THE UNIVERSITY OF WALES AND MEDICAL DEGREES.

1519 A local magistracy would certainly appear adhesions. Apart from slight congestion and oedema no judges in questions as to the rights and other macroscopic pulmonary lesion was found. There were requirements of a community, while the quarter sessions vegetative endocarditis of the mitral valve and infarcts in the bench would constitute a court of appeal from their kidneys and the spleen. Examination of the right eye after decisions if required. Everything must, however, depend enucleation showed purulent exudation in the retina, the upon the spirit in which the new Act is administered. It ciliary body, and the anterior chamber. Microscopic examinais much to be hoped that in granting licences under tion and cultures revealed the pneumococcus in pure culture its provisions regard will be had to the importance of in the exudation. In the aqueous humour the pneumococci were as numerous as in a culture. The vegetations on the encouraging temperance among the people. mitral valve were infiltrated with pneumococci. The heart’s blood yielded the pneumococcus in pure culture. Evidently PUBLIC AMBULANCES. pulmonary infection preceded the pneumococcic endocarditis THE use of ambulances in cases of accident and sudden and pneumococcic septicaemia to which the patient illness has recently been a subject of discussion in the succumbed. The clinical characteristics of the iritis enabled columns of the ManeAester Guardian and an important the pneumococcic nature of the infection to be diagnosed addition to the correspondence was made on May 23rd by a before a bacteriological examination was made. In another letter signed by Mr. R. H. Wolstenholme of Salford, case of pneumococcic iritis of uterine origin with cerebral chairman of the Manchester Medical Guild, and by the abscess observed by one of the writers the iritis ended in the two honorary secretaries of the guild. Briefly stated, the production of a similar fibrinous exudation in the pupil. In gaild is in favour of a municipal ambulance and first-aid the pus of the cerebral abscess the pneumococcus was found system available for the public in general without dis- in pure culture. Some writers have published cases of tinction of class and providing not only for patients who suppurative choroiditis in pneumonia. In 1853 Arlt described would probably be treated at one or other of the hos- the case of a child suffering from lobular pneumonia who pitals but also for those who would prefer to be removed had metastatic meningeal abscesses and suppurative choroiddirectly to their homes. Moreover, the first aid rendered itis. In 1874 Piéchaud observed suppurative choroiditis before removal by ambulance ought to be far more efficient with spontaneous perforation of the sclerotic in a woman than it is at present. Unnecessary haste in removal of who died from pneumonia with empyema. Natanson and patients is generally to be deprecated. The guild judiciously Eversbusch have reported cases of pneumonia during in-

dubious utility. to be the best

recommends that the first aid should be as efficient as the resources of medicine and surgery can possibly make it, that it should therefore be carried out by a properly qualified medical man, and that it should be available at any part of the district with the least possible delay. In order to avoid the expense and complications inseparable from the appointment of special emergency medical officers and the creation of dressing stations the guild suggests that the police should be empowered and directed to obtain the attendance of the nearest available medical practitioner who already has a surgery fitted up for dealing with emergencies.

