of course loss of flesh, and strength both of mind and body, and above all the sleep at this period goes astray. In a disease which is marked by such a variety of symptoms there is no more constant one than this loss of sleep; one exception only has come under my notice where it did not exist."

Thus the three chief symptoms are loss of flesh, alteration of countenance, and quickened circulation, with disordered function in one or more organs of the body. Or, to use the words of our author, the climacteric disease is" a decay, for the time, of the several functions constituting life, but more particularly of those of the nervous system. To any one studying a case of the disease, it appears as if the system had got tired, and could not carry on its various functions with its wonted energy." If this be the climacteric disease, we agree with Dr. Kennedy, that it is to be met with at all periods of life, and in all classes of society-but more frequently, of course, in the later than in the earlier periods of existence.

In respect to treatment, it is hardly necessary to say that no specific plan can be laid down for a disease that has no specific character or seat. Debility is, no doubt, a prominent feature in the malady; but there is so often a local affection attending the general weakness, that we ought always to examine the head, chest, and abdomen. Such a state of bad health as is described by Dr. K. presents usually a considerable degree of derangement of the abdominal secretions; and if these are not corrected, tonics or stimulants will be of little avail. Alteratives, tonics, and change of air, are among the chief therapeutic agents.

ON THE PRESENT STATE OF KNOWLEDGE OF THE NATURE OF INFLAMMATION. By T. WHARTON JONES, F.R.S. (Condensed from the Medical Gazette, April 19, 1844.)

Retardation of the flow of blood in the small vessels with dilatation of their calibre, and at last stagnation of the blood-corpuscles in the vessels, constitute the first microscopical phenomena in the inflammatory process, as seen in the frog. There is good reason for thinking that the microscopical phenomena of inflammation are the same in man. It is generally supposed that the dilatation is primary, and the retardation of the flow of blood a physical effect of the preceding dilatation; the retardation however is greater than the dilatation will physically account for. With respect to the nature of the dilatation, it is now admitted that the dilatation of the arteries in inflammation is a state of relaxation or paralysis and not of activity. Mr. Jones, not being satisfied that the capillaries and radicles of the veins have contractile walls, which the small arteries are believed to have, and therefore unwilling to admit primary dilatation from relaxation in them, concludes that dilatation of the capillaries and radicles of the veins is secondary to the retardation of the flow of blood in the arteries, and is owing to distension from accumulation of blood. Henle thinks that relaxation and dilatation of the vessels, with retardation of the flow of blood, act in determining stagnation of the blood, and in this way; the retarded flow of blood, together with the relaxation and dilatation of the vessels, favours the exudation of serum ; hence the plasma of the blood in the part becomes inspissated by a preponderance of protein matter over the salts. This inspissation of the plasma determines endosmotic changes in the red corpuscles, in consequence of which they are disposed to aggregate. Mr. Jones does not agree with Henle in this: he conceives that the stagnation of the blood must recognize some other cause than inspissation of the plasma. Mr. Jones considers that the proximate cause of inflammation, although affecting the constitution of the blood, does not reside in the blood only, but primarily in the agency on that fluid of the solids through which it passes in the capillary vessels he thinks this appears from the limitation of inflam

matory disease to a certain locality, from its easy reproduction at a subsequent period. The appearances, he says, attending the stagnation of the red corpuscles are such as might be supposed to be the effect of a suspension of the conditions by which, in the natural state, the red corpuscles keep in the middle of the stream, neither adhering to the walls of the vessels nor to each other, and not readily entering the smallest capillaries; the effect in fact of the establishment of an attraction between the red-corpuscles on the one hand and the walls of the vessels on the other, as well as among the red-corpuscles themselves, instead of the absence of attraction, or of the actual repulsion which naturally exists. Emmert, by way of explaining this attraction, indicates some of the conditions attending the operation of the attraction--he points out that constriction of the capillaries (small arteries) and the attraction between the parenchyma and bloodcorpuscles are in antagonism-that when the constriction of the capillaries is great, the attraction between the parenchyma and blood is small; hence no congestion. When, on the contrary, there is relaxation and dilatation of the capil laries, the attraction is great between the parenchyma and the blood; and hence accumulation and stagnation of the red corpuscles.

Mr. Jones, before expounding his theory, claims the following postulates: 1. That the constriction and dilatation of the calibre of the small arteries at least, if not of the capillaries, is owing to contraction and relaxation of their walls in virtue of their contractility or tonicity, which is dependent on the nervous system. 2. That the ordinary tone of the vessels is determined by the moderate discharge of nervous influence. 3. That the relaxation, atony, or paralysis of the walls of the vessels on which their dilatation depends, is owing to the suspension of nervous influence. 4. That the relaxation with dilatation of the vessels from suspension of the nervous influence is the precursor of the stagnation. The theory which Henle has formed of the mode in which the exciting cause of inflammation determines the suspension of nervous influence is this: the exciting cause acts primarily on sensitive nerves, exalting their activity. The motor nerves of the vessels which have sympathetical relations with the excited sensitive nerves, are secondarily affected-this affection of the motor nerves which supervenes by reflex action on the excitement of the sensitive nerves, is one of depression, or suspension of action; of paralysis-this form of sympathy is called antagonism.*

With respect to the inflammation of an organ occurring after section of some part of the sympathetic, Stilling refers it to paralysis of the walls of the vessels.

