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be delivered with the forceps, from the situation of the foetusin utero, of course. Again, in favour of his treatment hequotes the following:-" Efforts have frequently been madeto deliver with the forceps in such cases, (says Dr. Collins,)but this instrument is seldom applicable, as the introductionof the blades generally forces the head out of our reach; be-sides, but little would be gained, for the child dies shortlyafter the rupture takes place. The dimensions, oo, of thepelvis, are, in such cases, for the most part defective, (there-fore impeding the descent of the child,) all which circum-stances would seem strongly opposed to this mode of delivery."In all these remarks I perfectly coincide. Mr. Tyte does nottake into consideration the capacity of the pelvis, by whichcondition we mostly find such cases governed. In his casethere was nothing of the kind. There is a material differencehere, so that Mr. Tyte will find that the above quite accordswith my views; not, as he expected, that with my modernviews they would not accord. I think this word modern ismore applicable to himself, for if he refers to Drs. Denman,Blundell, Ryan, Davis, Lee, Rigby, Collins, &c., he will notfind the dreadful operation of evisceration performed underthe same circumstances. Mr. Tyte, in attempting to answermy inquiries, remarks that the difficulty of delivering withthe vectis and forceps arose from the frequent recession of thehead. Would the recession not be greater in attempting toperforate the head, than applying the forceps in a capaciouspelvis ? Dr. Ramsbotham says in these cases there is but onemode of practice that affords the least chance of life-viz.,speedy delivery. If the head has entered the pelvis, and hasnot receded, the child may be extracted by the agency of thelong or short forceps; but he generally found the head hadreceded beyond their reach. He would then introduce hishand, and turn. In Mr. Tyte’s case it had receded somewhat,but was in the cavity of the pelvis, and had descended afterthat. It is seldom under rupture of the uterus that the per-forator can be necessary or available. Mr. Tyte, to make hiscase appear more clear, (as he imagines,) asks, who wouldquestion that delivery ought to be effected at once ?-ashe contended, from the general circumstances of the case,he was imperatively called upon to deliver, and that he didnot believe any competent judge would question it. This is

certainly the best remark that he has yet made, and I per-fectly agree with him, from facts stated above. But had thispractice been put into operation, the case probably would nothave terminated as it did. Mr. Tyte, towards the conclusionof his letter, mentions that I wish to impress upon yourreaders that I could have performed the operation in littleless than half an hour. Far from it: Mr. Tyte is labouringunder a very great mistake here. I said, that the operationwith the forceps could have been performed, with any ma-nagement, in one-sixth of the time occupied by him-viz., fourhours, under the circumstances that presented themselves inthe case in question. I should be very sorry to undertake theoperation under such a presentation and combination of cir-cumstances. I may observe, that after the post-mortem exa-mination, it was ascertained that rupture existed. This iswhat he calls having the honour of pursuing Dr. Lee’s prac-tice. But here he does not forget to leave the last part of thebusiness unmentioned.High Holborn, March, 1846.

MEDICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON.

MONDAY, APRIL 20, 1846.—MR. DENDY, PRESIDENT.ALBUMINURIA.

MR. PniLp exhibited an enema syringe, which, by means ofan exhausting pump, had the recommendation of affording aconstant stream, instead of acting by jets, as was the casewith the old-fashioned syringe.Mr. FisHER related a case of affection of the kidney, in

which the most prominent symptom was the presence of alarge quantity of albumen in the urine for a period of severalmonths, as was evidenced by testing the fluid with nitric acidand heat. Under the treatment pursued, which was, in thecommencement, antiphlogistic, including the use of mercuryto ptyalism, followed by the tartrate of iron, the patientgot quite well, the urine becoming, and continuing normal.The patient shortly afterwards contracted typhus fever, ofwhich he died, and after death, the kidneys were found con-gested only, no marks of disorganization, even under the micro-scope, being detectable. The case was brought forward tcshow the uncertainty of the signs of disease as exhibited insome oases; in this instance, in particular, it would seem thai

a case of Bright’s disease had been cured, but the post-mortemexamination showed that no such disease had existed.

