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of this, however, cannot be classed with those doubting Thomases. He has brought forth a book of some 676 pages, which represents a grouping of his clinical lectures, with some elaborations. The opening chapters deal chiefly with the methods employed in medical treatment and this part of the work is elaborately illustrated. Of course a good part of the book deals with those conditions requiring the surgeon's knife, but throughout the work operative procedures are kept in the background and only brought into view as a last resort. We believe the work will receive the undoubted endorsation of the general practitioner.

The Works of Voltaire. In our front form pages will be found an advertisement which sets forth pretty completely details with regard to this very fine set of books. On the title page we readA Contemporary Version-A Critique and Biography, by the Rt. Hon. John Morley-Notes by Tobias Smollett, revised and modernized-New Translations by William F. Fleming and an Introduction by Oliver H. G. Leigh. The work is complete in 43 volumes and will make a very handsome and acceptable addition to all medical libraries in this country. There are all told 168 designs, comprising reproductions of rare old engravings, steel plates, photogravures and curious fac-similies. The work is put forth by the craftsmen of the St. Hubert Guild, Werner & Co., Akron, Ohio.

Contributions to the Science of Medicine and Surgery. By the Faculty in Celebration of the Twenty-fifth Anniversary, 18821907, of the founding of the New York Post-Graduate Medical School and Hospital.

This is a handsome paper-bound volume of 485 pages. The frontispiece is a fine portrait of D. B. St. John Roosa, M.D., LL.D., and the opening pages are devoted to a short sketch of his life. The book is a volume of original articles, all of exceeding value and great interest covering a wide range of subjects.

Protective Association

THE

ORGANIZED AT WINNIPEG, 1901

Under the Auspices of the Canadian Medical Association

HE objects of this Association are to unite the profession of the Dominion for mutual help and protection against unjust, improper or harassing cases of malpractice brought against a member who is not guilty of wrong-doing, and who frequently suffers owing to want of assistance at the right time; and rather than submit to exposure in the courts, and thus gain unenviable notoriety, he is forced to endure black-mailing.

The Association affords a ready channel where even those who feel that they are perfectly safe (which no one is) can for a small fee enroll themselves and so assist a professional brother in distress.

Experience has abundantly shown how useful the Association has been since its organization.

The Association has not lost a single case that it has agreed to defend.

The annual fee is only $3.00 at present, payable in January of each year.

The Association expects and hopes for the united support of the profession.

We have a bright and useful future if the profession will unite and join our ranks.

EXECUTIVE.

President-R. W. POWELL, M.D., Ottawa.
Vice-President-J. O. CAMARIND, M.D., Sherbrooke,
Secretary-Treasurer-J. F. ARGUE, M.D., Ottawa.

SOLICITOR,

F. H. CHRYSLER, K.C., Ottawa.

Send fees to the Secretary-Treasurer by Express Order, Money Order, Postal Note or Registered letter. If cheques are sent please add commission.

PROVINCIAL EXECUTIVES.

ONTARIO-E. E. King, Toronto; I. Olmsted, Hamilton; D. H. Arnott, London: J. C. Connell, Kingston; J. D. Courtenay, Ottawa.

QUEBEC-H. S. Birkett, Montreal; E. P. Lachapelle, Montreal; J. E. Dube, Montreal: H. R. Ross, Quebec; Russell Thomas, Lennoxville.

NEW BRUNSWICK-T. D. Walker, St. John; A. B. Atherton, Fredericton; Murray MacLaren, St. John.

NOVA SCOTIA-John Stewart, Halifax; J. W. T. Patton, Truro; H. Kendall, Sydney. PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND-S. R. Jenkins, Charlottetown.

MANITOBA-Harvey Smith, Winnipeg; J. A. MacArthur, Winnipeg; J. Hardy, Morden. NORTH-WEST TERRITORIES-J. D. Lafferty, Calgary; M. Seymour, Regina.

BRITISH COLUMBIA-S. J. Tunstall, Vancouver; O. M. Jones, Victoria; Dr. King, Cranbrooke.

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Published on the 15th of each month. Address all Communications and make all Cheques, Post Office Orders and Postal Notes payable to the Publisher, GEORGE ELLIOTT, 203 Beverley St., Toronto, Canada

VOL. XXXI.

