tread; and when the patient dies or goes insane under the shock-"well, he was no good anyhow and is better dead!"

The popular ideal treatment is that in which the patient sinks off to sleep and in one or two days awakes to find himself cured. To those who really believe such a thing to be possible, I would suggest an application to the King of the Goblins such as they must be believers in fairies as well as in fairy-tales.

Hyoscine, chloral, and bromides have been thus used; but do these drugs really effect a cure? Is such radical therapeutic surgery safe?

An approximation to common sense came in with the elimination method. Morphinism is a toxemia; the habit causes the victim to be saturated with autogenous toxins-therefore, depurate him. Open the doors of elimination and set free these toxic products.

This procedure comes as near as anything yet advanced to being universally applicable, and it certainly reduces to the minimum the suffering during the withdrawal period, provided it is judiciously fitted to the patient. The Towne plan is but one more Procrustean bed into which all the patients are forcibly made to fit.

But, does the most skilfully adapted elimination treatment restore the debilitated forces of the drug-sustained shell of a body? Is this method at best aught more than a very necessary preliminary?

The true specific treatment begins after the toxins have been eliminated from the system, the drug has been discontinued, the withdrawal period is past, and reaction has been fully established. Recuperation, rebuilding the shattered forces, restoration of exhausted vitality are things that take time. But here comes the patient-he "must" get back to work; "cannot take it easy." How often -oh! how often-we have opened to the patient the small, narrow door that leads to possible cure and been met by the expression: "I must complete this or that work." Over the monument of every captain of industry, of every multimillionaire, every intellectual giant should be written, "Died rather than stop work."

Curious, that these men never realize the truth, that they do not own their millions, their railways, their political boss-ships, but that these things own them. Harriman, lashed to the cowcatcher of his locomotive, was more securely enslaved than was Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom.

The morphinist is rarely a willing slave. No such moral degeneracy attends his habit as that caused by alcohol or cocaine. To the last the morphinist rebels against his slavery and longs for freedom. I have seen men turn away from

the verdict that told them the day for possible cure was past, and have seen the report of their sudden death shortly after. Suicide, or refusal to live in bondage?

Is there to be no chance for men of small means to meet the cost of a term of treatment really capable of curing?

The ideal might be found in ranch-life. Here, the cost of living is reduced to that of food production. Men may find opportunities to defray a part of their expenses by such work as they are capable of doing. Under the eye of the physician, they may begin by working lightly for a single hour in a day; extending their labors as their strength rises.

On a ranch there are many kinds of work that require time rather than much muscular strength: trash to be gathered; muck to be burned; weeds to be exterminated or gathered and prepared for the herb buyers; samples of seeds to be tested, promising strains to be crossed, varieties to be developed; pruning, grafting; chickens cared for; vermin exterminated; soils studied; water tested; animals dipped; fences mended; a thousand things that should be done but which the rancher can not do himself. And why? Simply because here also the ranch owns him. He can not stop to cut stovewood, because it looks as if it would rain and the clover must get in first. The team must go to town for stores, but the cows are in the oats and the fence must be mended. Nowhere does that little giant word MUST loom so large as on a ranch. Nowhere is there more work for the man who can do but little of muscle expenditure. The work is never completed, and its variety is such that every willing hand, however weak or inexperienced, may find its useful occupation.

Now to return to our convalescent. The work must always be secondary to the patient's welfare and under the control of his physician. In other words the physical exercise must form a part of the cure.

Nota bene-I have no ranch. I have no sanatorium. I have no ax to grind. I am not bidding for drug-habitués. But I do think that some of these physicians who groan over having too little to do might take up the idea here set forth and provide for their unfortunate brethren now under the dominion of that Beelzebub, Morphine. There is nothing especially difficult in treating and curing these victims; and there are many more than can be cared for by all the real specialists now engaged in the work. There is a charm in seeing a human soul save itself, pulling itself out of the slough, putting on the habiliments of selfrespecting manhood again. To aid such work is a pleasure, and it is a duty to those who are so situated that they can engage in it.

It seems to me that the abnormal in the evironment is being displayed in unexpected places, for above any other situation in life, one would expect fair play upon such an occasion, and in such proceedings as those here under consideration.

Again, in discussing another paper in which the essayist took a severe slap at some of the psychoterapeutic measures that have proven of efficacy to thousands of American physicians, I took notice of the "holier than thou" attitude assumed by him, showing that simple psychologic reconstructive procedures aimed to stimulate the normay psycho-physiological potentialities were not more "spurious" than the psychoanalytic procedures that were aimed at reconditioning or modifying the mechanism of abnormal dissociated functioning complexes. I expressed my appreciation of the motive which prompted the position of the essayist, but pointed out how simple words of encouragement, or an attitude of optimism on the part of a physician, in conjunction with medicinal agencies, could be of aid in the recovery of a typhoid fever or a pneumonia patient-who had no need of psychoanalytic proddings. This discussion was, also, omitted.

Another paper was discussed by me, in which I heartily agreed with the essayist, but showed that the opposite to the position taken by him was also true, and of equal value, as applied to certain well selected cases. This discussion, also, found no place in the published proceedings.