Dr. COPLAND had listened to the case with interest, as itconfirmed some views which he had advanced in his article," Dropsy," to show that the presence of albumen in the urinedid not afford sufficient evidence that the kidney was in agranular condition. This condition of urine might be presentwhen the kidney was inflamed, or simply congested, as wasoften the case after scarlet fever.

Dr. ROBERTS mentioned a case in which albumen was foundin the urine, probably as the result of the application of ablister. He mentioned another case, also, in which there wasa peculiar foetid condition of the urine in an old gentlemanwith enlarged prostate; there appeared to be no cause for thephenomenon, and he asked an explanation of it. The urinewas usually acid; once, after a shivering fit, it became sud-denly alkaline, but after a sleep, again assumed its acid cha-racter.Mr. HILTON observed that the urine was often offensive

when it had been long alkaline.The PRESIDENT had observed a peculiarly offensive con-

dition of urine in cases of scurvy.

CHEMISTRY, PHARMACY, ANDMATERIA MEDICA.

A LETTER, ADDRESSED TO BARON LIEBIG, PROFESSOR AT THE

UNIVERSITY OF GIESSEN, (G. D. OF HESSE.) By MM. LAURENTand GERHARDT.

MONSIEUR LE BARON,—You have just published a brochure,* inwhich you have attacked our labours in the most injuriousmanner.

You are at liberty, doubtless, to find our labours to be bad,and you may also attack us in a style at which any well-bredman would blush; you alone are responsible for your own ex-pressions.But you have no right to calumniate us; you have no right to

designate us forgers, highway robbers, to say, in the face of theworld, that in order to refute your theories, to expose yourerrors, we have deceived the Academy of Sciences, in present-ing to that body, on the 22nd of September last, experimentswhich do not exist, which we never made.Were you a Frenchman, Monsieur le Baron, we might call

you to account for these calumnies, before the legal tribunals,for those experiments were made in Paris, in the laboratoryof M. Pelouze, for the most part in the presence of M. Pelouze,or his pupils, and upon substances furnished by that chemist,and also in Montpelier, in the laboratory of the Faculty ofSciences, partly with materials furnished by M. Pelouze, andpartly on products prepared in the latter laboratory, and whichwere shown to many persons, amongst others to the Dean ofthe Faculty.

This will serve to show the value of your assertions.Since your being a Foreigner insures your impunity, we

have no other resource against you than an appeal to publicopinion; we beg you, therefore, Monsieur le Baron, to have thegoodness to give our reclamation its right, by retracting yourwords, and to accept our salutations empressees.

AUG. LAURENT,Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences.

CH. GERHARDT,Professor to the Faculty of Sciences, Montpelier.

In publishing this letter in his journal The Annalen, BaronLiebig tells us, the authors have sent no less than six copies,to be placed in a public reading-room at Giessen, besides veryliberally distributing copies- of it elsewhere; he says, "I thinkproper to accompany this letter with a few remarks."

It will be immediately perceived that the authors of thisletter have only tried to refute one point of my article onM. Gerhardt and his relation to organic chemistry. Their

object is to prove, by witnesses, that the statements theycommunicated to the Academy, in their letter of the 22nd ofSeptember, last year, are the results of experiments reallyinstituted. By the addition of his name, M. Laurent hasincurred part of the responsibility of these statements; and Ithink I am not deceived if I say that the only object of thereclamation is his justification.The statements contained in the communication of the

22nd of September, 1845, correspond, however, word for word,with the note laid before the Academv in January. 1844.

*In the present volume of THE LANCET, p. 84.

