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may commit. It is pretty safe to assert that this atti-tude affords no security whatever to the public. The factremains that material that may be no better than manureis being used for making bedding without any attemptbeing made to render it clean and wholesome by thescientific process of sterilisation by steam. There must bea number of filthy beds in the land and it is not improbablethat this fact accounts for some mysterious outbreaks ofdisease.We repeat that these circumstances demand immediate

legislation and the application of an obvious and simpleremedy-a remedy which some manufacturers already applyon their own initiative, though seriously handicapped by thesilly demand for the cheaper, because untreated, material.It is also desirable that the public should not be be-

guiled into buying cheap bedding which is falsely describedas " sanitary " or I I purified " when the material has under-gone absolutely no such cleansing process as is implied bythe above terms. This species of fraudulent trading should,of course, be dealt with under the Merchandise Marks Act,which exists to suppress false trade description.

MEDICINE AND THE LAW.

The Case of a Trooper in the Yeomanry suffering from ChronicUrticaria.

ON August 21st Mr. Horace Smith, sitting at theWestminster police court, dismissed a charge of an unusualcharacter against a trooper serving in the Middlesex

Imperial Yeomanry, but residing at Birmingham, based

upon his absence from the annual training of his corps. Thedefendant had served in South Africa in Paget’s Horse andsince then had regularly attended the camps of his own

corps, the Middlesex Yeomanry. This year he applied inApril for leave to be absent from camp, which takesplace in July, on the ground of business, but as hecould not be excused without making a payment he pre-pared to attend. About the same time, finding that he wasunwell he consulted his medical attendant and was treatedfor nettlerash. As it still gave him trouble when the timefor the annual training approached he communicated withthe Yeomanry authorities, and in consequence of a corre-

spondence in which it was insisted that he ought to proceedto London and be examined by Mr. C. Stonham, the surgeonof his corps, he forwarded three certificates to the effect thathe was suffering from urticaria and that he was not fit to gointo camp. Apparently the fact that no mention of thechronic nature of the complaint was made, coupled no doubtwith some want of explicitness in the information suppliedas to his condition, caused the officers of the Middlesex Yeo-manry, anxious to maintain their numbers in camp and toprevent what is known to military men as "skrimshanking," "to regard the certificates sent with scant respect. The trooperwas arrested and brought to London as a deserter, and afteradjournments his medical witnesses were compelled to attendthe court in support of their certificates. The evidence thusgiven was that Mr. Walter Flewitt, the usual medical attendantof the defendant, Lieutenant-Colonel S. E. Duncan, R.A.M.C.,medical officer in charge of troops at Birmingham, andMr. Edwin Gilbert Smith, senior surgeon to the Birming-ham Hospital for Diseases of the Skin, had all personallyexamined the patient at the time when their certificateswere given and had formed the opinion that he wasnot fit to go into camp where he would have to undergo acertain amount of exposure and hard work and where specialtreatment would be impossible. In the circumstances thecharge was, as a matter of course, dismissed, and it seemsa matter of regret that it should have been brought. Stillthe point is not quite as simple as it seems. Urticaria, asa rule, is little more than a temporary inconvenience;it gives rise to annoyance and discomfort for a few daysor even a week or two, but with the elimination of thetoxins which have produced it the whole trouble ceases.

There is, however, a chronic form in which the irritation isvery persistent and this may materially interfere with thework of the patient. Especially is this the case whenthe local vaso-motor centres are in that unstable con-

dition to which the name of "dermographism" is givenand this is what was indicated by one of the medicalwitnesses who said that the patient was suffering from" urticaria factitia." In this condition pressure on the skinmay immediately produce a wheal. We can quite understand

that this condition would materially interfere with activework in the Yeomanry. We do not know the exact form ofthe certificates given, but in all cases where a medicalcertificate is intended to state that a person is unable to

perform his duties the certificate should be as explicit aspossible, so that the condition of the patient should be clearto any other medical man.

Medical Men and County Court Procedure.Some attention has been aroused on the county court

circuit presided over by Judge Mulligan, K. C., owing to theattitude adopted by his honour towards a form of procedurewhich was sanctioned by his predecessor, Judge Willis, andwhich, though not universal, obtains elsewhere as well.Judge Mulligan will not allow debt collectors to appear beforehim to prove the debts owing to their clients. This is amatter which affects medical men generally because theyare often obliged either to sue for fees or to lose them, whilethey have little time to appear as witnesses or to conducttheir own cases in court. More particularly it alsoaffects them because Judge Mulligan, in disposing ofcertain cases at a recent sitting held by him at March,Cambridgeshire, made special reference to those in whichmedical fees were sought to be recovered, to the effect that"professional gentlemen ought to know better than to

employ the clerk of a firm of accountants to represent themin a court of justice." These observations we regret;they were passed upon gentlemen who were not presentto explain their position, and who probably had never

regarded the question from the point of view suggested,but had merely adopted a practice which had beenrecognised and universally pursued before the recent