If the "Meetings of the Alienists and Neurologists of the United States," under the auspices of the Chicago Medical Society, are to be an open arena, where light may shine, and where all may have an equal hearing, they will be productive of great good. But if such meetings are to be used for the purpose of presenting those of us, who are not afraid to express and to defend our convictions, in a false light, the generous spirit manifested outwardly by this organization will be seriously open to question. I trust that the powers that be will take due heed and govern themselves accordingly.

Chicago is a great city. Only such an educational center could furnish the environment that would produce such fair-minded men as Judge Pinckney and Judge Olson, both of whom are demonstrating the practical value of the well qualified physician as an adjunct to the court, and they are opening to our vision a field of work for the real doctor, which is as broad and far reaching as humanity is weak and needy.

In such a city, we who live in Chicago's suburbs expect to find men that are broad, liberal

and generous-men who appreciate genius and talent not only within her own portals, but in the remotest countries of the civilized world. And we, who are striving to emulate your example, expect more of you than that you would so reflect upon your own judgment, as to invite a man as your guest, who could have no more to say upon a paper like that of Dr. William Healy's than merely: "There was so much in the paper that is valuable, I certainly could not discuss it without careful study," and then, you might have added, "like a little two-year-old, he quietly took his seat."

Why did you not eliminate my discussion entirely, so as not to make me appear in a false light?

EDITOR'S COMMENT.-In explanation of the omission of Dr. Munro's remarks we want to say, in defense of Chicago's good name, that he was in no sense singled out. We have noted, in reading over the report of the meeting of Alienists and Neurologists, that the discussion, throughout, was very generally cut down or cut out. We presume that this was made necessary by the extreme length of the proceedings, which must have greatly taxed the resources of the Society.

VE VE VE

Anton-Bramann's Operation for Epilepsy.— Professor Anton, of Helle, has performed nearly one hundred times the Anton-Bramann operation of puncture of the corpus callosum for the relief of various developmental disorders of the brain, more especially epilepsy, and he reports his results in the Archiv fuer Psychologie, 1914, p. 98. (Cf. Ther. Monatsh., July, p. 537.) Seven cases of epilepsy, some of them severe, are described in detail, as having been influenced by this operation; however, the majority of the subjects markedly improved.

Then

Opotherapy Facilitating Impregnation of an Acromegalic Woman.-A married woman of 32 afflicted with acromegaly had been sterile, nor had she menstruated during fifteen years. L. Kalledy, of Pest (Arch. f. Gyn., 1913, No. 27), subjected her to a course of ovarian extract. At first he gave three intravenous injections a week, for which, after some initial improvement in her condition, he substituted the tablets, taken by mouth. In the course of some time this woman became pregnant, and the author promised to report further progress in this interesting case.

A

T

HAT Lawrence (otherwise known as Larry) Marchant, of all men in the world, should choose to bury himself and his talents in Kingston Falls, Massachusetts, of all places on the map, was a matter which irritated more than it surprised those who knew his eccentricities. It went against their professional grain to see so promising a young scientist, far and away the most brilliant of his class in medicine, throw himself away in such fashion. But to all of their remonstrance he turned a deaf ear and to all their questioning a dumb mouth-or a good-natured pleasantry which amounted to the same thing-and so the matter ended in their shrugging resigned shoulders and in Larry "ganging his ain gait."

The truth is, there was a method in his madness. Larry was no more enamored of rural life and practice, for their own sake, than any of his disgusted critics; and he had no intention of remaining in Kingston Falls for the rest of his natural life. But he had under way an important piece of research work from which he looked for very momentous results-no less than the discovery of a drug which would deaden consciousness during a surgical operation-and he sought the seclusion of the country for two reasons: first, that he might have leisure and abstraction for the carrying out of his long series of experiments, and second, if the truth must be told, that he might be free from the prying eyes of his inquisitive friends. Seclusion, indeed, he found in Kingston Falls to his heart's content; but that the most insignificant personages can sometimes thwart the largest schemes will appear as this narrative unfolds itself.

Kingston Falls was a typical Colonial village in the year of grace 1720. Old Judge Sherman, lawyer Parkes, the schoolmaster (whose name is unimportant to this story), and the village clerk, were the only men in whom Larry would have found the least approach to congenial companionship, if he had sought it. And, except for the Judge, these were not particularly inviting material for the exercise of his brilliant parts. The Judge was an exception. He was considerably older than Larry, being indeed a white-haired widower of sev

enty, but he was one of those rarely mellow old men, of native culture and gentle breeding, who never grow old in spirit or stunted in mental qualities. Despite the differences in their ages and temperaments, he and Larry became very companionable, and such time as the latter had to spare from his work he spent mostly at the Judge's simple but hospitable house.

If he had wanted it, or even been aware of it, the young scientist might have found, right to his hand, another and more charming distraction. The Judge's daughter, Dorothy, a winsome girl of nineteen, a youthful replica of the old Judge himself, tempered with the high spirit of her Celtic mother, presided over her father's house. And it must be confessed that he would have found the way to the cultivation of such distraction comparatively easy; for Dorothy was only human, and feminine flesh and blood could hardly be expected to withstand the frequent visits of the quiet, handsome young city-bred man. But Larry, alas, was wedded to his science, and his eyes were blinded to his opportunities in this direction; which, however, did not save him from the jealous resentment of lawyer Parkes, who, albeit on the shady side of forty, worshiped hopelessly at the same shrine, nor from the evil fruits of that resentment, as shall presently appear.

