called "mesenna,"which M. Courbon found growing in moderately Eugenie Children’s Hospital has recently been built, under the elevated situations in Abyssinia, and the bark of which is an immediate patronage of the Empress, at Fublaine, in the deinfallible remedy in cases of tasnia. The dose of mesenna is partment of Seine et Marne, about twenty miles from Paris. from one to two ounces of the bark in powder, and adminis- 250 little girls are already established within the walls of the tered either in some fermented liquor, or in the form of a paste " Asile," as it is termed. This is the third institution of the mixed with flour or butter. This new medicine possesses this kind in the neighbourhood of the capital; of the other two,. advantage over kousso and the other anthelmintics—namely, one (that for men) being at Vincennes, and the other (for that it produces no other effect than that of expelling the tape- females) at Vesinet, a village in the plain immediately below worm, neither deranging the stomach nor disturbing the func- St. Germain en Laye. tions of any other organ. M. Courbon further mentions that Dr. Constantine Paul, in a work which appeared during the the mesenna does not form a special genus, but much resembles course of last year, drew attention to the frequent occurrence the Acacia Lebbeck of Linnæns, and should be classed with of abortion in females suffering from lead poisoning. M. Paul that tree in the genus A lbizzia. Dubois, in the enumeration of the ordinary causes of abortion,, M. Maher, surgeon of the Naval Hospital of Rochefort, pub- one day last week at the Clinique, included the influence of lishes in the Gazette des Hôpitaux of this week several cases of saturnine intoxication amongst the circumstances likely to painless extraction of the great toe nail by means of local provoke the premature expulsion of the ovum. The following ansæsthesia, the ordinary freezing mixture, pounded ice and figures have been published by Dr. Paul in a statistical investisalt, held in a bladder, being used for the purpose. The usual gation of the subject. Out of 141 pregnancies in females under surgical method is familiar to all. , Two points of novelty pre- the influence of lead, 82 abortions took place; in 4, premature sent themselves, however, in M. Maher’s modus operandi confinements occurred; in 5, the children were still-born; in which seem to me worthy of record: the one being the en- 20, the children died in the course of the first year; in 8, An array circling of the root of the toe by a tight ligature previous to during the second year; and in 7, in the third, &c. the application of the ice-bag ; the other, the employment of a of figures not to be lightly passed over. strong spatula fixed on a handle for the purpose of detaching Paris, March 25th, 1861. the nail, the instrument being passed along its dorsal surface to a point beyond the root, when the handle is raised and the ROYAL FREE HOSPITAL. extremity of the spatula thus inserted underneath the ungual appendage, which is then by force torn from its deep attachmeni THE thirty-third anniversary festival of this institution, of the toe, and so rather pushed than pullec off from phalanx. Whilst on this very uncomfortable sub which since its foundation in 1828 up to the close of 1860, has ject, let me not forget a communication recently made (says thE afforded relief to upwards of 730,000 patients, was celebrated Pre8se Medicate Belge) to the Royal Academy of Brussels by on the 19th at the Freemasons’ Hall. About 200 Professor Sentin. "Starting from the fact," loquitur the friends and instant, of the supporters charity sat down to dinner. The, journal in question, " admitted by all surgeons, that it is no the nail that grows into the flesh, but the flesh that grows ove Right Hon. the Lord Mayor presided, supported by Mr. Alderthe nail, it being generally forced upwards by the second toe, man Abbiss, Mr. Sheriff Lusk, Mr. Alderman Rose, Mr. Black, Professor Sentin first treats the local inflammation, then, care M.P., Mr. T. H. Wakley, Mr. Beale Browne, Mr. Weeden fully raising the nail, cuts off the covered segment with curves Cooke, Rev. J. B. Owen, Dr. Hassall, Mr. M. J. O’Connell, E. Masterman, Dr. O’Connor, Mr. Victor de Meric, Dr. scissors. In the subsequent dressing lies the pith of the method
concerned,
-
-
to the integuments the
Mr.
..
