New York Medical Gazette and Journal of Health

EPILEPSY.

The carotid artery has been recently tied in this city again, for epilepsy, with the fanciful hope of curing, but, as usual, without benefit, unless to the surgeon, who thus increases his numerical catalogue of operations, the results being of secondary importance. Was laryngismus present? What will Marshall Hall think and say of American Surgery?

DR. JOHN H. GRISCOM

HAS published a pamphlet of some ten pages, entitled Hospital Hygeine Illustrated, read before the N. Y. Academy of Medicine, and paged as a part of the transactions of that body. In his illustrations he is strangely oblivious of the facts at Bellevue in 1847, when the benefits of pure air in Typhus were proved by hundreds of examples, but which he chooses to ignore. We leave it to others to say what he deserves for this paltry, but characteristic littleness.

N. E. FEMALE MEDICAL COLLEGE.

D. W. M. CORNELL, of Boston, has published an Introductory Lec. ture alike able and instructive, as we infer from the extracts in our Boston contemporary.

Our crowded columns must be our apology for delaying several original articles, and other contributions, domestic and foreign, which will appear in our next. If we continue to receive the favor of the profession, by increasing our subscription list, we contemplate another enlargement without any increase in price, so as to afford room for greater variety in each number.

PROF. GEORGE HEADLEY, of Buffalo Medical College, has accepted the appointment of Professor of Chemistry and Natural History in Castleton Medical College. Prof. Headley's attainments in literature and general science, and his experience as a teacher of Chemistry, have procurred for him the reputation of an able instructor in that department.

NECROLOGY.

Among the recent deaths, we are pained to see those of Dr. HESTER, of New Orleans, by Cholera, and Dr. MowER, of the U. S. Navy; both of them eminent members of the profession.

THE Physician's Visiting List, Diary, and Book of Engagements for 1854, published by Lindsay & Blakiston, of Philadelphia, is an invaluable pocket book for medical men, which once used will never be dispensed with.

New Publications.

Text Book of Anatomy, and Guide in Dissections, for the use of Students of Medicine and Dental Surgery. By WASHINGTON R. HANDY, M. D., &c. With 264 Illustrations. Philadelphia, Lindsay & Blakiston.

WE announce this publication with much pleasure, having long known the author as an ardent student and enthusiastic teacher of Anatomy, the science to which he has devoted his mind from his youth, and in the intimate knowledge of which he excels, as this volume very clearly exhibits. And although from his relations to the Dental College of Baltimore, he has given special minuteness to those structures which are adapted to the student of scientific dentistry, yet this portion of the work only increases its value to medical students, for all this physicians ought to know as thoroughly as dentists. We know of no book on human Anatomy which we can more unqualifiedly recommend to all who wish to be instructed in this fundamental science, and this because of its completeness, and especially its adaptation to beginners. There are some of the wood cuts, which the worthy publishers should have substituted by new and better ones, especially as such a work is destined to become a standard for yearsTM to come.

ELECTRIC SCIENCE, by F. C. Bakewell. London, Ingram, Cooke & Co. NewYork, Bangs & Bro.

THE history, phenomena, and applications of electricity are here taught in an attractive form, illnstrated by instructive and beautiful engravings. Every lover of Franklin should possess this book, for it does full justice to his name and memory.

MEMOIRS OF JOHN ABERNETHY, F. R. S. By George Macilwain, &c. New York, Harper & Brothers.

WE heartily commend this new book to the profession, everywhere, and predict not only a high degree of entertainment, but still greater instruction and profit, by its perusal. Abernethy was a medical scholar, thoroughly versed in

every department,-a Surgeon, but no specialist, or mere operator; in short, a medical philosopher. His eccentricities were those of genius, and exhibited talent of a high order. His love of truth gave no quarter to medical heresies, and his humanity prompted him to consecrate all his powers to the public good, doing right irrespective of popularity. His biographer loved and honored him, and has done good service to his brethren in this publication. We shall extract passages from this work on the Hospital system, and other collateral topics soon.

ETIOLOGV, PATHOLOGY AND TREATMENT OF FIBRO BRONCHITIS, AND RHEUMATICPNEUMONIA, by Thos. H. Buckler, M. D. Formerly Physician to the Baltimore Alms House.

