Scientific American Supplement, No. 384, May 12, 1883

V >> Various >> Scientific American Supplement, No. 384, May 12, 1883

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This leads me here to say that physicians trust too much to the simple
dicta of men who may be very eminent in some department of natural
history, and yet ignorant in the very department about which, being
called upon, they have given an opinion. All everywhere have so much
to learn that we should be very careful how we reject new truths,
especially when they come from one of our number educated in our own
medical schools, studied under our own masters. If the subject is
one about which we know nothing, we had better say so when asked our
opinion, and we should receive with respect what is respectfully offered
by a man whom we know to be honest, a hard worker, eminent in his
department by long and tedious labors. If he asks us to look over his
evidence, do so in a kindly spirit, and not open the denunciations of
bar room vocabularies upon the presenter, simply because we don't see
his point. In other words, we should all be receptive, but careful in
our assimilation, remembering that some of the great operations in
surgery, for example, came from laymen in low life, as the operation for
stone, and even the operation of spaying came from a swineherd.

It is my desire, however, to have this settled as far as can be among
scientists, but for the practical uses of practicing physicians I say
that far more evidence has been adduced by you in support of the cause
of intermittent fever than we have in the etiology of many other
diseases. I take the position that so long as no one presents a better
history of the etiology of intermittent fever by facts and observations,
your theory must stand. This, too, notwithstanding what may be said to
the contrary.

Certainly you are to be commended for having done as you have in this
matter. It is one of the great rights of the profession, and duties
also, that if a physician has or thinks he has anything that is new and
valuable, to communicate it, and so long as he observes the rules of
good society the profession are to give him a respectful hearing,
even though he may have made a mistake. I do not think you had a fair
hearing, and hence so far as I myself am concerned I indorse your
position, and shall do so till some one comes along and gives a better
demonstration. Allow me also to proceed with more evidence.

Observation at West Falmouth, Mass., Sept 1, 1877. I made five
observations in like manner about the marshes and bogs of this town,
which is, as it were, situated on the tendo achillis of Cape Cod, Mass.
In only one of these observations did I find any palmellae like the ague
plants, and they were not characteristic.

Chelsea, Mass., near the Naval Hospital, September 5, 1877. Three sets
of observations. In all spores were found and some sporangia, but
they were not the genuine plants as far as I could judge. They were
Protococcaceae. It is not necessary to add that there are no cases of
intermittent fever regarded as originating on the localities named.
Still, the ancient history of New England contains some accounts of ague
occurring there, but they are not regarded as entirely authentic.

Observation. Lexington, Mass, September 6, 1877. Observation made in
a meadow. There was no saline incrustation, and no palmellae found. No
local malaria.

Observation. Cambridge, Mass. Water works on the shore of Fresh Pond.
Found a few palmellae analogous to, but not the ague palmellae.

Observation. Woburn, Mass, September 27, 1877, with Dr. J. M. Moore.
Found some palmellae, but scanty. Abundance of spores of cryptogams.

Observation. Stonington, Conn., August 15, 1877. Examined a pond hole
nearly opposite the railroad station on the New York Shore Line. Found
abundantly the white incrustation on the surface of the soil. Here I
found the spores and the sporangias of the gemiasmas verdans and rubra.

Observation 2. Repetition of the last.

Observation 3. I examined some of an incrustation that was copiously
deposited in the same locality, which was not white or frosty, but dark
brown and a dirty green. Here the spores were very abundant, and a few
sporangias of the Gemiasma rubra. Ague has of late years been noted in
Connecticut and Rhode Island.

Observations in Connecticut. Middlefield near Middletown, summer of
1878. Being in this locality, I heard that intermittent fever was
advancing eastward at the rate of ten miles a year. It had been observed
in Middlefield. I was much interested to see if I could find the
gemiasmas there. On examining the dripping of some bog moss, I found a
plenty of them.

Observations in Connecticut. New Haven. Early in the summer of 1881 I
visited this city. One object of my visit was to ascertain the truth
of the presence of intermittent fever there, which I had understood
prevailed to such an extent that my patient, a consumptive, was afraid
to return to his home in New Haven. At this time I examined the hydrant
water of the city water works, and also the east shore of the West
River, which seemed to be too full of sewage. I found a plenty of the
Oscillatoreaceae, but no Palmellae.