Exudation. This commences immediately after or during the stagnation of the blood-it is at first serous, and afterwards pure plasma. So long as the vessels are entire, none of the corpuscles of the blood pass out or escape. With exudation is completed the inflammatory process, properly so called.

There is scarcely a shadow of difference between this theory, and that propounded by Dr. Billing in his First Principles of Medicine.-Rev.

PHYSIOLOGY.

MUSCLE, A NEUROMAGNETIC APPARATUS.*

Gazette.)

(From the London Medical

The mechanism by which muscles contract or shorten their fibres is a question which has been much agitated. The view which I have taken is, that muscular fibre consists of a series of pieces in the form of discs, not immediately adherent to each other, but held together by an intervening substance, so yielding and elastic as to admit of very close approximation of the discs to each other, or their separation to a certain extent. These discs I consider analogous in their nature to electro-magnets; and I propose to call them neuro-magnets. The neuromagnetic discs composing muscular fibre are of microscopical minuteness, and are arranged so as to operate on each other at very short distances only. The primitive fibrils of the nerves are disposed in loops across the muscular fibres, but not coiled round the neuro-magnets, as the galvanism conducting wire is around electro-magnets, when much electro-magnetic force is required. The nervous influence streaming along the primitive fibrils of the nerves, thus disposed in loops across the muscular fibres, communicates to the neuro-magnetic discs composing these fibres a magnetic state, by virtue of which they attract each other; this constitutes contraction of the muscular fibre.

ON THE RELATIVE PROPORTION OF CENTENARIANS, OF DEAF AND DUMB, OF BLIND AND OF INSANE, IN THE RACES OF EUROPEAN AND AFRICAN ORIGIN, AS SHOWN BY THE CENSUSES OF THE UNITED STATES. By Dr. FORRY. (From the New York Journal of Medicine, May 1844.)

In a preceding Number of the New York Journal of Medicine, Dr. Forry inserted an article, the object of which was to show the fallacy of an attempt made to prove, from the single fact that the census gives a much higher ratio of cen tenarians to our African than to our European race, that the two people constitute distinct species, and that their offspring, the mulatto, on the assumed ground of having a very short mean duration of life, is a hybrid. The subject of the relative number of deaf and dumb, blind and insane, in the two races, as well as the relative ratios among the slaves and free-coloured, was also noticed in the same article. In the Census of 1830 the number of deaf and dumb, and blind, was alone computed; that for 1840 included the insane also. In the Census of 1830 the ratio of whites, deaf and dumb, was 1 in 1964, and of the coloured population 1 in 3134; and of blind, the ratio of the former was 1 in 2651, and of the latter 1 in 1584. In this inverse result in the two races, the excess is about equal, the deaf and dumb whites being a little more than three to two, and the excess of coloured blind being in about the same ratio. According to the Census of 1840

The ratio of the white deaf and dumb was

1 in 2123

1 in 2933

1 in 2821

1 in 1509

Extract from Mr. Wharton Jones's Lecture introductory to his course on Anatomy and Physiology at the Charing Cross Hospital, Oct. 1843.

It is here seen that the proportions of the insane in the two races are identical, being about 1 in 1000. The discrepance among the States is so great as respects the ratios of the coloured insane, that no reliance can be placed on their

correctness.

Relative Proportion of Centenarians in the two Races.—It has been proved by the Censuses that the coloured race, by virtue of some peculiar tenacity of life, far outnumbers the whites in centenarians. A comparison of the whites and the coloured race, at the age of 100 and upwards, in the Census of 1830, shows that the chances of attaining this great longevity are forty times as great with the free coloured as the whites, and with the slaves, eleven times as great; and in 1840, the disproportion, though somewhat diminished, shows nine slaves and thirty free-coloured centenarians to one white one. Dr. Forry maintains that this mere tenacity of life possesses not the least importance in the estimate of the mean duration of man's life. In the Report on the Sanatory Condition of the Labouring Population of Great Britain, it is observed that the greatest proportion of centenarians are of the labouring classes; and that instances of them have from time to time appeared amidst the crowded populations in some of the worst neighbourhoods of London, where the average duration of life is the lowest. Dr. Forry concludes that, as far as regards centenarians, they are to be found in the worst periods of man's history, as respects the condition of population, and often too, in the most insalubrious localities; that they abound in countries having a low mean duration of life, and that they decrease and finally disappear in proportion as the mean term of man's existence is extended by the improvement of his physical condition and lastly, that they are found in that class of society, which has the lowest mean duration of life. He adds further, that the investigation of man's organization and of his natural history will continue still further to confirm the conclusion, that the entire human race have been made upon one model, and accordingly constitute but one family.

