sinks 2 or 3 degrees below the usual point, that by this slight degree of cooling the death of the oldest and weakest males, as well as females, is brought about. They are found lying tranquil in bed, without the slightest symptoms of disease, or of the usual recognizable causes of death.

"Practical medicine, in many cases, makes use of cold in a highly rational manner, as a means of exalting and accelerating, in an unwonted degree, the change of matter. This occurs especially in certain morbid conditions, in the substance of the centre of the apparatus of motion; when a glowing heat and a rapid current of blood toward the brain point out an abnormal metamorphosis of the brain. When this condition continues beyond a certain time, experience teaches that all motions in the body cease. If the change of matter be chiefly confined to the brain, then the change of matter, the generation of force, diminishes in all other parts. By surrounding the head with ice the temperature is lowered, but the cause of the liberation of heat continues; the metamorphosis which decides the issue of the disease, is limited to a short period. We must not forget, that the ice melts and absorbs heat from the diseased part; that if the ice be removed before the completion of the metamorphosis, the temperature again rises; that far more heat is removed by means of ice than if we were to surround the head with a bad conductor of heat. There has obviously been liberated in an equal time, a far larger amount of heat than in the state of health; and this is only rendered possible by an increased supply of oxygen, which must have determined a more rapid change of matter."

But, despairing of doing justice by extracts to these speculations, we hasten to conclude this article by giving an abstract of his theory of respiration.

It

The change in the color of the blood which takes place in the lungs is one of the most familiar facts in physiology. seems to be connected, in some way, with the iron contained in the red globules, and which is found in no other constituent of the body. The external agent concerned in this change is oxygen. The globules of arterial blood retain their florid hue until they reach the capillaries where they lose it. Venous blood in contact with oxygen is reddened, and the change, in either case, depends upon the globules which have the power of combining with gases. These globules take no part in the process of nutrition, and it cannot be doubted, therefore, that their office is to aid in respiration. They contain iron, and no

other metal can be compared with this for the remarkable properties of its compounds. Thus, the compounds of the protoxide of iron possess the power of depriving the other oxidized compounds of oxygen; while the compounds of perox ide of iron, under other circumstances, give up oxygen with the utmost facility. Now, in arterial blood the globules contain iron in the state of a peroxide-they are saturated with oxygen in the lungs. In the passage of the blood through the capillaries the peroxide of iron is reduced, by giving up a part of its oxygen to the carbon it there meets with, and in this way becomes a protoxide of iron, which combines with the carbonic acid just formed, and as a carbonate of iron passes on through the veins to the heart. When the globules reach the lungs, they will again take the oxygen they have lost; for every volume of oxygen absorbed they will liberate a corres ponding volume of carbonic acid, and will be in a state to give off oxygen in the capillaries again. One purpose of the arterial globules is, to yield oxygen to certain constituents of the body, to produce the change of matter, determine the separation of living parts and their conversion into lifeless compounds, and aid in the formation of secretions and excretions. But the greater portion of the oxygen is employed in converting into oxidized compounds the newly-formed substances, which no longer make part of the living tissues. All the constituents present in venous blood, which have an attraction for oxygen, are converted, in the lungs, like the globules, into more highly oxidized compounds. From all of which it appears, that, in the animal organism, two processes of oxida tion are going on—one in the lungs, the other in the capillaries. By means of the former, in spite of the degree of cooling, and of the increased evaporation which takes place there, the constant temperature of the lungs is kept up; while the heat of the rest of the body is supplied by the latter.

The frightful effects of sulphuretted hydrogen, and of prussic acid, when inspired, the author thinks are to be explained by the well-known action of these compounds on the preparations of iron. He says,

"Let us suppose that the globules, lose their property of ab

sorbing oxygen, and of afterwards giving up this oxygen and carrying off the resulting carbonic acid; such a hypothetical state of disease must instantly become perceptible in the temperature and other vital phenomena of the body. The change of matter will be arrested, while yet the vital motions will not be instantly stopped.

"The conductors of force, the nerves, will convey, as before, to the heart and intestines, the power necessary for their func tions. This power they will receive from the muscular system, while, as no change of matter takes place in the latter, the supply must soon fail. As no change of matter occurs, no lifeless componds are separated, neither bile nor urine can be formed; and the temperature of the body must sink.

"This state of matters soon puts a stop to the process of nutrition, and, sooner or later, death must follow, but unaccompanied by febrile symptoms, which, in this case, is a very im portant fact.