In September I revisited the city, taking with me a medical gentleman
who, residing in the South, had had a larger experience with the disease
than I. From the macroscopical examination he pronounced a case we
examined to be ague, but I was not able to detect the plants either in
the urine or blood. This might have been that I did not examine long
enough. But a little later I revisited the city and explored the soil
about the Whitney Water Works, whence the city gets its supply of
water, and I had no difficulty in finding a good many of the plants
you describe as found by you in ague cases. At a still later period my
patient, whom I had set to use the microscope and instructed how to
collect the ague plants, set to work himself. One day his mother brought
in a film from off an ash pile that lay in the shade, and this her son
found was made up of an abundance of the ague plants. By simply winding
a wet bandage around the slide, Mr. A. was enabled to keep the plants
in good condition until the time of my next visit, when I examined and
pronounced them to be genuine plants.

I should here remark that I had in examining the sputa of this patient
sent to me, found some of the ague plants. He said that he had been
riding near the Whitney Pond, and perceived a different odor, and
thought he must have inhaled the miasm. I told him he was correct in his
supposition, as no one could mistake the plants; indeed, Prof. Nunn, of
Savannah, Ga., my pupil recognized it at once.

This relation, though short, is to me of great importance. So long as I
could not detect the gemiasmas in New Haven, I was very skeptical as to
the presence of malaria in New Haven, as I thought there must be some
mistake, it being a very good cloak to hide under (malaria). There is no
doubt but that the name has covered lesions not belonging to it. But now
the positive demonstrations above so briefly related show to my mind
that the local profession have not been mistaken, and have sustained
their high reputation.

I should say that I have examined a great deal of sputa, but, with the
exception of cases that were malarious, I have not encountered the
mature plants before. Of course I have found them as you did, in my own
excretions as I was traveling over ague bogs.

[_To be continued_.]

* * * * *

ICHTHYOL.

DR. P.G. UNNA, of Hamburg, has lately been experimenting on the dermato
therapeutic uses of a substance called ichthyol, obtained by Herr
Rudolph Schroter by the distillation of bituminous substances and
treatment with condensed sulphuric acid. This body, though tar-like in
appearance, and with a peculiar and disagreeable smell of its own, does
not resemble any known wood or coal tar in its chemical and physical
properties. It has a consistence like vaseline, and its emulsion with
water is easily washed off the skin. It is partly soluble in alcohol,
partly in ether with a changing and lessening of the smell, and totally
dissolves in a mixture of both. It may be mixed with vaseline, lard,
or oil in any proportions. Its chemical constitution is not well
established, but it contains sulphur, oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, and also
phosphorus in vanishing proportions, and it may be considered comparable
with a 10 per cent, sulphur salve. Over ordinary sulphur preparations
it has this advantage, that the sulphur is in very intimate and stable
union, so that ichthyol can be united with lead and mercury preparations
without decomposition. Ichthyol when rubbed undiluted on the normal skin
does not set up dermatitis, yet it is a resolvent, and in a high degree
a soother of pain and itching. In psoriasis it is a fairly good remedy,
but inferior to crysarobin in P. inveterata. It is useful also locally
in rheumatic affections as a resolvent and anodyne, in acne, and as a
parasiticide. The most remarkable effects, however, were met with in
eczema, which was cured in a surprisingly short time. From an experience
in the treatment of thirty cases of different kinds--viz., obstinate
circumscribed moist patches on the hands and arms, intensely itching
papular eczema of the flexures and face, infantile moist eczemas,
etc.--he recommends the following procedure. As with sulphur
preparations, he begins with a moderately strong preparation, and as
he proceeds reduces the strength of the application. For moist eczema
weaker preparations (20 to 30 per cent. decreased to 10 per cent.) must
be used than for the papular condition (50 per cent. reduced to 20 per
cent.), and the hand, for example, will require a stronger application
than the face, and children a weaker one than adults; but ichthyol may
be used in any strength from a 5 per cent. to a 40 to 50 per cent.
application or undiluted. For obstinate eczema of the hands the
following formula is given as very efficacious: R. Lithargyri 10.0;
coq.c. aceti, 30.0; ad reman. 20.0; adde olei olivar., adipis, aa 10.0;
ichthyol 10.0, M. ft. ung. Until its internal effects are better known,
caution is advised as to its very widespread application, although
Herr Schroter has taken a gramme with only some apparent increase of
peristalsis and appetite.--_Lancet_.

