Various

“ As was stated in the early part of the paper, men must be protected from themselves and especially against water of their own poisoning. Nature’s strivings are constantly to make clean the unclean; to dissipate the noxious and to destroy the hurtful, but man by breaking nature’s laws, brings ten fold vengeance on his head. ”

“ Those who live in the country are often prone to thank God that they live beyond the reach of sewer gases and other poisonous contaminations of city wells; but, before being too confident, let us ask ourselves the question, “are the people of our villages, or on our farms and plantations, entirely free from typhoid fever, diphtheria and other diseases, whose origin is so often traced to impure drinking-water.” ”

“ After reviewing the opinions of several writers who have extolled chlorate of potassa in large doses, and having pointed out the real solution of so many having succumbed to nephritis or similar symptoms, he concludes:
“The practical point I wish to make is this, that chlorate of potassa is by no means an indifferent remedy; that it can prove and has proved dangerous and fatal in a number of instances, producing one of the most dangerous diseases—acute nephritis. We are not very careful in regard to doses of alkalies in general, but in regard to the chlorate we ought to be very particular. ”

“ Dame Nature furnishes about two hundred and fifty articles to man for food, giving him the greatest variety, from which to choose, when hungry; but, when he would slake his material thirst, she offers simply water. ”

“ I should add, that arsenic often determines a deceptive hunger, to which there should be no concession, because at this period of the disease, the lightest broth might cause fatal indigestion.
I have tried every possible remedy for black vomit, and there is not one, which has constantly given the same result. I have had extraordinary success with agents, which at other times produced no effect; and I affirm, that there is no therapeutic agent, which can always be employed with entire confidence. Black vomit is the symptom of alteration, more or less profound, of the bile and of the blood. ”

“ Filth he does not consider is any more abundant in the summer, and the disease declines with the increase of the very rains that favor increased decomposition. He does not attach much importance to unripe fruits as a causative element. “For whoever saw a youngster who would not exchange all his earthly possessions for a green apple, and whoever saw a child in good health injured by an unripe apple or by any quantity not altogether unreasonable?” And then the sufferers from cholera infantum are all under two years, and hence have not arrived at the green-fruit eating stage of their existence. ”

“ It can be seen from the outlines we have just given, without the need of a further demonstration, that the quality of drinking-water is of the utmost importance.
It is strange, but true, that man needs to be protected, even by force, against himself, and this is well exemplified in the matter of drinking-water. ”

“ There is no disease which develops contagious miasm more suddenly than yellow fever. A large accumulation of sick in the same place, is a certain source of disease and contagion.
On board of vessels, a good hygienic system would greatly diminish the number of the sick. In ordinary times, government vessels should not have full crews. The men will then have a sufficient quantity of air to breathe. They should not be drilled in the fierce heat of the sun, or in rain, and they should be required to go to the surgeon, for the least pain in the head. ”

“ As, of course, no American physician can now forego the pleasure and duty of making Frerich’s on the Liver one of his working tools, we leave them to judge if we are mistaken in saying that it is a master-piece. ”

“ We know of cases where wells had been used for years with no bad effect, when suddenly disease and death appeared. The poison, though slow in its course, had finally reached the well and a chemical analysis revealed contamination from privies thirty feet or more distant.
The living organisms which are found in water are, some of them injurious; some beneficial.
Under favorable conditions of light, warmth, &c., countless millions of living things will spring into life in any water; the more impure, the more abundant they will be. ”

“ Deaths are registered, to be sure, and the books are made in the cities, but if the conditions above mentioned exist in the country, the disease appears there—of course, not a great many cases, for the susceptible bodies furnished by a single block in the city would outnumber those of two or three square miles in the country—yet I am glad to admit that the conditions for obvious reasons are not so likely to be present 278in the country; the contrast, in point of green grass, shade, cool water, and moving air, is no less marked than is the percentage of mortality, and it is no more marked. ”

“ When the disease commences with chills, followed by abundant sweats after the emetic and purgative, there is assurance, that there will be another remission, and then the sulphate of quinine is preëminently the remedy. But when there are no chills in the commencement of the disease, when the prominent symptoms are heat and dryness of the skin, and the fever continues, the exacerbation will not be long delayed, and no propitious moment can be found to administer the anti-periodic. ”

“ In localities where heat and marshes abound, water may often be colored by organic acids and other substances which dissolves, and yet not be appreciably unhealthy. Such waters are common in some countries, and present dangerous possibilities, should fermentation and putrefaction at any time set in. Decaying fish and animals, leaves, &c., &c., form the ordinary and accidental organic impurities of water. These are unhealthy not only in themselves, but especially because they offer to the germs of disease or pestilence a harbor and sustenance. ”