-
-
330 iVarsden, Mr. J. Robinson, Mr. Harle Harris, Mr. E. Ha,lswell,
Mr. Judd, Mr. Alderman Lawrence, and other influential gentlemen. The usual loyal toasts having been proposed, His LORDSHIP said he had now to propose the toast of the evening, " Prosperity to the Royal Free Hospital," one of the most useful of the many noble charitable institutions the existence of which in the metropolis afforded so large an amount
of relief to the sick and suffering. Happily the great merits and the excellence of the Royal Free Hospital were so well known that it required but few words on his part to point out the- claims which the institution had on the sympathy and support of the public. Indeed, it was his belief that advocacy with those whom he addressed became unnecessary, for he knew that the gentlemen who attended the festival came there to do their duty, and he felt that it would be impertinence to attempt any appeal to their liberality. But if he could make himself heard throughout the masses of the metropolis, and awaken them to a consciousness of the value of this noble hospital, then, indeed, would a most desirable object be achieved, for he felt thoroughly convinced there was no charitable institution in the world that could claim higher pre-eminence than the Royal Free Hospital. Pure philanthropy was here carried out on the broadest and most useful basis, and taught in the most admirable manner. There was no necessity that the poor, helpless, wornout creature should bring a letter of recommendation for admission to the hospital. They only required that he should be in need of the healing art, and relief was immediately administered, no matter what the sex, country, or age of the applicant, or what might be the degree or character of the complaint in question. Let it be only ascertained that there was distress which required assistance from this benevolent institution, and it was freely offered. When he saw before him so large and so influential an assemblage, and when he recollected the starting of this hospital, then his next-door neighbour in Greville- street, he felt greatly delighted, for a manifest proof was afforded of the progress which the institution had made. His Lordship concluded by proposing " Prosperity to the Royal Free Hospital." The toast was received and drunk with great enthusiasm. Subscriptions to the amount of no less than £3740 were announced.
Medical News.
APOTHECARIES’ HALL.-The following gentleman passed
his examination in the science and received a certificate to practise, on
practice
of medicine, and
Thursday, March 21st, 1861. Shone, Richard Lewis, Bangor, Carmarthen, N. Wales. The following gentlemen also on the same day passed their
first examination:Hawkins, Henry Mortimer,
St.
Mary’s-road, Peckham.
Hayward, Sidney, Queen Anne-street. Webb, John Wesley, Abersychan, Monmouthshire.
THE SOCIETY
OF
APOTHECARIES
AND
THE
ROYAL COL-
PHYSICIANS.—We understand that an injunction upon the part of the Society of Apothecaries to restrain the Royal College of Physicians from creating a new order of practitioners, will be moved for on the 12th of April next, before Vice Chancellor Sir W. Page Wood. LEGE OF
RETIREMENT
OF
HOSPITAL SURGEONS. - We
are
in-
formed that at St. Mary’s Hospital, Paddington, the governors have arrived at a resolution that surgeons in charge of inpatients shall hold office during a term not exceeding fifteen years, being eligible for re-election, and to be re-elected every five years during that time. In addition to this restriction, the surgeons will be called upon to retire when they reach the age of sixty, should that occur before the conclusion of fifteen years’ service. The present staff are excepted from these regulations, and have just been re-elected.
THE
LATE
DR. BALY.-The will of Dr.
Baly, Physician
Extraordinary to her Majesty, of Queen Anne-street, Cavendish-square, has been proved in the principal registry by the executors, Robert Martin, Esq., M.D., of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, and Charles St. Clare Bedford, Esq., Solicitor, the Sanctuary, Westminster. The personalty was sworn under