appointment of Mr. Mulligan, K.C., to his present post. Thepractice referred to appears to be as follows. In order toestablish a claim against a deftndant in a county court whenit is disputed a solicitor is, or may be, employed who inturn may brief a barrister, and witnesses are brought to thecourt who can prove the facts by going into the witness-boxand giving evidence. There are many debts, however, whichare not disputed by those who owe them but in order torecover which the judgment of the county-court judge isapplied for. Some of these debts may be very small,a matter of one, or two, or three pounds, a greatdeal less than the fee of the advocate and the costof the witnesses. When the sum recovered is so smalllittle or nothing is allowed for "costs." Even if the

plaintiff is his own advocate, and if his evidence is all thatis required, he loses time and has to undergo a gooddeal which is not agreeable. It has consequently beenfound of advantage to employ a debt collector who chargesa fee fixed in proportion to the amount recovered and whoproceeds in this way. He takes an assignment of the debtfrom the creditor and gives notice thereof to the debtor,thus enabling himself to sue as if he were the originalcreditor. He also approaches the debtor with a view ofobtaining payment and in doing so gets from himan admission that he owes the debt. Thus armed heinitiates county-court proceedings and goes to the courtto prove the debt by means of the admission or, as in thecase referred to above, sends one of his staff to representthe firm. In dealing with a large number of cases at Marchin which this course had been adopted Judge Mulligan didwhat he has done at other places on his circuit with aview to stopping a practice of which he disapproves.He carefully scrutinised the details of each case,insisted upon the proof that the necessary notices hadbeen given and that the documents were in order, and inthe case of those purporting to be assignments of the debtsin question he ruled that they were not properly stamped.By the end of the day he had struck out a large number ofclaims of this kind and in the course of some concludingobservations he used the words which have been quotedabove. His reference to medical men as professional menwho should have acted otherwise was no doubt not meritedbecause, as we have suggested, the practice which thelearned county-court judge seeks to do away with had beenlong recognised before he was raised to the county-courtbench and is, we believe, permitted to a greater or

less extent in other courts. It also has the merit ofsimplifying and of rendering inexpensive the recovery ofjust debts. His point, however, is worthy of considera-tion. He invited, though in undesirable terms, theattention of medical men to the position of lawyers,who have two earn their livings by their profession, and

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who, like medical men, feel it to be a hardship that personsnot qualified to practise a profession should do so, or

should do what is equivalent to it. The procedure which hasbeen described must to an appreciable extent interfere withthe emoluments of solicitors by introducing lay advocateswhere, strictly speaking, only solicitors or barristers areentitled to be heard on behalf of others, and, no doubt,abuses are possible under it. Medical men naturally andstrongly resent the practising of medicine by unqualifiedpersons, and reference to the columns of THE LANCETwill show the position maintained in it, for example, withregard to druggists who prescribe and to opticians who gobeyond the limits of their trade. In these circumstancesmedical men should sympathise and be in accord with thosemembers of the legal profession who desire to see their pro-fessional privileges protected, even though medical men mayform a small percentage of the mass of small creditors whoavail themselves of the services of the debt collector. Thedebt collector’s method as described must be, to some extentor in some instances, an evasion of the law, and, apartfrom questions of the stamping of documents, a doubt prob-ably remains in each case whether the assignment is agenuine one. What all would desire to see, however, is suchuniformity of practice in the courts as would render theapplication of the law certain and precise.

TAe Sale of Poisons.The firm which trades as Boots, Cash Chemists (Southern),

Limited, was summoned at the West London police courtrecently at the instance of the Pharmaceutical Society andfined .B5 with 23s. costs for selling strychnine withoutobserving the prescribed formalities. The circumstanceswere of a peculiar nature and the prosecution wasdue to the tragic sequel traceable indirectly to thedefendants’ conduct. A customer purchased, and wasallowed to take, without having his attention calledto the matter by the observance of any precautions,a bottle of Easton’s syrup in tabloid form. At a later datehis little son, aged 16 months, while playing got hold ofthe bottle, broke it, and swallowed about 17 of thetabloids, with the result that he died in half an hour.Various excuses were put forward on behalf of the defendantfirm, including the statement that it was a common practicein the trade to sell such tabloids without obtaining thecustomer’s signature in the book kept for the purpose, which,as was suggested by the prosecution, might have had someeffect in preventing him in the case in question from leavingthe bottle about. On behalf of the Pharmaceutical Societyit was denied that such laxity was customary. The

magistrate, in imposing the maximum penalty, expressedhis concurrence with the view that the observance of the

proper formalities was likely to impress upon a purchaser thedangerous nature of the article bought, and was of tht

opinion that the contravention of the Act was a grave oneThe case is one worthy of careful consideration by traderlof the class of the defendants.

Looking Back.FROM

THE LANCET, SATURDAY, Sept. 5th, 1829.