THIS work, as its title implies, is by an original thinker, who has something to say and therefore writes. Such a book, in these days of compilation and plagiarism, of annotators and out-riders, who plant upon the title pages of other men's labors their own “humble names," and even print themselves in gold let ters on the backs of volumes of stolen thoughts, covering up the theft and stereotyping their guilty impertinence and presumption, by an introductory and deprecatory preface, or the interpolation of a few worthless notes, such a book, we say, is a green oasis in the desert of our literature.

Dr. Buckler attempts the discrimination between those cases of Bronchitis in which the mucus, or the fibrous tissues respectively, are the seat of the inflammation; justly regarding the distinction of importance alike for the diagnosis and treatment. He alleges an analogous difference in the tissues involved, as of still higher value in Pneumonia, supervening upon, or co-existing with the former pathological condition. And upon these and kindred topics, he reasons theoretically and practically, that a solution of many enigmas in the pathology of diseases of the chest is thus to be attained, illustrating his ideas by cases, which appear cautiously observed and faithfully recorded. Having only had leisure for a partial examination of the book, we are not prepared to give relia ble judgment on its merits, but we honor the author for his courage to think and the ability with which he writes, and defer any criticism. It is published at Philadelphia, by Blanchard & Lea, in commendable style.

INSTITUTIONS FOR THE INSANE IN PRUSSIA, AUSTRIA, AND GERMANY. By Pliny. Earle, M. D. Utica, 1853.

THIS work comprises the whole of the valuable series of papers, contributed to the American Journal of Insanity, by the author, and are the result of his personal observations in the several foreign countries named, during a late tourupon the continent, for the purpose of examining the Institutions of the old world, for the treatment of Insanity. No man in our country can write or speak on this topic with better practical knowledge, and none would be so likely to be appreciated by the profession. Dr. Earle has moreover no superior among us as a medical writer, and this work will increase his reputation.

[From the Peninsular Journal of Medicine.]

EXPOSURE OF SECRET REMEDIES.

MR. EDITOR: The National Association, at their last meeting had up the subject of the appointment of a national chemist, whose duty it should be to an alyze patent medicines and secret remedies, and publish the result. This is certainly a good idea. Half the glory of secret remedies consist in that imaginative splendor with which people clothe an unknown and, as they suppose, unknowable thing. It is considered an unanswerable argument in favor of a thing, if nobody can find out what it is made of, and especially if the doctors have tried to penetrate the secret and failed. They will swallow such compounds with a ludicrously solemn reverence, when if they happened to know what commonplace materials it consisted of, they would turn up their noses in contempt. Such a chemist as is proposed, would, by his labors, extinguish like magic the phantom glories that play around the pill-boxes of empiricism.

However, this measure, to be thoroughly carried out, would involve heavy expense, which there is no very obvious way of meeting. As a partial substitute for his labors, therefore, I beg leave to make the following suggestions, through your journal. Very many of the secret remedies are in fact no secrets at all, their compositions becoming known in various ways to individuals of the regular profession, but these physicians seeing that the best of them are not essentially different, nor a whit better than extempore prescriptions which they are making every day, laugh in their sleeves to see how the people are gulled, and think no more about it. Would it not be well in all such cases to publish the composition of the article, that it may be stripped of the false attractions derived from its secrecy. It would give a greater weight, too, to the opinion of physicians upon these remedies, were it understood that they were perfectly familiar with their composition, and that they spoke from knowledge, when they pronounced this, that or the other new wonder a very common-place preparation. The glory departs from patent pill boxes, in most men's eyes, when you enumerate to them, article by article, the things that are in it.

I do not know as you will consider the suggestion as worth your notice; but if you do, here is a formula to begin with, which I am informed is that of Ayer's Cherry Pectoral:

B.-Morph. Acetas.
Tinct. Sanguinariæ,

Wine of Antimony,
Wine of Ipecac,

Syrup of Wild Cherry Bark,

grains. iv.
drams. ij.

ounces.

iij.

CONTENTS.

Two cases of Vesico-Vaginal Fistula, by Dr. J. M. Sims

Observations on administration loaide of Potassium, by Dr. O'Rielly.

An Example for Christian Men..

Last Turn of the Wheel of Quackery.

Tania Lata expelled by Kousso..