.67000. DEATH
OF
M. FERRUS.
-
This
distinguished psycho-
logist, member of the Academy of Medicine of Paris, inspectorgeneral of asylums for the insane and of prisons, has just died, at the age of seventy-five. His funeral was attended by the élite of the capital, by members of the learned societies to which he belonged (especially the Medico-Psychological, of which he was one of the founders), and by a considerable number of professional brethren. M. Ferrus was pupil of Pinel, and perfected the great reforms commenced by his teacher. By his exertions useful classifications were made in prisons, and he has done much to improve the condition of cretins. The Emperor, at M. Ferrus’s request, has just given £8000 for the erection of an asylum at Chambery, where these unfor-
ROYAL COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS OF LONDON.-At the tunate beings are to be received. Comitia Majora Ordinaria, held on Monday, the 25th instant, GOMPERTZ’S LAW OF MORTALITY.—At the Institute of TnonAS MAYO, M.D., F.R.S., Actuaries, last week, a paper was read by Mr. Thomas Bond In Sprague on Mr. Gompertz’s Law of Human Mortality, &c. was re-elected President of the College for the ensuing year.
this paper Mr. Sprague investigated a celebrated proposition, and certain mathematical deductions from it, put forth by Mr. Thomas Watson, M.D., Gompertz some years ago in a paper read before the Royal Henry Jeaffreson, M.D., and James Risdon Bennett, M.D., Society. He also examined with James Copland, M.D., great minuteness the grounds of certain claims to the independent origination of the propowere chosen members of the Council of the College. sition, and to the extension of the deductions following upon it. At the Comitia Majora, held on the same day, the following Mr. Gompertz’s proposition, briefly, was, that " If the average gentlemen, having undergone the necessary examination, were exhaustion of a man’s power to avoid death be such that at duly admitted Members of the College :the end of equal small intervals of time he lost equal portions of his remaining power to oppose destruction which he had at Broadbent, William Henry, M.D., Upper Seymour-street. Corfe, George, M.D., Nottingham-terrace, Regent’s-park. the commencement of those intervals, then at any given age (z) Rogers, John Henry, East Grinstead, Sussex. his power to avoid death or the intensity of his mortality Calcutta. Webb, Allan, M.D., might be denoted by a certain algebraical expression (a q x);" The following gentlemen, formerly Extra-Licentiates of the and reasoning from this basis he showed what the numbers College, were also admitted Members :at successive ages should be as represented in a table of living Bull, Martin Meggison, Jersey. Roberts, John, M.D., Satisbnry. and pointed out that the numbers thus theoretically mortality, H.lYLS. Lancaster, Joseph, Clifton. Walsh, James, Sogue. determined corresponded closely with those derived from actual Witt, Charles, Spring-gardens. observation. At the same Comitia, ARSENIC FOR HYDROPHOBIA.—Dr. Arendt has come Andrew Wynter, M.D., Colherne-court, Old Brompton, municated to the Academy of Sciences a paper " On Hydrowas admitted a Member, having been previously elected under phobia," in which he speaks highly of the effects produced by a temporary bye-law (now expired). the use of arsenic, both externally and internally. This adds Also, at this Comitia, the following gentlemen, having un- another to the list of remedies for hydrophobia, of which so dergone the necessary examination, and satisfied the College of many scores have been highly vaunted, but of which not one their proficiency in the Science and Practice of Medicine and has been found practically useful. Midwifery, were duly admitted to practise Physic as Licentiates SIMPLE MODE OF SEDATIVE HYPODERMIC INOCULATION. of, the College :- M. Lafargue has published in the Bulletin de Thérapeutique Blenkinsop, William Henry, Binfield, Berkshire. (Jan. 15 and Feb. 28, 1861) two articles on these inoculations, Downing, Samuel Dawson, Birkenhead. and advises the use of a little instrument composed of a hollow Pyburn, James, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. needle and plug. By means of the latter, a moistened powder, Slayter, William Bruce, Westminster Hospital. Steele, Charles, Clifton. composed either of atropine or morphine and powdered bella-
At the
same
Comitia,
)
.
I
.