Among her other qualities, Dorothy was a reader; and a reader of the best kind. As may be supposed, she had but the meagrest kind of library on which to exercise her faculty. Books were neither so numerous nor so varied then as now. But such as there were she made the most of them. Above all, there was a Shakespeare; old, it is true, printed in black-letter, and its pages yellow with age; but a Shakespeare just the same, and a mine of untold wealth to Dorothy. She pored over the ancient volume for hours at a time, and never tired of sitting at the feet of the old Master, whose genial human philosophy no black lettering could hide, and whose quaint wit no faded page could dim.

Larry had converted an old house on the outskirts of the village into a laboratory and a bachelor's living quarters; and here six months of arduous, fruitful work went by apace. The day at length came when he felt justified in mak

chose for subject a young seamstress in the village, Letitia Brooks by name, who had suffered several years with an infected knee-joint requiring amputation, and whom he had had under his care since he came to Kingston Falls. After a brief, simple explanation to the attendants and friends of what he expected to do, he proceeded to administer the vapor, and then, amid the breathless astonishment of the onlookers, to amputate the limb from the unconscious girl, stopping every little while to renew the anesthetic. It was, of course, a comparatively crude proceeding; but the triumph was complete. For the first time in the history of medicine a major operation had been performed without the consciousness of the patient.

The operation had taken place in the afternoon. Strange to say, when Larry returned, later in the winter evening, to his bachelor apartments, he had none of the sense of elation which his success might be expected to induce. On the contrary, the reaction made him unusually irritable and depressed. He was tired out and dispirited, and without even stopping to prepare himself supper he went up to his bedroom and got quickly into bed, where he lay in a sort of feverish condition.

About midnight he was aroused by a loud and persistent knocking at the door below. His first natural thought was that something untoward had happened to Lettice. Hastily throwing on a few clothes, and lighting and catching up his lamp, he ran down to answer the continuous knocking. Lifting the lamp above his head, he peered out into the dark, and was astonished to see Lawyer Parkes and another man, whom he recognized as Master Dean, the village constable, on the doorstep.

"Come in, come in," he exclaimed, rather testily leading the way into the living room. "This is something of an unholy hour to drag an honest man out of his bed. The matter should be urgent."

"Urgent, quotha!" rejoined Parkes, with a malicious scowl. "Urgent enough, I promise you. And as to an honest man, that may be a matter of opinion."

Larry set the light down on the table. He had never had any particular liking for Parkes, and he liked him less than ever at this moment.

"Well, out with it, man!" he said, impatiently. "I make no doubt I shall survive the shock." "All in good time, young sir, all in good time," drawled Parkes, who rather enjoyed baiting his natural enemy. "We will proceed in regular order, an' it please your honesty. This gentleman,"

pointing to his companion, who had kept himself in the gloom of the partly darkened room, ❝is, as you well know, the village constable, and he hath a warrant for the arrest of one Lawrence Marchant, physician."

Larry turned pale. His worst fears, then, were realized. Lettice was dead, and he was to be accused of her death.

"Is this true, Master Dean?" he asked of the constable.

"Very true, sir," answered the man, gravely. He and his family had received more than one kindness from the young scientist. "I am sorry, sir. I do only my duty."

There was a tense silence for a moment. Larry could not bring himself to hear in cold words, what he felt to be the tragic denouement of his life's work. At length he managed to force himself into a reasonable state of composure.

"What is the charge?" he asked, shortly. Even Larry, in his wildest conjectures, was not prepared for the astounding reply from Parke's smugly malicious lips.

"Witch-craft."

For a moment Larry stared, speechless, at his two visitors. Then the revulsion of his relief from the charge which he had dreaded made him hysterical, and he burst into a laugh. Parkes eyed him sourly.

"You shall find it anything but matter for laughing young sir," he said dryly, "before you shall be done with it."

Larry sobered himself with an effort.

"Why, the charge is ridiculous, preposterous, man," he said, impatiently, "and you know it, Master Parkes."

"That will be for the court to decide," rejoined the lawyer.

"Let me see the warrant," demanded Larry. Dean handed it to him, and he unrolled it and ran over its contents. The merest glance satisfied him that the instrument was regular, and it bore the undoubted signature of Judge Sherman.

"Very well, gentlemen," he said quietly, walking to the door and opening it, "You will find me here when you want me. I am getting very cold and sleepy. I bid you good-night.”

This did not suit Parkes at all. He had come to humiliate his enemy, and, in spite of the circumstances in his favor, he had an uneasy feeling that somehow or other Larry's high-bred superiority was putting him (Parkes) in a sorry light.

"I fear," he said, with a nasty smile, "it will be necessary for you to go with us tonight."

Larry made no answer. He measured Parkes quietly, almost dreamily, with his eye, idly spec