THE LEWIS INCANDESCENT GAS-BURNER.

106 delivered at the request of the National Health Society, and are considered necessary by the coming without any steps òe:ng taken to ascertain that were intended for the instruction of the workmen in that the site of the house is dry and wholesome, that the closets, branch of trade, but they are of a character to be useful also &c., are of good construction, and in working order, and to the employers and to all who may be called upon to that the drains are well laid, efficiently trapped, and report on the sanitary condition of dwellings. The descrip. thoroughly ventilated. It is a melancholy fact that many tion of the mode in which the work ought to be done is of those to whom the building and fitting of dwelling- evidently that of a man who thoroughly understands it, and houses are entrusted are either profoundly ignorant of the who does not hesitate to show up the defective way in which principles of sanitary construction, or culpably negligent it is too often executed. It cannot fail to be useful by enabling in their application. In too many instances, also, where those interested in the sanitary state of a house to detect the knowledge exists and its practical application is intended, flaws which might be productive of serious consequences, the work is, we fear, entrusted to incompetent hands and and to judge whether the proper remedy is applied and the carried out without efficient and intelligent supervision. work satisfactorily carried out. The author concludes his The result is that the defects are only found out by lectures with a very brief but useful " Code of Rules for their consequences as shown in the broken-down general House-Sanitation."" This volume and Mr. Bailey-Denton’s health of the inmates of the house, or by an outbreak of have each the advantage of a carefully-prepared index. diphtheria or fever. That this is no imaginary picture has been proved by the history of too many families. During the last twenty years much has been done to improve the general public health, and to enforce attention to the sanitary conditions of towns, but these measures have not AN INSTRUMENT FOR REMOVING PLASTER.OF as yet had much effect in awakening the bulk of the public PARIS SPLINTS. to the necessity of individual watchfulness over the state of MR. GOWAN, of Guy’s Hospital, has designed a very their homes with a view to detect the causes of disease as useful and the measures become instrument, which is capable of saving much labour necessary adopt they developed, for their removal. In this direction much useful work may in that often troublesome and dirty job of removing plaster. be done, and Mr. Bailey-Denton’s Handbook of Sanitation of-Paris splints. In principle it is not unlike some others is a valuable contribution to the knowledge of what is we have seen, but is more powerful and workmanlike in required and how it may be effected. He explains the con- construction. It consists of two hinged blades, one of which, ditions required in a house to ensure it being healthy-the the female, is prolonged into a blunt-ended beak, which is external, including site, drainage, and construction, and the various methods of removing and disposing of the refuse, liquid and solid-and the internal, under which come the waterclosets, baths, and lavatories, with a description of the various traps in use to prevent the introduction of noxious gases, and the different systems of ventilation. The second portion of the book is devoted to the important subject of water-its qualities, sources of supply, storage and filtration, and distribution. On all these topics Mr. Bailey-Denton gives a clear, intelligible, and, as it appears to us, an impartial account of the various systems in vogue, with a statement of their relative advantages and drawbacks, and his descriptions of the various arrangements are illustrated by excellent woodcuts, which render his remarks easily understood. We consider this book to be one well deserving the careful study of architects, sanitary slipped under the edge of the splint ; its upper surface is engineers, and medical men, and worthy also of the grooved, and in this groove works the extremity of the male attention of educated non-professional persons who take an blade, which is a circular saw. The handles of the blades interest in questions relating to the health of the people. It are long, so as to afford considerable leverage. In use the bears the impress of thorough knowledge, theoretical and beak is passed up under the splint, which is then quickly practical, of the subject of which it treats. sawn through by a to-and-fro movement of the male handle. Mr. Banner’s work has been written avowedly with the Those who use plaster-of-Paris splints and apparatus will same purpose as the preceding, that of showing how to make find this a very useful instrument. It is made by Mr. wholesome houses; but he has confined himself to two sub- Hawksley. jects-ventilation and house-drainage. In both of these he THE LEWIS INCANDESCENT GAS-BURNER. recommends the system which he has invented under the name of the Banner System, and appends numerous testiTHE latest novelty in the way of gas-burners is now to be monials of its efficacy, and a list of some of the more im. seen in action at the Crystal Palace, and all who see it will portant places where it has been successfully adopted. The . confess that the inventor has succeeded in getting a most book deserves to be well considered by those who have to powerful light by the consumption of a very moderate decide upon the system to be adopted in fitting a house amount of gas. The light is evolved from a cage of platinum but it must not be forgotten that it is an exposition of one wire, which is kept at a white heat. An ordinary gas-pipe system only, and should be studied in comparison witb is fitted with a Bunsen’s burner of rather special construcothers. This construction of trapless waterclosets appears tion, and the flame is further supplied with a jet of air under open to serious objections, even with the perfect ventilation pressure, so that practically the Lewis light consists of a of the soil-pipe, ensured by the "Banner system." platinum gauze cage kept at a white heat by means of an It is needless to say that special The third book on the list may be considered as com automatic blowpipe. other two. It to the treats of are necessary for supplying the air-jet to the plementary sanitary plumbing; arrangements a branch of work highly necessary in carrying out the con but the flame ; arrangements are comparatively simple, and struction of wholesome houses. The lectures were originallJ will not, we think, militate against the introduction of the