* * * * *

AUTOPSY TABLE.

The illustration represents an autopsy table placed in the Coroner's
Department of the New York Hospital, designed by George B. Post and
Frederick C. Merry.

An amphitheater, fitted up for the convenience of the jury and those
interested when inquests are held, surrounds the table, which is placed
in the center of the floor, thus enabling the subject to be viewed by
the coroner's jury and other officials who may be present.

The mechanical construction of this table will be readily understood by
the following explanation:

The top, indicated by letter, A, is made of thick, heavy, cast glass,
concaved in the direction of the strainer, as shown. It is about eight
feet long and two feet and six inches wide, in one piece, an opening
being left in the center to receive the strainer, so as to allow the
fluid matter of the body, as well as the water with which it is washed,
to find its way to the waste pipe below the table, and thus avoid
soiling or staining the floor,

The strainer is quite large, with a downward draught which passes
through a large flue, as shown by letter, F, connected above the water
seal of the waste trap and trunk of the table to the chimney of the
boiler house, as indicated by the arrows, carrying down all offensive
odors from the body, thereby preventing the permeating of the air in the
room.

[Illustration: IMPROVED AUTOPSY TABLE.]

The base of the table, indicated by letter, B, represents a ground
swinging attachment, which enables the turning of the table in any
direction.

D represents the cold water supply cock and handle, intersecting with
letter, E, which is the hot water cock, below the base, as shown, and
then upward to a swing or ball joint, C, then crossing under the plate
glass top to the right with a hose attachment for the use of the
operator. Here a small hose pipe is secured, for use as may be required
in washing off all matter, to insure the clean exposure of the parts to
be dissected. The ball swing, C, enables the turning of the table in any
direction without disturbing the water connections. This apparatus has
been in operation since the building of the hospital in 1876, and has
met all the requirements in connection with its uses.--_Hydraulic
Plumber_.

* * * * *

THE EXCITING PROPERTIES OF OATS.

Experiments have been recently made by Mr. Sanson with a view to
settling the question whether oats have or have not the excitant
property that has been attributed to them. The nervous and muscular
excitability of horses was carefully observed with the aid of graduated
electrical apparatus before and after they had eaten a given quantity
of oats, or received a little of a certain principle which Mr. Sanson
succeeded in isolating from oats. The chief results of the inquiry are
as follows: The pericarp of the fruit of oats contains a substance
soluble in alcohol and capable of exciting the motor cells of the
nervous system. This substance is not (as some have thought) vanilline
or the odorous principle of vanilla, nor at all like it. It is a
nitrogenized matter which seems to belong to the group of alkaloids; is
uncrystallizable, finely granular, and brown in mass. The author calls
it "avenine." All varieties of cultivated oats seem to elaborate it, but
they do so in very different degrees. The elaborated substance is the
same in all varieties. The differences in quantity depend not only on
the variety of the plant but also on the place of cultivation. Oats of
the white variety have much less than those of the dark, but for some
of the former, in Sweden, the difference is small; while for others, in
Russia, it is considerable. Less than 0.9 of the excitant principle per
cent. of air-dried oats, the dose is insufficient to certainly affect
the excitability of horses, but above this proportion the excitant
action is certain. While some light-colored oats certainly have
considerable excitant power, some dark oats have little. Determination
of the amount of the principle present is the only sure basis of
appreciation, though (as already stated) white oats are likely to
be less exciting than dark. Crushing or grinding the grain weakens
considerably the excitant property, probably by altering the substance
to which it is due; the excitant action is more prompt, but much less
strong and durable. The action, which is immediate and more intense
with the isolated principle, does not appear for some minutes after the
eating of oats; in both cases it increases to a certain point, then
diminishes and disappears. The total duration of the effect is stated to
be an hour per kilogramme of oats ingested.

* * * * *

FILARIA DISEASE.