"This example has been selected in order to show the impor tance and probable advantage of an examination of the blood in analogous diseased conditions. It cannot be, in the slighest degree, doubtful, that the function ascribed to the blood-globules may be considered as fully explained and cleared up, if, in such morbid conditions, we shall discover a change in their form, structure, or chemical characters, a change which must be recognizable by the use of appropriate reagents."

This view of respiration combines every quality that can be required in an hypothesis-it rests upon well-known observations, and explains all the phenomena of the process; it is prob ably, therefore, the true theory.

The appendix, the most elaborate part of Dr. Liebig's work, consisting of a great number of the most recent and exact analyses, and comprising the data upon which his conclusions rest, cannot, of course, be given, even in outline, in an analytical review. The work, we are sure, is destined to a wide and lasting popularity, and each reader will examine for himself the mass of curious and interesting details, upon which this beautiful system has been erected. To the chemist, the physiologist, the medical man, and the agriculturist, it is a volume of singular interest, shedding the brightest light upon every function of the animal system accessible to chemistry, and opening a path which has led to the most unexpected and astonishing results.

Y.

Selections from American and Foreign Journals.

On the incipient Stage of Cancerous Affections of the Womb. By Dr. W. F. MONTGOMERY.-In this paper the author directs the attention of practitioners to a stage of cancer uteri which precedes the two usually described by writers.

The symptoms are-sharp but comparatively fugitive lancinating pains in the back and loins, across the supra-pubic region, or shooting along the front of the thigh, or sometimes along the course of the sciatic nerve, producing numbness, and not unfrequently debility of the whole limb.

In a large proportion of the cases, there is found a decided fulness, or a distinct tumor in one or other iliac hollow, with fixed pain, and tenderness traceable to, and, as it were, issuing out of the abdominal ring; there is, generally, more or less irritation of the bladder, with dysuria, and the patient often complains of a sensation about the lower part of the rectum, which induces her to think that she is laboring under piles. Menstruation, though in some instances disturbed, is much more frequently quite regular in its returns; but there is apt to be bursts of hemorrhage, either accompanying the discharge, or occurring in the intervals; there is little, or no leucorrhoeal or serous discharge, often none; and it is not until the disease has existed for a considerable time, that the appetite is impaired, sleep is disturbed, the flesh becomes softer and wastes, and the countenance pale, and expressive of distress.

On making examination per vaginam, the margin of the os uteri is found hard, and often slightly fissured, and projects more than usual, or is natural, into the vagina, and is ir regular in its form.

In the situation of the muciparous glands, there are felt sev eral small, hard, and distinctly defined projections, almost like grains of shot, or gravel, under the mucous membrane.

Pressure on these, with the point of the finger, gives pain, and the patient often complains that it makes her stomach feel sick.

The cervix is, in most instances, slightly enlarged, and harder than it ought to be. The circumference of the os uteri, especially between the projecting glandulæ, feels turgid, and to the eye presents a deep crimson color, while the projecting points have sometimes a bluish hue.

There is no thickening, or other alteration of structure in any part of the vagina, at its conjunction with which the cervix uteri moves freely; nor is there any consolidation of the uterus with the neighboring contents of the pelvis; in fact, the morbid organic change appears to be, at first, entirely confined to the os uteri and lower portion of the cervix.

This stage of the affection is, in many instances, very slow, lasting sometimes, for years, before the second and hopeless stage is established; during this time the patient experiences only comparatively slight and transient attacks of pain, or perhaps only sensations of uneasiness, referred often to the situation of one or other of the ovaries, or about the os uteri, with anomalous tingling along the front and inside of the thighs; these last for a few hours, or a day or two, and then disappear, perhaps for weeks; but again and again return in the same situation, and for a long time are not increased in severity; the patient finds that sexual intercourse now, occasionally, causes her pain, which she ascribes to some deep-seated part being touched, and the act is followed by an appearance of blood; she is, also, often troubled with slight irritability of the bladder; but the appetite, digestion, and sleep, may, for a long time, continue good, and the pulse, generally, gives no indication of the existing disease, or its changes; an observation which will be found applicable to many uterine affections of a grave character; in short, the general health may long remain quite undisturbed, nor has the patient, in many instances, the slightest suspicion that there is any thing seriously wrong with her, nor thinks of seeking for medical aid until she is induced to do so by the solicitations of her husband, or some anxious friend who has become, as she thinks, unreasonably alarmed about her state.

Dr. Montgomery thinks that the first discoverable change in the cases now alluded to "takes place in and around" the muciparous glandulae, which exist in such numbers in the "cervix and margin of the os uteri;" these become indurated by the deposition of scirrhous matter around them, and by the thickening of their coats, in consequence of which they feel, at