496

(Comptes Rendus, p. 158,) therefore two years ago ; they areexactly those which he endeavoured to maintain in January,1845, (Comptes Rendus, p. 27,) when he declared that he, aswell as two other very well-known chemists, had not suc-ceeded in obtaining mellonide of potassium.There can, I should think, be no doubt that the formulæ

which M. Gerhardt gave in July, 1844, and in January, 1845,as the composition of the mellon compounds, only express hisown opinions, and are not by any means the results of experi-ments made by himself ; and the complete manner in whichhis statements of the 22nd of September, 1845, correspondwith his former ones, seemed to leave no doubt as to theirbeing of the same origin.The contents of the note of the 22nd of September, in

which M. Laurent bore a part, by adding his name, turn uponthe refutation of two principal points. It is said that Iasserted—1st, that mellonide of potassium is produced bydissolving mellon in potassium; 2ndly, that hydromellonic acidis decomposed by heat into mellon and hydrogen. Both ofthese things are impossible according to the views whichMM. Gerhardt and Laurent have taken of the composition ofthe mellon compounds. These two assertions are contra-dicted in their note, and the Academy is made acquaintedwith the error which I have committed. " It is impossible,"say MM. Gerhardt and Laurent, " to conceive, according tothis, the formation of mellonide of potassium out of mellonwith potassa: we have, besides this, no example of such anextraordinary reaction as hydromellonic acid affords by heat.

If I now maintained that the Academy has been deceivedby Messrs. Gerhardt and Laurent, I believe I have an undis-putable right to do so, as the assertions which they attributedto me are false, and were never made by me. I have nevermaintained that mellonide of potassium may be prepared bythe solution of mellon in potash ; on the contrary, I haveshown and described circumstantially, (Ann. de Claemie etde Physic, p. 55,) that there is formed, under these circum-stances, a salt of a strong alkaline re-action, the acid of whichin the silver salt contains 1.11 per cent. of hydrogen, and 22.18per cent. of oxygen.

I have never asserted or maintained that the so-called

hydromellonic acid is decomposed by heat into mellon andhydrogen.The statements of Messrs. Gerhardt and Laurent could

therefore have no other object than to lead the Academyastray in their judgment. I say, they could have no othermotive, because I have, with a perseverance which scarcelyany other chemist would have exercised, endeavoured, al-though altogether without success, to correct their error ayear before.

After I had read M. Gerhardt’s note, addressed to theAcademy in January, 1844, wherein these assertions firstappeared, I determined to repeat my labours on mellon andits compounds. This investigation presented great difficulties,and it cost me three months labour to discover a good methodfor making mellonide of potassium, and to determine the com-position of the mellon compounds. Theory and theoreticalspeculations were not at all questions in my labours, (Ann.de Ohern. et Phccrm., vol. I. s. 338,) as they consist of aseries of results expressed in figures. What sentiments Ithen entertained may be judged of by the paper itself, where,at page 344, I said," If before describing my own experi-ments, I have said nothing more of the labours and results ofothers (Volkel’s and Gerhardt’s) which are opposed to theexistence of mellon itself, or to its nature as a compoundradical, than that I have read them, it is only because I thinkthat they will be refuted in the following details :-

This hint, which might, to any impartial person, serve toprove that I sought to correct mistakes in the most forbearingmanner, and wished to avoid a dispute, failed to accomplishits object. Even when, after some months, there appearedan absurd, contradictory, and totally false interpretation of myexperiments from the pen of M. Gerhardt, in his ComptesRendus mensuels, (January, 1845,) I forebore saying anything;but when, in September of the same year, the same inventiomand false assertions re-appeared in the circle of the Academy,and were discussed in their original construction, there conldnot possibly be any more doubt as to the intention and objectof these attacks; and no one will blame me if I expressed myself with the full indignation which such proceedings mustexcite.The proofs that they have worked upon the mellon com-

pounds, to which MM. Gerhardt and Laurent allude in theirletter to me, in themselves say nothing, and are worthlessbecause they do not demonstrate that they really analyze(mellon combinations, I do not doubt that they have insti

