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LECONS DE PATHOLOGIE DIGESTIVE.By M. LOEPER. 4me seric. With 34 illustrations.Paris: Ma,4soii et Clie. 1919. Pp. 298. 11 frtmu;s.

THESE 20 essays Oll a variety of topics connected withgastro-intestinal medicine range irregularly over a widefield—hyperchlorhydria, flatulence in Gravcs’s disease.sarcoma of stomach, duodenal nlcer, the rectal lesionsof dysentery. The author thinks lie can establish theexistence of a suprarenal dyspepsia and constipation.arising from adrenal insufficiency, which are amenable tospecific treatment. An interesting chapter descrihes thecardio-vascular defects of dysenteries, and the last threeessays all deal with the rather neglected nervous

apparatus in the walls of the stomach and bowels.Functional disease is recognised, and especial import-ance is attached to the local implication of gangliaand nerves in dysentery and cancer as the cause of

pain; there are some striking illustrations of diseased

sympathetic ganglia.

THE WELFARE OF THE SCHOOL CHILD.

By JOSEPH CATES, M.D., D.P.H. English PublicHealth Series, Vol. VI. Edited by Sir MALCOLMMORRIS, K.C.V.O. London : Cassell and Co. 1919.

Pp. 154. 5s.

Dr. Cates writes in a clear and straightforward stylewhich is well adapted for the wide public to whom thisseries is addressed. The first part of the book dealswith the findings of medical inspection of schoolchildren, and is calculated to produce the requisiteamount of horripilation in the reader. The final

chapters deal with the school building and the school annexe. The latter, which is the offspring of recent Isolicitude for the welfare of the school child, includes the canteen, the gymnasium, the school baths, theplay centre, and the treatment centre. The authorwrites from the point of view of the medical officer ofhealth of a large industrial town, who is also the schoolmedical officer. The importance of the environmentof the school child in the production of ill-health is

throughout insisted upon. Dr. Cates writes stronglyupon the iniqnities of the insanitary privy-midden andthe pail-closet. It is to be doubted, however, if theserelics of the Middle Ages have in fact that influence inproducing malnutrition in children which he ascribes tothem. In contradistinction to the general run of similar

hooks little space is devoted to infectious diseases inrelation to schools and scholars. These diseases aretreated only in a general way, hut the paragraphsdealing with them reveal a breadth of view and a pro-gressive spirit which it is not usual to find in thesanitarian’s attitude to this question. Instead of theostrich-like policy of wholesale exclusion from school. Dr.Cates advocates the attendance even of contacts fromhouses in which infectious disease exists: and hedescribes a system of regular supervision and visitingby school nurses which has proved more successful inpractice than the older methods of school closure andexclusion.

Dr. Cates writes only of what lie knows and thereforewith authority. The hook, however, has in consequencethe defects of its qualities. Many of the public forwhom it is intended will search it in vain for anydescription of, or even allusion to, the various forms ofvoluntary effort which have been enlisted throughoutmany progressive areas in schemes for promoting thewelfare of the school child. The subject of physicalexercises is not adequately dealt with and no guidanceis given in regard to such immediate extensions of

activity as, for instance, the development of nurseryschools. In spite of these serious omissions the work is an admirable exposition of the conditions which existand of the provision which has been made for thewelfare of the school child in a typical manufacturing district; and no doubt if the author had not limited Ihimself to the things of his own experience thebook would have lost much of that directnessand authenticity which are its most importantcharacteristics.

A DICTIONARY OF TREATMENT.

By Sir WILLIAM WHITLA, M.A., M.D., LL.D.. M.P..late Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeuticsin Queen’s University, Belfast. Sixth edition.London: Baillière, Tindall, and Cox. 1920. Pp. 1083.25s.

THIS work was first published in 1891, and the factthat it has reached its sixth edition is sufficient proofthat the efforts of the author in making the hook auseful work of reference have met with the success theydeserve. The dictionary includes medical and surgicaltherapeutics, and the present volume has been, as faras possible, brought up to date. The more commonaffec;tions, which form the great majority of cases in

ordinary practice, receive due attention, whilst therarer maladies, such as sprue and anthrax, are likewisediscussed at suitable length.The amount of space devoted to the treatment of the

various diseases is by no means curtailed : for instance.no less than ten pages are occupied with the discussionon the therapeutics of eczema. Functional affections

’

of the heart occupy nearly four pages, whilst theinformation on valvular diseases of the heart takes nla14 pages, and sound and practical suggestions are madeas to the drug treatment of these affections and thegeneral mode of life to be adopted by the patients.The book is a reliable and complete work of referencewithin the limitations which the author has resolved toobserve. It is a dictionary of treatment and not a

system of the art and science of medicine.