The rapid strides which our knowledge has made during the past few years
in the subject of the filaria parasite have been mainly owing to the
diligent researches of Dr. Patrick Manson, who continues to work at the
question. In the last number of the _Medical Reports for China_, Dr.
Manson deals with the phenomenon known as "filarial periodicity," and
with the fate of embryo parasites not removed from the blood. The
intimate pathology of the disease, and the subject of abscess caused
by the death of the parent filaria, also receive further attention.
An endeavor to explain the phenomenon of "filarial periodicity" by an
appeal to the logical "method of concomitant variations" takes Manson
into an interesting excursion which is not productive of any positive
results; nor is any more certain conclusion come to with regard to the
fate of the embryos which disappear from the blood during the day time.
Manson does not incline to the view that there is a diurnal intermittent
reproduction of embryos with a corresponding destruction. An original
and important speculation is made with respect to the intimate pathology
of elephantiasis, chyluria, and lymph scrotum, which is thoroughly
worthy of consideration. Our readers are probably aware that the parent
filaria and the filaria sanguinis hominis may exist in the human body
without entailing any apparent disturbance. The diameter of an
embryo filaria is about the same as that of a red blood disk, one
three-thousandth of an inch. The dimensions of an ovum are one
seven-hundred-and-fiftieth by one five-hundredth of an inch. If we
imagine the parent filaria located in a distal lymphatic vessel to abort
and give birth to ova instead of embryos, it may be understood that the
ova might be unable to pass such narrow passages as the embryo could,
and this is really the hypothesis which Manson has put forward on the
strength of observations made on two cases. The true pathology of the
elephantoid diseases may thus be briefly summarized: A parent filaria in
a distant lymphatic prematurely expels her ova; these act as emboli
to the nearest lymphatic glands, whence ensues stasis of lymph,
regurgitation of lymph, and partial compensation by anastomoses of
lymphatic vessels; this brings about hypertrophy of tissues, and may go
on to lymphorrhoea or chyluria, according to the site of the obstructed
lymphatics. It may be objected that too much is assumed in supposing
that the parent worm is liable to miscarry. But as Manson had sufficient
evidence in two cases that such abortions had happened, he thinks it is
not too much to expect their more frequent occurrence. The explanation
given of the manner in which elephantoid disease is produced applies to
most, if not all, diseases, with one exception, which result from the
presence of the parasite in the human body. The death of the parent
parasite in the afferent lymphatic may give rise to an abscess, and the
frequency with which abscess of the scrotum or thigh is met with in
Chinese practice is, in Manson's opinion, attributable to this. Dr.
Manson's report closes with an account of a case of abscess of the
thigh, with varicose inguinal glands, in which fragments of a mature
worm were discovered in the contents of the abscess.--_Lancet_.

* * * * *

THE SPECTRAL MASDEVALLIA.

(_M. chimaera_.)

Of all orchids no genus we can just now call to mind is more distinct or
is composed of species more widely divergent in size, form, structure,
and color than is this one of Masdevallia. It was founded well nigh a
century ago by Ruiz and Pavon on a species from Mexico, M. uniflora.
which, so far as I know, is nearly if not quite unknown to present day
cultivators. When Lindley wrote his "Genera and Species" in 1836, three
species of Masdevallias only were known to botanists but twenty-five
years later, when he prepared his "Folio Orchidaceae," nearly forty
species were; known in herbaria, and to-day perhaps fully a hundred
kinds are grown in our gardens, while travelers tell us of all the
gorgeous beauties which are known to exist high up on the cloud-swept
sides of the Andes and Cordilleras of the New World. The Masdevallia
is confined to the Western hemisphere alone, and as in bird and animal
distribution, so in the case of many orchids we find that when any genus
is confined to one hemisphere, those who look for another representative
genus in the other are rarely disappointed. Thus hornbills in the East
are represented by toucans in the West, and the humming bird of the West
by the sunbird of the East, and so also in the Malayan archipelago.
Notably in Borneo we find bolbophyls without pseudo bulbs, and with
solitary or few flowered scapes and other traits singularly suggestive
at first sight of the Western Masdevallia. Thus some bolbophyl, for
example, have caudal appendages to their sepals, as in Masdevallias,
and on the other hand some Masdevallias have their labellums hinged
and oscillatory, which is so commonly the case as to be "almost
characteristic" in the genus Bolbophyllum or Sarcopodium. Speaking
generally, Masdevallias, coming as most of them do from high altitudes,
lend themselves to what is now well known as "cool treatment," and
cultivators find it equally necessary to offer them moisture in
abundance both at the root and in the atmosphere, also seeing that when
at home in cloud-land they are often and well nigh continually drenched
by heavy dews and copious showers.