tuted analyses in M. Pelouze’s laboratory of substances, wichthey took for mellonide of potassium; but who would give tosuch proceedings the name of an investigation, and ascribe tothem the character of demonstration, as they have done1Five months have now elapsed since the 22nd of September,1845, and neither of these two chemists has ever publishedany result in figures of this analysis, which might make itpossible for other chemists to judge of the correctness of theirstatements. Are these not sufficient grounds to make onebelieve that the statements of the 22nd of September, 1845rest upon the same basis as the two preceding ones, whichcorrespond literally with these, and are not founded upon ex-periments and analyses, and for which no reclamation is made!

Nothing is certainly more convenient than this kind of re-futation by the analysis of substances, which they might, incase of need, have obtained as good, and perhaps even muchbetter, at that excellent manufactory of chemical products.which bears the honourable name of M. Roubiquet. It oftenhappens that my assistants make combustions of organicsubstances for me, because the time that I spend in mylaboratory in teaching, is much too valuable for me to per-form operations with which my assistants are perfectly ac-quainted ; but I should never dream of valuing in the least,or of publishing an analysis of a substance which I had notprepared with my own hands. For these preparations thereare necessary a number of experiments, and an expenditure-of time, exceeding often a hundred-fold that spent uponan analysis. Thus I may give an instance: that merely inorder to find a secure method of preparing glycocoll, (gela-tine sugar,) and to be able to confirm one of the most im-portant facts for animal chemistry-namely, the division ofhippuric acid into benzoic acid and glycocoll, described byDessaignes, (a statement which was perfectly correct,) I hadto perform, necessarily, a series of experiments, which occu-pied me unceasingly for six weeks. How can the difficultiesof such an undertaking be compared to the performance ofan organic analysis ! If, however, the method is once found,then a number of young chemists are sufficiently clever andexperienced to finish the work, which for them becomes a.source of instruction.

I repeat, that I should never have thought it worth whileto bring to public discussion the manner in which M. Ger-hardt mutilates the labours of foreign chemists, and turnsthem to his own use, had not he known how to attain theconfidence of the editors of one of the best French journals,and to induce them to spread through a large circulation hisfalse and unconscientious statements. If the editors of this.journal would, for example, take the trouble to compare theextract of the investigations of MM. Merklein and Wöhler onbezoaric acid, which M. Gerhardt gave in the last number ofthe journal, with the original paper, they would once for allbe deterred from making M. Gerhardt’s views their own, asthey have done in combining from this time the ComptesRendus of M. Gerhardt’s with their own journal. All thatWöhler states of the imperfect knowledge of glauco-melanic ,acid is given by 11. Gerhardt as his idea, as his critical judg-

. ment, so that the reader of this extract might be led to eon-, sider the authors as unskilful beginners.

Another artifice of M. Gerhardt’s is, that he mentions., nothing in the above article of what Wöhler has said upon. the evident connexion of bezoaric, gallic, and tannic acids,instead of which he, however, describes the re-actions that M.

Wohler gives, as proofs of his conclusions, and adds, " I pro-phesy, that a conversion of bezoaric into gallic acid has here

: taken place." This is certainly the cheapest manner of ob-taining the reputation of a prophet, and of securing to himself

) priorities of discoveries. In no country in the world wouldsuch proceedings be tolerated. J. L.:

BRITISH AND AMERICAN MEDICALJOURNALS.

IN the second volume of THE LANCET for 1844, at page 258,we gave a short analysis of a communication on the subject of’

PERFORATION OF THE MEMBRANA TYMPANI FOR THE

CURE OF DEAFNESS.

The cases in which this operation is admissible were there

stated, and the conclusion arrived at was, that it is rarelysuccessful in the restoration of hearing. Attention is againdirected to the subject by an interesting communication, byMr. BUTCHER, to the Dublin Surgical Society, and reported in