ROENTGEN INTERPRETATION.A Manual for Students and Practitioners. ByGEORGE W. HOLMES, M.D., Roentgenologist to theMassachusetts General Hospital ; and HOWARD E.RCGGlJE8. M.D.. Roentgenologist to the Universityof California Hospital. With 181 figures. LondonHenry Kimpton. 1919. Pp. 211. His.

THIS volume is a valuable contribution to radiologyinasmuch as. unlike many works on the subject, it dealsadequately with the most important aspect of radio-

diagnosis. The aim of the authors is to provide ageneral guide to the accurate interpretation of theevidence afforded by X ray methods. They are carefulto impress the fact that no book can impart thenecessary skill, and that the illustrations given are buttypes of lesions, or momentary phases of constantlychanging and extremely variable processes. Givenaccess to the work of a busy X ray department thisbook will be of great value to the radiological student.but, of course, a medical training is a necessary preludeto this study. The authors rightly say that: "Inattempting to study gross changes by means of shadowsa knowledge of pathology is as essential to the

roentgenologist as that of anatomy is to the surgeon."The book is arranged as a series of chapters, each

dealing with a special subject, and concludes with abibliography which, while not complete, is sufficient forthe purpose. Some chapters seem rather compressecl,but if every section were treated at length the volumewould cease to be the convenient, almost pocketcompanion it now is. Every radiological student shouldhave this book constantly at hand as lie is sure to findin it many a useful hint for the elucidation of obscureX ray findings.

JOURNALS.Journal q Pathology and Bacteriology, Vol. XXIII.,

No. 1, pp. 1-128, December, 1919.-Experiments on theAction of Unsaturated Fatty Acids and Lipoids on

Amylolytic and Haemolytic Phenomena, by P. Stocks.-A Modified Wassermann Test, by C. Y. Wang. Theauthor mixes loopfuls of unheated serum antigen andsensitised ox corpuscles on a slide and observes theresult microscopically ; enough blood can be obtainedfrom a fine capillary tubeful. He meets the manyobjections which will naturally be raised by showingthat in a long series of cases tested in parallel with theoriginal Wassermann method his process affords a rather more delicate test. Heating the suspected serum is.

32 harmful to the specific reacting substance as well as tocomplement.-The Biochemical Comparison of Bacillussporogenes and the Reading Bacillus by QuantitativeMethods, by J. E. G. Harris.-The Paths of Spread ofBacterial Exotoxins, with Special Reference to TetanusToxin, by F. H. Teale and D. Embleton. Tetanus toxinpasses from the site of injection to the central nervoussystem more by way of the perineural lymphatics thanalong the axis-cylinders; although it is quickly passedfrom systemic capillaries to connective-tissue spacesit will not pass into the central nervous systemfrom the cerebral capillaries, nor into the cerebro-spinalfluid through the choroid plexus. Tetanus antitoxincannot enter the central nervous system by way of theblood-vessels, axis-cylinders, or perineural lymphatics,nor from the cerebro-spinal fluid.—Macroscopic Appear-ances of War-injured Nerves, by S. M. Cone.-TheProtozoal Parasites of the Rat, with Special Referenceto Spirochœta icterohœmorrhagiœ, by A. G. R. Foulerton.A full account of the occurrence of the parasite of spiro-chaetal jaundice (4 times in 101) and Trypanosoma lewisi(45 in 123) in London rats, with a useful summary of thepresent state of knowledge.-A Squamous Epitheliomaof the Frontal and Maxillary Sinuses in a Mare, byJ. F. D. Tutt.-Hydrogen-Ion Concentration and Anti-septic Potency, with Special Reference to AcridineCompounds, by C. H. Browning, R. Gulbransen, andE. L. Kennaway. Acridine compounds are speciallyeffective in serum, because they do not combine withproteids, and work best at the reaction of bodyfluids.—Ectopia Cloacae, by C. Walker.-Obituaryof S. G. Scott, the histologist, with a portrait familiarto those who knew him in his laboratory at Oxford.-Spontaneous Nephritis in Rabbits, by J. P. McGowan.-Ganglioneuroma of the Adrenal and Neuroblastoma ofthe Sympathetic, by M. J. Stewart.-Subacute LiverAtrophy in a Case of Syphilis Treated with Galyl, byM. J. Stewart, C. W. Vining, and J. P. Bibby.-AStarch-splitting Streptothrix found in the Stools in

Diabetes, by W. Ford Robertson.-Method of StainingOrganisms in Tissues, by G. H. Wilson.-AntisepticProperties of Acridine and Phenazine Compounds, byC. H. Browning, J. B. Cohen, and R. Gulbransen.-TheSmall Production of Agglutinins by Mice, by A. E.Boycott.-Effect of X Rays on Susceptibility to BacterialInfection, by C. H. Browning, R. Gulbransen, and S.Russ. No effect with pneumococci and tubercle bacilli.