,
first time that I had heard the veterinary section of the Aca- Into the cavity whence the portion of nail has been cut a little demy referred to contemptuously. By far the most useful of lint is placed, and then the second toe is so strapped up that its. all the functions of this learned body, in a sanitary point of plantar prominence rests upon the hypertrophied cushion, view at least, is one to which I referred in a former letter- exerting a pressure downwards and outwards, which it is said namely, that of examining the various petitions presented to very rapidly remedies the distressing deformation. the Minister of the Interior for the licensing of patent mediM. Mandl, who is at the present moment lecturing at the cines and secret remedies. A permanent committee exists for Ecole Pratique on the maladies of the larynx and the use of the purpose of considering the various applications made to the laryngoscope, makes the following remarks on the treatGovernment by village quacks and bone-setters for permission ment of chronic laryngitis, which are rendered valuable by the to vend their newly-devised pills or plasters; and M. Robinet, great experience of this gentleman in this particularly intractthe actual President, who has not yet abdicated his rôle of re- able class of disorders. This practitioner is not a partizan of porter, deals out to the noisome fabrications his condemnatory the employment of sulphureous water, so generally believed of verdicts in a manner most congenial and consolatory to ortho- service in these cases. He is much more inclined to attribute doxy. One of the most tiresome functions of the Academy, the cures which have been obtained after a sojourn at Eauxin so far at least as the individual members are Bonnes, or Luchon, to the influence of rest, than to any alteramust be that entailed by the weekly receipt of some half dozen tive power possessed by these mineral sources. Of internal or more essays from provincial medical men, who, remote from remedies, the only class to which M. Mandl concedes any cer. the intellectual centre to which all the rays of new light have tain efficacy is that of the preparations of iodine; but, en rebeen for years converging, and not being of Solomon’s opinion vctnche, he believes that much may be done by topical applicain the matter of novelty, are each week stumbling, like the tions. He recommends the neck to be kept warm, and, in order cock in the fable, on a diamond in the dunghill, the purity of to ensure constant preservation of the skin from impressions of whose water they expect the Academy to test. M. Kerga- cold, protects the throat externally with a coating of guttaradec, one of the most patient and conscientious of all the percha collodion; and enjoins the wearing of Jeffreys’ respiacademical committee-men, read his report on one such pro- rator. In some cases the excision of the uvula and tonsils must. duction on Tuesday last, the memoir being entitled " Studies precede all other treatment. The remaining means of cure are the inspiration of vapours or fine powders, and cauterization. on the Causes of Melancholy," by Dr. Corlieu, and the following was his summing up :-" This so-called study ’On the The best vapour for inhalation is the steam of boiling water;, Causes of Melancholy,’ consists in a simple enumeration of the and the powders found most efficacious, either for inspiration influences which may produce this affection-an enumeration or insufflation, are those of nitrate of silver mixed with sugar, which, I may add, is incomplete, as it does not include the or of alum. The caustic applications consist of strong solutions. effects of changes in the blood, as in chlorosis or anasmia. The of nitrate of silver, the acid nitrate of mercury, sulphates of author’s views are, for the most part, perfectly admissible, but copper or zinc, chromic acid, or of a watery solution of iodine possess the defect of being neither new nor original. The diffi- and iodide of potassium (the proportions of the latter preparaculty, in this question, is not to trace melancholy to its cause: tion being-of iodine, sixteen grains; iodide of potassium, two it is to assign some therapeutical means for its removal; and drachms and a half; and three ounces and a half of watery on this latter point the author of this paper is silent. I, there- These remedial agents may be conveyed to the larynx under fore, think his memoir can hardly advance" the cause of science, the guidance of the laryngoscope, either by means of a sponge and do not recommend it for nublication. on a stalk of whalebone, or by the laryngeal syringe (a curved The other Academy, that of Sciences, listened on Monday to tube terminating in a rose like that of a watering-pot, and fitted a report read by M. Deville on an interesting memoir forwardedL to an elastic india-rubber bottle). The lecturer, in concluding, by M. Courbon, a French naval