are

too often all that

householder,

New Inventions.

-

107 It need not be said that the light gives off no and that the combustion of the carbon is perfect. smoke, it is not influenced Further, by any amount of draught, and cannot be extinguished or sensibly affected by blowing upon it, so that the light requires no protection in the shape of chimney or globe. The light given off is equal to that of five candles for every cubic foot of gas consumed per hour, and an ordinary Lewis light consumes twelve and a half feet per hour, and gives off the light of fifty candles. The light can easily be made to ventilate. The heat given off is necessarily considerable, and we think the light will prove more generally useful for street lighting than for inside lighting. Unless provided with means of ventilation, the Lewis light would certainly be too hot for use in ordinary sitting-rooms.

Lewis

light.

EDWARDS’S SMOKE-CONSUMING, SLOWCOMBUSTION GRATE.

of meeting the growing demands. During the the year expenditure had exceed the income by more than f300. The number of annuitants on the list was now 48, of whom 11 had been elected during the year ; one at the age of ninety-three, 2 aged eighty-four and eighty-three respectively, and 2 aged seventy-eight; only 4 were less than seventy, and of these one died of joy on hearing of her election, and another only lived a month. Grants were made at the monthly meetings to 170 applicants, all of whom were in distress, and some in positive misery. It was pointed out that while from some towns large sums were sent up by hon. local secretaries, and many suitable cases for relief, from others the fund received nothing ; and for want of local representation many poor and suffering members of the profession in those neighbourhoods must be cut off from the benefits of the charity. Dr. Fleetwood Churchill and Mr. Malcolm Morris joined the committee, and Mr. Ed. East, of Clifton-gardens, was appointed hon. secretary for cases in the place of Mr. Malcolm Morris, the

THIS grate has a back, sides, and bottom of fire-clay, the front being of metal as in ordinary grates. The fuel for the day (varying in amount according to the size of the grate) is put in in the morning and is lighted at the top. So far the principles involved are such as have been adopted by Neill Arnott and others. In the Neill Arnott stoves the mass of fuel, as it burns, is lifted from below ; while in Edwards’s grate the fuel, as it burns, is exposed by depressing a shield which hangs in front of the bars. This plan is simpler than Arnott’s. The shield works up and down just like a sashwindow, and the counterpoise can be exposed and repaired without removing the grate, which is a decided advantage. No coal-scuttle is necessary, and a poker is almost a superfluity. We have seen the grate in action, and can say that it gives off an immense heat, and that it burns brightly and with little smoke. The register door is of a far simpler construction than that in ordinary use, and is regulated by means of a chain from the front and upper part of the grate. This grate is ornamental in appearance, and can be made to admit a current of fresh air from the outside. In places where a fire is required to lae kept alight for long periods, as in offices and in sick-rooms, Mr. Edwards’s invention will be found a great boon, and, in fact, the principles of its construction are sufficiently sound to constitute it a decided improvement on the majority of grates in use.