BOOKS OF REFERENCE.Burdett’s Hospitals and Charities, 1919: The Year

Book of Philanthropy and Hospital Annucal (London :The Scientific Press, Ltd. Pp. 1087. 12s. 6d. net), whichcontains a review of everything that concerns hospitaladministration, medical schools, asylums, convalescentinstitutions, and nursing establishments, is now so wellknown and established as a reliable book of referencethat it scarcely requires from us any detailed descrip-tion or commendation. At a time when hospitals areso sorely tried to make ends meet that there is gravedanger of State intervention and the abolition of thevoluntary system which has been the boast and pride ofthis country for the past 200 years, Burdett is particu-larly valuable as showing not only the needs of our

healing institutions, but also the enormous volume ofsuccour to the sick poor which they ,give. Thisvaluable book also contains much useful informa-tion in regard to American and colonial hospitalsand allied institutions, and we know of no other workof similar scope which is so convenient for reference.-The Annual Charities Register and Digest (London :Longmans, Green, and Co. Pp. 584. 5s. net), which isnow in its twenty-eighth edition, is another well-knownwork of reference, and is an indispensable handbook toeveryone who is interested in the charities in, or avail-able for, the metropolis. Besides containing a reviewof the year of the financial position of metropolitancharities, detailed information is given of the individualinstitutions grouped under headings such as blind, deafand dumb, epileptics, incurables, and so forth; while,under the heading of miscellaneous, societies dealing withsocial and physical improvement, employment, emigra-tion, and protection of life, and of the helpless are dealtwith. Reference is facilitated by a very full index.

New Inventions.AN ELECTRICALLY DRIVEN BATH CHAIR.

OUR Motor Correspondent writes: An invalid’scarriage, comfortable and luxuriously C-spring sus-

pended, which is sure to be appreciated by invalids owingto the fact that it is driven by the occupant and therebydoes away with the necessity of an attendant, has beenproduced by Messrs. J. and A. Carter, of Great Portland-street, London. Twenty-four 4 volt accumulators, eachof 36 amperes capacity, placed under the seat, drive a h.p. electric motor housed under a bonnet over thefront axle. The transmission from the motor to thefront axle is by helical gearing, well boxed in, with aconveniently placed plug for oiling. The control is bya lever on the driver’s right. When this is pulled backit applies a band brake to the right rear wheel.

Pushing the lever forward and depressing a buttonreleases the brake and switches on the power, which isfull on with the handle fully advanced. By this meansany speed from a mere crawl up to five miles an hourcan be obtained. Sufficient power, which is ample to

ascend any incline, is carried for a run of about 20 miles.An accessible switch permits reversing at any speed.There is an additional brake, controlled by a lever onthe left hand and acting on the left rear wheel. Thefront wheels have 12 x 1 Dunlop pneumatic tyres, therear 26 x 2 Dunlop pneumatic grooved motor-cycletyres. The steering is of the ordinary bath-chair type,and seems particularly easy. On the floor facingthe driver is a voltmeter and a plug for charging thebatteries; a mileage recorder is also attached. The weightempty is 243 cwt. The machine is simplicity itself, andany patient with the use of his arms can manipulate it,and take a run at any speed up to five miles an hour.The simplicity and ease of control greatly appealed

to the writer, as, after a moment’s explanation, hewas able to manipulate the chair in and. out amongcrowds of furniture in the showrooms, advancing andreversing at will. For ascertaining that there is sufficientpower in the accumulators for a trip, it would be as wellif an amptmeter as well as a voltmeter was fltted. Avoltmeter may register almost the full voltage until theaccumulators are nearly run out. Legally, the chairmust be registered as a motor-car, carry number plates,and pay an annual motor-carriage licence. The driver,too, must have a driver’s licence. It seems rather ananomaly that an invalid carriage, with a speed-limit offive miles an hour, should be thus penalised. Thematter is, I understand, being represented to a trafficcommittee, now sitting, with a view to obtainingexemption of self-propelled bath chairs from regulationswhich it seems absurd to apply to such vehicles.