RUPTURE OF THE LIVER, AND OF THE EXTERNAL ILIAC

VEIN, WITH LACERATED WOUND OF THE THIGH.

Thomas Wight, a stout muscular man, rather below themiddle stature, was admitted into Jacob’s Ward,l betweenfour and five o’clock, on the afternoon of Wednesday, Augustthe 19th, with a deep lacerated wound of the right thigh.It was stated by the friends of the patient, that he hadaccidentally fallen from a scaffold, in Leadenhall Market,on which he was standing at the time, in the act ofpainting a sky-light, and in falling had come in contactwith one of the hooks in front of a butcher’s stall,which penetrated the back part of his thigh, and suspendedhim for nearly two minutes, when the hook broke, andhe fell to the ground; the distance from whence he fell tothe hook was said. to be ten feet, and from thence to theground six or seven more. At the time of his admission hewas exceedingly pale, and the pulse at the wrist was scarcelyperceptible; he appeared, however, perfectly sensible and

aware of his approaching dissolution, intimating hisconviction, that he should not long survive the accident.Having immediately been placed in bed, some brandy andrum (about half an ounce of each) were administered to him,which he appeared to have some difficulty in swallowing. Hedid not complain of any thing further than a pain across theepigastric region. He had not been long in bed when hebecame restless, turned several times from side to side, andalmost instantly expired.

Autopsy t7venty hours after death.’

The abdomen being first examined, there was found con-tained in its cavity a large quantity (probably about twoquarts) of dark-coloured blood, in a fluid state ; this beingremoved, on tracing the different large veins, the rightexternal iliac was found nearly torn through, about itsmiddle. There was a longitudinal rupture of the liver,situated on the right lobe, and extending in a line from theright extremity of the sulcus transversus to the margoobtusis ; and on examining the thorax, all the cavities of theheart were found to be quite empty. It may be proper toobserve, that there was no external mark of injury per-ceptible on the abdomen. On the thigh was a laceratedwound of the integuments, about four inches long, situatedat the upper and posterior part below, and extending to theinner side of the great trochanter. On continuing theexamination, it was found that the hook, having entered atthis part, had passed to the inner side of the great sciaticnerve, pierced the adductor magnus muscle, and on to thefore-part of the thigh to the inner side of the femoralvessels, not having penetrated the integument at the

fore-part.We have since visited the place, and find, from eye

witnesses of the accident, that the statement of the persons,who brought him to the hospital, was not perfectly correct.He was standing on a ladder, and leaning forward to reachhis pot, when the ladder turned over, and precipitated himon one of the hooks, (which are full a foot in length,) onwhich he remained suspended a considerable time, the by-standers being so shocked that they were incapable, at first,of rendering him any assistance ; but in one or two minutes hewas lifted off, (the hook not having broken, as asserted bythe friends,) and immediately taken to the hospital. Thedistance from the beam to the window measures about sixfeet, so that the poor fellow could not have been standingmore than two feet above the hook.

1 St. Thomas’s Hospital.

VITAL STATISTICS.

HEALTH OF ENGLISH TOWNS.

IN 76 of the largest English towns 8444 births and 3542deaths were registered during the week ending August 24th.The annual rate of mortality, which had been equal to 11 8per 1000 in each of the two preceding weeks, declinedin the week under notice to 11-5 per 1000. During the firsteight weeks of the current quarter the death-rate has aver-aged 12 - 0 per 1000, the rate in London during the sameperiod being 11’9. The lowest death-rates in the 76 townsduring the week were 5° 2 in Willesden, 5 4 in East Ham, 5’ 6in Leyton. and 5 - 7 in Southampton ; the highest rates were15 6 in Warrington and in South Shields, 15’ 8 in Oldham,16 6 in Burton-on-Trent, 18 8 in Wallasey, and 21 - 7 in GreatYarmouth. The 3542 deaths in the 76 towns during the weekmentioned showed a decline of 83 from the number in thepreceding week, and included 433 which were referred to theprincipal epidemic diseases, against 362, 378, and 407 in thethree preceding weeks ; of these, 166 resulted from diarrhoea,99 from whooping-cough, 84 from measles, 37 from diph-theria, 30 from scarlet fever, and 17 from "fever" (prin-cipally enteric), but not any from small-pox. No deathfrom any of these epidemic diseases was registered duringthe week in Blackburn, Brighton, Southampton, Hornsey,Reading, Newport (Mon.), Bournemouth, West Bromwich, orBarrow-in-Furness ; the annual death-rates from thesediseases, however, ranged upwards to 3’0 0 in Great Yar-mouth, 3 - 2 in Handsworth (Staffs), 3 3 in Sheffield, 3 - 8 8in Aston Manor, 3’ 9 in Bootle, and 6’ 1 in Cardiff. Thefatal cases of diarrhoea, which had increased from 39 to130 in the six preceding weeks, further rose to 166 in theweek under notice ; the mortality from this cause ranged