ON THE ACTION OF CONEIA ON THE BLOOD. By Professor HUNEFIELD. (From Simon's Beiträge zur Physiologischen und Pathologischen Chemie und Mikroscopie. 1844.)

As soon as any Coneia is mixed with the blood, a striking change became immediately perceptible. The blood was changed into a dirty reddish yellow greasy mass, which no longer allowed any blood-corpuscles to be recognized in it under the microscope. The Coneia employed was perfectly pure. On adding muriate of Coneia the blood remained unchanged. A short time since, I repeated these experiments with Coneia, and obtained the same result. The recent experiments directed to ascertain the causes of this re-action now show me, that Serum and Albumen coagulate in a similar manner; for if a glass rod, moistened with Coneia, be introduced into these fluids, a tenacious coagulum forms on the rod. Coneia shows this property with creosote, oil of turpentine, oil of bitter almonds and some other etherial oils, whilst others, as oil of rosemary, of peppermint, chamomile, valerian, petroleum and citron oils effect no coagulation in this way, and it is only on adding some water and shaking, that they produce something resembling a coagulum; differences which deserve to be more closely investigated. A moderately concentrated solution of dried blood soon undergoes a change of colour into a yellowish-brown, so that the fibrine of the blood becomes changed, and after longer standing, the blood becomes thickened.

Coneia, accordingly, deviates from the other alkaloids in these re-actions, and approximates, as was to be expected, to the etherial oils. Whether the other fluid alkaloids, as for instance, fluid Nicotine, produce a coagulating effect, I leave to be ascertained by those, who have those substances at hand. That Coneia, given by itself, and as a salt, kills with extreme rapidity, has been stated by Christison, and I have had an opportunity of ascertaining the great suddenness of its deadly operation. That the Salts of Coneia are equally poisonous, that a drop of Coneia can kill a large rabbit in a few minutes, that the bloodcorpuscle, and the blood of the animal just killed, evince no change whatever ; that death here occurs with peculiar nervous symptoms, whilst in the case of other narcotics it is ushered in with different symptoms, all these circumstances do not favour the opinion, that the actions of poisons are always of a chemical nature. A distinction may be made of poisons into blood-poisons and nervouspoisons. Whoever keeps all the physiological phenomena, namely, the great body of Nervous Physics, constantly before his eyes, will find that the actions of external powers on the organism cannot be explained on chemical principles, and that we are deeply indebted to some distinguished Physiologists, for their having given a check to the chemical views which are now becoming so prevalent. I let fall this observation, and reserve its extension for a more convenient time.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE HUMAN OVARY. BY CHARLES RITCHIE, M.D. Glasgow. (From the London Medical Gazette May, 1844.)

1. The Fallopian tubes of the infant, and of the child before puberty, are perfect in their structure, although their patency is more or less obstructed at birth by the presence in them and in the Uterus of a tenacious glue-coloured mucus: and immediately before the establishment of menstruation, and throughout adult life, they are occupied, and have their uterine extremities in particular distended by a cream-looking fluid similar in appearance to the ordinary vaginal secretion, and which, as seen by the microscope, consists of innumerable very minute globules in masses of an oval form, differing from the globules of blood or pus.

2. The ovaries of new-born infants and children are occupied, sometimes numerously, by Graafian vesicles or ovisacs, which are highly vascular as early as the sixth year, and vary in size from the bulk of a coriander seed to that of a small raisin, in the 14th year, at which time they are filled with their usual transparent granular fluid, their contained ova can be detected, and their coats are so elastic, that their contents, on their rupture, can be projected to at least twelve inches: the existence of menstruation not being essential, therefore, to those conditions, either as a cause, or as an effect, and the possibility, even at this age, should rupture of the follicles occur, of their contained ova being conveyed to the uterus, along the Fallopian tubes, kept patent by their peculiar secretion.

3. The Graafian vesicles contained in the ovaries prior to menstruation, are found, as they also are in every other period of life, in continual progression towards the circumference of the glands, which they penetrate, discharging themselves by circular-shaped capillary pores in the peritoneal coat; the presence of the catamenia being thus no indispensable prerequisite to their rupture.

4. The establishment of menstruation, does not necessarily give rise to any immediate modification in the manner in which the ovisacs are discharged, or in their subsequent changes.

5. The ovisacs of the healthy menstruating female are, in general, larger and