fluenza with irido-choroiditis, unilateral or bilateral. When the part played by the pneumococcus in pneumonia was discovered it became possible to establish more precisely the connexion between the ocular affection and the pneumonia. In 1892 Herrnheiser first demonstrated the presence of the pneumococcus in the ocular pus. The patient was a man, aged 67 years, who was admitted to hospital on March 25th for pulmonary trouble. On April 2nd there was suppurative infiltration of both corneas with bypopyon. On the 10th there was left panophthalmitis with perforation of the cornea. In the right eye there were slight infiltration of the cornea, iritis, hypopyon, and yellowish exudation on the posterior surface of the crystalline lens. Death took ENDOGENOUS PNEUMOCOCCIC INFECTION OF The necropsy showed fibrinous place four days later. THE EYE. pneumonia of the left lung, suppurative meningitis, and MODERN researches have shown that lesions in other parts acute aortic endocarditis. Pneumococci were found in all than the lungs are frequently produced by pneumococci. In the ocular and other lesions. the eye conjunctivitis and suppurative keratitis may result from infection of external origin. But ocular infection of THE UNIVERSITY OF WALES AND MEDICAL internal origin, the pneumococci being conveyed to the eye DEGREES. by the circulation, has received little attention. At the de des Paris on of the Soci6t6 Médicale A WELL-INFORMED article in the Cardiff News of May 23rd H6pitaux meeting related and M. Morax the in M. P. Le Gendre V. sets out much detail a 29th April variety of arguments in support of following case. A woman, aged 47 years, was admitted to the view that the University of Wales should be authorised to hospital on Jan. 17th in a delirious condition. At the confer degrees in medicine. Of course the chief centre of beginning of the month she took to bed with a feverish interest in such circumstances would be the Cardiff Medical illness which her medical attendant attributed to pulmonary School which would naturally bear to the University of congestion," and on the day before admission she became Wales the same relation as the Newcastle-on-Tyne Medical delirious. At the apex of the left lung there were subcrepitant School at present has to the University of Durham. The râles and an expiratory"souffle."" She did not appear to see Cardiff school may be said to date from 1893, when chairs in clearly but there were no signs of ocular inflammation. The anatomy and physiology and a lectureship in materia medica delirium continued, the temperature was about 104° F., and and pharmacy were established, thereby making it auscultation gave rise to a suspicion of infectious endocarditis. possible for students of medicine to learn the subjects On the 19th there were diffuse cloudiness of the right cornea included in the first three years of medical study as and pus in the anterior chamber. The conjunctiva and required by all universities and colleges in Great Britain. episcleral tissue were moderately injected. In the left eye Attendance on this portion of the curriculum at Cardiff is the symptoms were less severe ; there were slight iritis and recognised and accepted by all universities and colleges. fibrinous exudation in the field of the pupil. On the During last year there were in the Cardiff school 55 following days the condition of the left eye did not alter students of medicine and 20 special students in the public much but the pus in the right anterior chamber increased health department, making a total of 75. In 1903 there were considerably. On the 22nd the right eye was enucleated. 15 medical students registered at the school, the correspondDeath occurred on the 25th. The necropsy showed in the ing numbers.being 18 for University College, London, and also whole extent of the left lung extremely thick pleural for the University of Birmingham. As mentioned in our issue

1520 May 21st, p. 1465, the subject of a supplemental charter out of a holiday there is nothing like going abroad. A conferring various additional powers is already being con- holiday depends not so much upon sunshine as upon a sidered by the University of Wales and the chances of the complete change of scene, change of surroundings, of food, and even of language. Moreover, a holiday spent abroad University obtaining what it seeks seem good. of

A month for 10 MODERN PERAMBULATORS. Brittany Normandy easily spent food who for the of his i diem and the Briton francs sighs per A CORRESPONDENT who has returned to this country after native land will now find that French coffee is quite as bad an absence of 20 years is much exercised to find that a new But it is still as English, only about one-third of the price. fad has arisen " which may have a most serious effect on the to know that our much abused climate can comforting rising generation. I refer to the baby carriages now in as much sunshine as that of countries lying further i produce general use in which the unhappy child is south. through the world backwards." We do not think that The modern our correspondent need distress himself. THE DISTRIBUTION OF PLAGUE. old-fashioned is far to the arrangeperambulator superior THE medical officer of health of the Cape Colony states ment in which the unhappy child was placed on a narrow A weakly child inthat for the week ending April 30th only 1 case of plague seat and fastened in with a strap. as a