TORONTO, SEPTEMBER, 1908.

No. 3.

COMMENT FROM MONTH TO MONTH.

Canadian Medical Association-Amendments to By-Laws By Executive Council. Under "Officers and Committees," Art. 1, sec. i., all the words after Association are struck out. Under Art. III. Reference Committees "-Sec. v., Committees on Reports of Officers was amended to read: Committee on Medical Education. Art. I.-Committees-sec. vii was changed to read as follows: The Committee of Arrangements shall have power to add to its numbers and shall name two of the Reference Committees, as the Chairmen thereof, namely, 1-A Committee on Sections and Section Work. 2-A Committee on Credentials. Art. III, Sec. I-Reference Committees, was amended to read as follows: The Executive Council shall at its first meeting name the following six Reference Committees and appoint the Chairmen thereof. 1-A Committee on Medical Legislation. 2-A Committee on Medical Education. 3-A Committee on Hygiene and Public

Health. 4-A Committee on Amendments to the Constitution and By-Laws. 5-A Committee on Reports of Officers.

6-A Com

mittee on Necrology. Then under "Scientific Work "-Art. IGeneral Meetings-Sec. 2., the first sentence thereof read as follows: A General Meeting or Session shall be held at 10.30 a.m. of the first day, and at such other times as shall be decided by the Committee of Arrangements.

The Calmette Tuberculin Test. In a recent article in the Journal of the American Medical Association Dr. Harry C. Parker draws the following conclusions regarding this very interesting test for incipient tuberculosis:

I. The Calmette ocular tuberculin test is of as great diagnostic importance as any other single test.

II. A positive reaction is indicative of a tubercular focus, somewhere in the body.

III. The test is uncertain in patients under two years of age, in whom the cutaneous test of Von Pirquet is most certain.

IV. The test fails in advanced cases of tuberculosis but there is little need of it here.

V. The initial instillation should be preferably under one per cent. strength in order that severe inflammatory conditions may not follow. If necessary to make the second and stronger test, the eye not previously used should be selected.

VI. The concensus of opinion seems to be against using the test in an eye not wholly normal.

VII. After complications have occurred from its use but have entirely cleared up in a varying length of time and are not so frequent when the initial test is made with a solution under one per cent., recent investigations have shown a greater number of ophthalmie affections due to tuberculosis than formerly supposed. And in the Calmette reaction we have a simple means of differential diagnosis, which should be thoroughly tried.

VIII. The ocular reaction is especially valuable for ascertaining the tuberculous nature of cases of phlyctenular keratitis and con

junctivitis episcleritis and scleritis, chronic iritis, iridocyclitis. interstitial keratitis and chorioidities.

IX. A one per cent. solution of Koch's Old Tuberculin is nearly as good as the Calmette solution for diagnostic purposes.

X. The test in the hands of various observers has given such uniformally excellent results that its value is practically assured.

British and Canadian Medical Journals, and consequently British and Canadian practitioners have taken very little interest in the campaign which for the past few years has been going on in the United States and which is quite commonly referred to as "The Great American Fraud." In the June issue of the Critic and Guide are some striking comments on the subject. One is entitled "Do Physicians Prescribe Nostrums? or, Bok's threat to annihilate the Medical Profession." Another deals with the proteid iron preparations of the National Formulary, or the N. F. propaganda, with some queries and conclusions. To those who have been using and getting the good results for years from many well known proprietary preparations, which have not been admitted into the National Formulary, it is difficult to understand the just limitations of prescribing. Probably there will be many who would agree in affirming their adherence to what a preparation will do than to what it exactly is. Supposing for instance we did know the exact proportions of all these preparations, who would remember them, and who would not go on prescribing them for the results got, rather than for the ingredients they contained? Preparations which are put forth by honorable and responsible manufacturers should not be unjustly and indiscriminately condemned, because the age has demanded the best skill of the pharmaeist, which is not always to be got even from the physician and local druggist combined. When the physician prescribes he trusts to the honesty of the druggist that his prescription is properly and correctly dispensed. If a manufacturing pharmacist places before us a preparation which will produce results, why consider he is always dishonest? If we do not get the results in a given patient we soon abandon that preparation, as we would one we knew the exact in

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