BRITISH MEDICAL BENEVOLENT FUND.

means

resigned.

_____

"PERMANGANATE OF POTASH PILLS." To the Editor of THE LANCET. SiR,—In your issue of last week, Mr. Martindale speaks of having heard of cases of the spontaneous combustion of permanganate of potash pills. Since the publication of Drs. Ringer and Murrell’s paper on the use of the salt in amenorrhoea, I have myself made a number of the pills, and have kept them made, but in no instance have I observed anything akin to spontaneous combustion to take place. It is, however, true that when permanganate of potash is rubbed up in a mortar with any of the ordinary excipients, it ignites and burns slowly, after the manner of moistened gunpowder; but in my case the friction caused by triturating the mass was clearly the starting-point of the ignition, as no change occurred when the ingredients were gently mixed together. I think the term "spontaneous combustion,as applied to the chemical change occurring in such cases, is erroneous, and likely to mislead practitioners into the belief that the mass, when made, suddenly and while (in my case at least) the decomviolentlyisexplodes, effected. position quietly Again, the formula Mr. Martindale suggests seems to me cumbrous, and out, of the way of the majority of dispensing country practitioners, in whose surgeries kaolin or sandarach is rarely met with. I have found that if the permanganate be reduced to powder, moistened with a drop or two of water, and rubbed up with starch powder, or compound tragacanth powder, it may be readily made into a mass with extract of gentian, which mass seems also to keep unchanged. If any coating is desired, the compound tincture of benzoin answers well. I am, Sir, yours truly,

general meeting of subscribers to the British MedicalBenevolentFundwasheldonJan.llth,at63,MontaguTHE annual

W. SNELL, L.R.C.P. Edin. Gargrave, Yorkshire, January, 1883.

square, the house of the hon. secretary, Mr. Malcolm Morris, Dr. G. C. Jonson taking the chair in the unavoidable absence To the Editor of THE LANCET. of the President, Sir George Burrows. The financial statement SIR,-In a note from Mr. Martindale the attention of your was submitted and the annual report of the committee was readers is drawn to the difficulty that exists in the di. read by the treasurer, Dr. Broadbent, from which it appeared of pills containing permanganate of potash. Having pensing that the donations during the year 1882 had amounted to f803, this week met witha case of missed menstruation, from a chill, the

subscriptions

to

f1l52; the former being less than in I proceeded

to make

use

of the

valuable,

1881, the latter more than in any previous year. The action well-grounded, information which

Metropolitan Counties Branch of the British Medical Association in permitting contributions to the fund to be collected at the same time with the subscriptions to the Association had brought a considerable accession of subscriptions. The disbursements during the year had beenin grants, the unprecedented amount of .62184; in annnities, f938 10.; a total of more than f3000; and the entire

of the

expense of collecting and distributing this sum had not amounted to 132—i.e., not 4 per cent., including the printing and postage of a volumillous report and the postage and stamps employed in the distribution of over E2000 by Dr. G. C. Jonson, Chairman of the Committee, in weekly of monthly instillments. The expansion in the operations or the Fund, while full of satisfaction to the committee was a source of anxiety, as constant effort was required to obtain

and

apparently

have had from Drs. Ringer and Murrell, and prescribed two-grain doses of permangate of potash in pill. In my prescription the excipient was and the chemist with whom my parent dealt, a most careful and competent dispenser, came to me to say that he could not make up the pills with it as the compound smoked. I suggested an extract, but it also was found to be incompatible. Ultimately the pills were mada up with liquorice powder and a little oil. I may add that none of the disagreeable effects described are felt by my patient, who takes six grains of the permanganate daily; on the contrary, she imagines that her appetite has been improved. She takes the pills immediately after food, which is to be as solid as possible. I am, Sir, yours truly, ROBERT MACPHERSON. Glasgow, Jan. 13th, 1883. we

glycerine,

P