rule costs much less than in this country. in

or

can

be done

propelled

____

such circumstances when he fell asleep always fell forwardswas reported throughout the colony-namely, a Chinese and sideways and was mainly supported by the strapmale at Port Elizabeth. Plague-infected rodents were also which pressed on the abdomen while the child’s headfound in the town. In the Cape Town and Harbour Board lolled over the side. The modern perambulator in whicharea 629 rodents were examined but none was affected with the child can lie is far better and it is of no great moment plague. As regards the Transvaal, Lord Milner, telegraphing < whether the child faces in the direction in which he is on May 21st, states that the plague return for the week in if or he faces towards May 21st was as follows : total number of fresh cases his nurse he ending fact, no ; travelling can talk to her when he pleases, which, given an intelligentreported since May 14, 7-namely, whites, 2; coloured nurse, is a very good thing. There is, however, a form of persons, 5. Of the cases reported 3 have been found to be perambulator, or push-buggy, to give it its name in thenot plague-making the present total of suspected and proved ( 140, of which 24 occurred in whites and 116 in coloured country of its origin, which is most pernicious. It is a cases little mail-cart which runs near the ground and can be persons. The number of deaths since May 14th is 2, both

folded up at will. The child in one of these is far too nearwhites. -the ground, the seat is too small, and there is next to no MEDICAL SCIENCE PAPERS AT THE BONN support for the feet. It is more than probable that the MEETING OF THE GERMAN BUNSEN indiscriminate use of such conveyances may seriously injure GESELLSCHAFT. a child’s nervous system but the reclining form of perambuGerman THE lator is harmless-even though the child does face the opposite Society for the Study of Physical Chemistry, as the Deutsche Bunsen Gesellschaft, has been l known way to which it is going. , its annual gathering in Bonn and on eleventh holding THE SUNSHINE OF ENGLAND AND SWITZER- May 14th a whole session of its time was devoted to LAND COMPARED. tthe reading and discussion of papers of medical interest. Dr. J. W. Cook, the medical officer of health of the Di. Schroeder of Bonn dealt with the importance of cryo’Clacton urban district council, sends us a most interest- sscopy (or freezing-point determination) in its relation to and stated that by such observations upon the 1 ing table in reference to our remarks upon the relative health amounts of sunshine in England and Switzerland whichblood and the urine valuable light could be thrown upon the appeared in THE LANCET of May 14th. It will be seen by Eactivity of the heart and the state of the circulation. Prof this table that Clacton-on-Sea, even in the dismal years of fessor Dreser of Elberfeld followed with a paper upon the 1902 and 1903, had a decided advantage over nearly everysame subject, while Professor Arrhenius of Stockholm dealt other place mentioned in the matter of sunshine. with the Chemical Mass Action of Toxins and Antitoxins. 1 has carried out a long series of laboratory investiHe Comparative Sunshine recorded in the Month of April at the Undermentioned Places in England as per the Meteoro- gations on this subject and has arrived at conclusions logical Office Weather -Report for the Three Years 1902, which are opposed to the generally accepted theories of the 1903, and 1904. action of these bodies upon each other. Professor Arrhenius is convinced that toxins and antitoxins obey the ordinary laws of chemical action and that they react with one another in the animal organism as weak acids react with weak bases in chemical mixtures. Dr. Ehrlich of Frankfort led the opposition to the views of Professor Arrhenius and stated that his own experience of the action of poisons gained in the Institute of Experimental Therapy in Frankfort, of which he is the head, had convinced him that the ordinary laws of chemical action would not explain the interaction of toxins and antitoxins. In the case of diphtheria his view of the action of the antitoxin was that it reacted with the toxin produced by the bacteria characteristic of the illness, but that such reaction was far more complex and difficult to follow than was foreshadowed by the theory of Professor Arrhenius. A number of Dr. Cook says: ’’ Doubtless when Englishmen know that authorities and writers on this subject joined in the dissuch a large amount of sunshine can be had so near home, cussion and striking differences of opinion were manifested. rather than going so far for it they will be inclined to keep The fourth paper of medical interest was by Professor Nernst their money in England instead of spending it in Switzer- of Gottingen and related to the action of the electric current ,land." We rather doubt this, for to get the most advantage upon the nervous system. Experiments with high-frequency ___

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