“ They are never found in fresh rain water, but abundant in nearly every cistern. The office of infusoria is in water, that of the buzzard on land: they are scavengers, and purify the liquid by feeding upon the decaying matters it contains. But the microscope reveals to us in water, contaminated with sewerage, for instance, minute germs capable of motion, which, as in the case of the infusoria, live on the organic matter, but are believed to accompany if not to cause many forms of contagious disease, filling even the air, in times of epidemic. ”

“ Water being the most universal solvent, whenever it comes in contact with the earth, dissolves the soluble constituents of the soil through which it flows, and hence it is that on analyzing water we find solid substances in solution. ”

“ If we mix them in a vessel and apply a match, there is instantly a powerful explosion, heat is generated and there is formed—water. The two strange, invisible gases have combined and formed the well-known liquid. Whenever a substance which contains hydrogen, like wood, paper, starch, sugar, &c., burns, it forms water with oxygen of the air. In fact, these two gases are always ready, on the slightest provocation to unite. Rain, or melted snow, approaches nearest to chemically pure water, but all wells, springs, rivers and seas contain dissolved substances, in greater or less degree. ”

“ The counter-indications of purgatives are colliquative diarrhœa, the third period of the disease, hemorrhages, especially those of the anus. Feeble and lymphatic temperaments do not endure them well. They should be given to women and children with caution, and in small doses frequently repeated.
Calomel.—We have spoken of calomel, the action of which, so different according to the dose, is here formally indicated, either as a purgative, or as an alterative, or as a derivative. ”

“ A body weighing one hundred and twenty pounds, if dried till free from all its liquids, would weigh but twenty pounds—while three-fourths, by weight, of the human body is water. If we were to make a box 16 inches square and the same deep, (a cube of 16 inches,) with walls one inch thick, and fill it with water, the ratio of water to wood would very nearly represent the relative proportions of solid and liquid constituents of the human body, both by weight and volume. ”

“ It is better that the daily quantity of twenty grains should be given in fifty or sixty doses than in eight or ten: that is, the solution should be weak, and a drachm or a half-drachm of such solution can be given every hour or every half hour, or every fifteen or twenty minutes, care being taken that no water is given soon after the remedy has been administered for obvious reasons. He referred to these facts with so much emphasis because of late an attempt has been made to introduce chlorate of potassa as the main remedy in bad cases of diphtheria—and, what is worst, in large doses. ”

“ These organic, poisonous matters ooze through the soil into wells and springs, and as before said, may not show any bad effect for sometime, but sooner or later disease and death will surely visit the unsuspecting household and the physician’s aid be sought in vain, for with every draught of water which passes the fevered lips, the sufferer imbibes new poison and hastens the inevitable end. ”

“ The reason of the efficacy of some mineral waters may be in unrecognized combustion of known elements or the presence of substances as yet beyond the power of chemistry to detect.
Four of these common substances mentioned above have a characteristic taste, and as they are all found in nearly every well, it follows that these waters must have some taste. This, as already stated, is a fact. We, who are accustomed by constant use to one particular well, fail to recognize any taste at all, while a stranger will often detect it at once. ”

“ What are the indications of sulphate of quinine in yellow fever? There must be at least remission, if there is not complete intermission of the fever. Its application is then excluded from the continued type. When the fever has yielded, by the use of the medicines of which we have spoken, or when, with sweat or moisture of the skin, the pulse has sensibly lowered, the employment of quinine is always good. Its effect will be shown, for the strongest reason, in the intermittent type. ”

“ In the adult we have more room, and the cartilage is often found hard, and unyielding in persons of advanced life, and it is therefore necessary when enlargement is required in the adult, to cut an additional ring or more of the trachea. I continue my incision below the cricoid cartilage, so far as one or more of the rings of the trachea. ”

“ Moreover, the germs of many contagious diseases, which feed on filth and multiply in foul water, are nurtured and preserved in warm climates through winter weather, by the equable temperature of wells and cisterns, and are ready to start anew on their errand of death, when a favorable moment arrives. ”

“ The nourishment ought to be select and the patient should not be exposed to the sun or to the influence of the moon. When the disease does not go beyond the first period, convalescence is much shorter, if there is no leading organ assailed; but if it reaches the second and third period, especially that of hemorrhages and profound alterations of the blood, convalescence is long and painful, and often leaves its traces during the whole life. ”

“ Purgatives.—Purgatives are of as great importance as emetics in the treatment of yellow fever.
After the administration of the emetic and a repose of twelve to twenty-four hours, the purgative may be used to induce action by the intestines. It slightly excites the secretion of mucus, and facilitates the circulation and the passing of bile by the stools. Drastics should be absolutely excluded, their too violent action producing injurious irritation. Among the purgatives I recommend, above all, castor oil alone, or associated with oil of sweet almonds. ”