Of all the cultivated Masdevallias, none are so weirdly strange and
fascinating as is the species M. chimaera, which is so well illustrated
in the accompany engraving. This singular plant was discovered by
Benedict Roezl, and about 1872 or 1873 I remember M. Lucien Linden
calling upon me one day, and among other rarities showing me a dried
flower of this species. I remember I took up a pen and rapidly made a
sketch of the flower, which soon after appeared (1873, p. 3) in _The
Florist_, and was perhaps the first published figure of the plant. It
was named by Professor Reichenbach, who could find for it no better
name than that of the mythical monster Chimaera, than which, as an old
historian tells us, no stranger bogy ever came out of the earth's
inside. Our engraving shows the plant about natural size, and indicates
the form and local coloring pretty accurately. The ground color is
yellowish, blotched with lurid brownish crimson, the long pendent tails
being blood color, and the interior of the sepals are almost shaggy.
The spectral appearance of the flower is considerably heightened by the
smooth, white, slipper-like lip, which contrasts so forcibly in color
and texture with the lurid shagginess around it. Sir J. D. Hooker, in
describing this species in the _Botanical Magazine_, t. 6, 152, says
that the aspect of the curved scape as it bears aloft its buds and hairy
flowers is very suggestive of the head and body of a viper about to
strike. Dr. Haughton, F.R.S., told me long ago that Darlingtonia
californica always reminds him of a cobra when raised and puffed out in
a rage, and certainly the likeness is a close one.

Grown in shallow teak wood baskets, suspended near the roof in a
partially shaded structure, all the chimaeroid section of Masdevallia
succeed even better than when grown in pots or pans, as they have a
Stanhopea-like habit of pushing out their flowers at all sorts of
deflected angles. A close glance at the engraving will show that for
convenience sake the artist has propped up the flower with a stick, this
much arrangement being a necessity, so as to enable the tails to lie
diagonally across the picture. From tip to tip the flower represented is
9 inches, or not so much by 7 inches as the flower measured in Messrs.
Backhouse's nursery at York.--_The Garden_.

[Illustration: THE SPECTRAL MASDEVALLIA.--MASDEVALLIA CHIMAERA (Natural
Size)]

* * * * *

SURVEY OF THE BLACK CANON.

It is rumored again that a survey is soon to be made through the
heaviest portion of the Black Canon of the Gunnison. For a long distance
the walls of syenite rise to the stupendous height of 3,000 feet, and
for 1,800 feet the walls of the canon are arched not many feet from the
bed of the river. If the survey is successful, and the Denver and Rio
Grande is built through the canon, it will undoubtedly be the grandest
piece of engineering on the American continent. The river is very swift,
and it is proposed to build a boat at the western end, and provision
it for a length of time, allowing it to float with the stream, but
controlled by ropes. If the boat goes, the chances are that the baby
road goes, too.--_Gunnison (Colo.) Review_.

* * * * *

THE ANCIENT MISSISSIPPI AND ITS TRIBUTARIES.

[Footnote: This lecture was delivered in the Chapel of the State
University, at Columbia, as an inaugural address on January 10, 1883,
and illustrated by projections. The author has purposely avoided the
very lengthy details of scientific observation by which the conclusions
have been arrived at relating to the former wonderful condition of
the Mississippi, and the subsequent changes to its present form: as a
consideration of them would not only cause him to go beyond the allotted
time, but might, perhaps, prove tiresome.]

By J. W. SPENCER, B.A.Sc., Ph.D., F.G.S., Professor of Geology in the
State University of Missouri.

Physical geology is the science which deals with the past changes of
the earth's crust, and the causes which have produced the present
geographical features, everywhere seen about us. The subject of the
present address must therefore be considered as one of geology rather
than of geography, and I propose to trace for you the early history of
the great Mississippi River, of which we have only a diminished remnant
of the mightiest river that ever flowed over any terrestrial continent.

By way of introduction, I wish you each to look at the map of our great
river, with its tributaries as we now see it, draining half of the
central portion of the continent, but which formerly drained, in
addition, at least two of our great lakes, and many of the great rivers
at the present time emptying into the colder Arctic Sea.

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