surgeon, regarding certain in- expressed a hope of soon being able to furnish some details dividuals of the Abyssinian Flora; this memoir being the result; regarding the value of the perchloride of iron in this special of an expedition sent out by the Government in 1859 and 1860) branch of therapeutics, the drug in question being at present. for the purpose of exploring the Red Sea coasts. The reporterr the subject of experiment at his clinique. A Convalescent Institution in connexion with the Ste. dwelt more especially upon the properties of a tree called "mesenna,"which M. Courbon found growing in moderately Eugenie Children’s Hospital has recently been built, under the elevated situations in Abyssinia, and the bark of which is an immediate patronage of the Empress, at Fublaine, in the deinfallible remedy in cases of tasnia. The dose of mesenna is partment of Seine et Marne, about twenty miles from Paris. from one to two ounces of the bark in powder, and adminis- 250 little girls are already established within the walls of the tered either in some fermented liquor, or in the form of a paste " Asile," as it is termed. This is the third institution of the mixed with flour or butter. This new medicine possesses this kind in the neighbourhood of the capital; of the other two,. advantage over kousso and the other anthelmintics—namely, one (that for men) being at Vincennes, and the other (for that it produces no other effect than that of expelling the tape- females) at Vesinet, a village in the plain immediately below worm, neither deranging the stomach nor disturbing the func- St. Germain en Laye. tions of any other organ. M. Courbon further mentions that Dr. Constantine Paul, in a work which appeared during the the mesenna does not form a special genus, but much resembles course of last year, drew attention to the frequent occurrence the Acacia Lebbeck of Linnæns, and should be classed with of abortion in females suffering from lead poisoning. M. Paul that tree in the genus A lbizzia. Dubois, in the enumeration of the ordinary causes of abortion,, M. Maher, surgeon of the Naval Hospital of Rochefort, pub- one day last week at the Clinique, included the influence of lishes in the Gazette des Hôpitaux of this week several cases of saturnine intoxication amongst the circumstances likely to painless extraction of the great toe nail by means of local provoke the premature expulsion of the ovum. The following ansæsthesia, the ordinary freezing mixture, pounded ice and figures have been published by Dr. Paul in a statistical investisalt, held in a bladder, being used for the purpose. The usual gation of the subject. Out of 141 pregnancies in females under surgical method is familiar to all. , Two points of novelty pre- the influence of lead, 82 abortions took place; in 4, premature sent themselves, however, in M. Maher’s modus operandi confinements occurred; in 5, the children were still-born; in which seem to me worthy of record: the one being the en- 20, the children died in the course of the first year; in 8, An array circling of the root of the toe by a tight ligature previous to during the second year; and in 7, in the third, &c. the application of the ice-bag ; the other, the employment of a of figures not to be lightly passed over. strong spatula fixed on a handle for the purpose of detaching Paris, March 25th, 1861. the nail, the instrument being passed along its dorsal surface to a point beyond the root, when the handle is raised and the ROYAL FREE HOSPITAL. extremity of the spatula thus inserted underneath the ungual appendage, which is then by force torn from its deep attachmeni THE thirty-third anniversary festival of this institution, of the toe, and so rather pushed than pullec off from phalanx. Whilst on this very uncomfortable sub which since its foundation in 1828 up to the close of 1860, has ject, let me not forget a communication recently made (says thE afforded relief to upwards of 730,000 patients, was celebrated Pre8se Medicate Belge) to the Royal Academy of Brussels by on the 19th at the Freemasons’ Hall. About 200 Professor Sentin. "Starting from the fact," loquitur the friends and instant, of the supporters charity sat down to dinner. The, journal in question, " admitted by all surgeons, that it is no the nail that grows into the flesh, but the flesh that grows ove Right Hon. the Lord Mayor presided, supported by Mr. Alderthe nail, it being generally forced upwards by the second toe, man Abbiss, Mr. Sheriff Lusk, Mr. Alderman Rose, Mr. Black, Professor Sentin first treats the local inflammation, then, care M.P., Mr. T. H. Wakley, Mr. Beale Browne, Mr. Weeden fully raising the nail, cuts off the covered segment with curves Cooke, Rev. J. B. Owen, Dr. Hassall, Mr. M. J. O’Connell, E. Masterman, Dr. O’Connor, Mr. Victor de Meric, Dr. scissors. In the subsequent dressing lies the pith of the method
concerned,
-
-
to the integuments the
Mr.
..
-
-
330 iVarsden, Mr. J. Robinson, Mr. Harle Harris, Mr. E. Ha,lswell,
Mr. Judd, Mr. Alderman Lawrence, and other influential gentlemen. The usual loyal toasts having been proposed, His LORDSHIP said he had now to propose the toast of the evening, " Prosperity to the Royal Free Hospital," one of the most useful of the many noble charitable institutions the existence of which in the metropolis afforded so large an amount
of relief to the sick and suffering. Happily the great merits and the excellence of the Royal Free Hospital were so well known that it required but few words on his part to point out the- claims which the institution had on the sympathy and support of the public. Indeed, it was his belief that advocacy with those whom he addressed became unnecessary, for he knew that the gentlemen who attended the festival came there to do their duty, and he felt that it would be impertinence to attempt any appeal to their liberality. But if he could make himself heard throughout the masses of the metropolis, and awaken them to a consciousness of the value of this noble hospital, then, indeed, would a most desirable object be achieved, for he felt thoroughly convinced there was no charitable institution in the world that could claim higher pre-eminence than the Royal Free Hospital. Pure philanthropy was here carried out on the broadest and most useful basis, and taught in the most admirable manner. There was no necessity that the poor, helpless, wornout creature should bring a letter of recommendation for admission to the hospital. They only required that he should be in need of the healing art, and relief was immediately administered, no matter what the sex, country, or age of the applicant, or what might be the degree or character of the complaint in question. Let it be only ascertained that there was distress which required assistance from this benevolent institution, and it was freely offered. When he saw before him so large and so influential an assemblage, and when he recollected the starting of this hospital, then his next-door neighbour in Greville- street, he felt greatly delighted, for a manifest proof was afforded of the progress which the institution had made. His Lordship concluded by proposing " Prosperity to the Royal Free Hospital." The toast was received and drunk with great enthusiasm. Subscriptions to the amount of no less than £3740 were announced.
Medical News.
APOTHECARIES’ HALL.-The following gentleman passed
his examination in the science and received a certificate to practise, on
practice
of medicine, and
Thursday, March 21st, 1861. Shone, Richard Lewis, Bangor, Carmarthen, N. Wales. The following gentlemen also on the same day passed their
first examination:Hawkins, Henry Mortimer,
St.
Mary’s-road, Peckham.
Hayward, Sidney, Queen Anne-street. Webb, John Wesley, Abersychan, Monmouthshire.
THE SOCIETY
OF
APOTHECARIES
AND
THE
ROYAL COL-
PHYSICIANS.—We understand that an injunction upon the part of the Society of Apothecaries to restrain the Royal College of Physicians from creating a new order of practitioners, will be moved for on the 12th of April next, before Vice Chancellor Sir W. Page Wood. LEGE OF
RETIREMENT
OF
HOSPITAL SURGEONS. - We
are
in-
formed that at St. Mary’s Hospital, Paddington, the governors have arrived at a resolution that surgeons in charge of inpatients shall hold office during a term not exceeding fifteen years, being eligible for re-election, and to be re-elected every five years during that time. In addition to this restriction, the surgeons will be called upon to retire when they reach the age of sixty, should that occur before the conclusion of fifteen years’ service. The present staff are excepted from these regulations, and have just been re-elected.
THE
LATE
DR. BALY.-The will of Dr.
Baly, Physician
Extraordinary to her Majesty, of Queen Anne-street, Cavendish-square, has been proved in the principal registry by the executors, Robert Martin, Esq., M.D., of St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, and Charles St. Clare Bedford, Esq., Solicitor, the Sanctuary, Westminster. The personalty was sworn under
.67000. DEATH
OF
M. FERRUS.
-
This
distinguished psycho-
logist, member of the Academy of Medicine of Paris, inspectorgeneral of asylums for the insane and of prisons, has just died, at the age of seventy-five. His funeral was attended by the élite of the capital, by members of the learned societies to which he belonged (especially the Medico-Psychological, of which he was one of the founders), and by a considerable number of professional brethren. M. Ferrus was pupil of Pinel, and perfected the great reforms commenced by his teacher. By his exertions useful classifications were made in prisons, and he has done much to improve the condition of cretins. The Emperor, at M. Ferrus’s request, has just given £8000 for the erection of an asylum at Chambery, where these unfor-
ROYAL COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS OF LONDON.-At the tunate beings are to be received. Comitia Majora Ordinaria, held on Monday, the 25th instant, GOMPERTZ’S LAW OF MORTALITY.—At the Institute of TnonAS MAYO, M.D., F.R.S., Actuaries, last week, a paper was read by Mr. Thomas Bond In Sprague on Mr. Gompertz’s Law of Human Mortality, &c. was re-elected President of the College for the ensuing year.
this paper Mr. Sprague investigated a celebrated proposition, and certain mathematical deductions from it, put forth by Mr. Thomas Watson, M.D., Gompertz some years ago in a paper read before the Royal Henry Jeaffreson, M.D., and James Risdon Bennett, M.D., Society. He also examined with James Copland, M.D., great minuteness the grounds of certain claims to the independent origination of the propowere chosen members of the Council of the College. sition, and to the extension of the deductions following upon it. At the Comitia Majora, held on the same day, the following Mr. Gompertz’s proposition, briefly, was, that " If the average gentlemen, having undergone the necessary examination, were exhaustion of a man’s power to avoid death be such that at duly admitted Members of the College :the end of equal small intervals of time he lost equal portions of his remaining power to oppose destruction which he had at Broadbent, William Henry, M.D., Upper Seymour-street. Corfe, George, M.D., Nottingham-terrace, Regent’s-park. the commencement of those intervals, then at any given age (z) Rogers, John Henry, East Grinstead, Sussex. his power to avoid death or the intensity of his mortality Calcutta. Webb, Allan, M.D., might be denoted by a certain algebraical expression (a q x);" The following gentlemen, formerly Extra-Licentiates of the and reasoning from this basis he showed what the numbers College, were also admitted Members :at successive ages should be as represented in a table of living Bull, Martin Meggison, Jersey. Roberts, John, M.D., Satisbnry. and pointed out that the numbers thus theoretically mortality, H.lYLS. Lancaster, Joseph, Clifton. Walsh, James, Sogue. determined corresponded closely with those derived from actual Witt, Charles, Spring-gardens. observation. At the same Comitia, ARSENIC FOR HYDROPHOBIA.—Dr. Arendt has come Andrew Wynter, M.D., Colherne-court, Old Brompton, municated to the Academy of Sciences a paper " On Hydrowas admitted a Member, having been previously elected under phobia," in which he speaks highly of the effects produced by a temporary bye-law (now expired). the use of arsenic, both externally and internally. This adds Also, at this Comitia, the following gentlemen, having un- another to the list of remedies for hydrophobia, of which so dergone the necessary examination, and satisfied the College of many scores have been highly vaunted, but of which not one their proficiency in the Science and Practice of Medicine and has been found practically useful. Midwifery, were duly admitted to practise Physic as Licentiates SIMPLE MODE OF SEDATIVE HYPODERMIC INOCULATION. of, the College :- M. Lafargue has published in the Bulletin de Thérapeutique Blenkinsop, William Henry, Binfield, Berkshire. (Jan. 15 and Feb. 28, 1861) two articles on these inoculations, Downing, Samuel Dawson, Birkenhead. and advises the use of a little instrument composed of a hollow Pyburn, James, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. needle and plug. By means of the latter, a moistened powder, Slayter, William Bruce, Westminster Hospital. Steele, Charles, Clifton. composed either of atropine or morphine and powdered bella-
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