by the profession; but this use is now restricted, and the
administration made with great caution. Prof. A.L. Loomis, of New York
City, has published several lectures on the pathology and treatment of
typhoid fever. Referring thereto, Dr. Hunt says: "No one in our country
can speak more authoritatively, and as he has no radical views as to the
exclusion of alcohol, it is worth while to notice the place to which he
assigns it. In the milder cases he entirely excludes it. As a means of
reducing temperature, he does not mention it, but relies on cold,
quinine, and sometimes, digitalis and quinine." When, about the third
week, signs of failure of heart-power begin to manifest themselves, and
the use of some form of stimulant seems to be indicated, Dr. Loomis
gives the most guarded advice as to their employment. "Never," he says,
"give a patient stimulants simply because he has typhoid fever." And
again, "Where there is reasonable doubt as to the propriety of giving or
withholding stimulants, it is safer to withhold them." He then insists
that, if stimulants are administered, the patient should be visited
every two hours to watch their effects.

It will thus be seen how guarded has now become the use of alcohol as a
cardiac stimulant in typhoid fevers, where it was once employed with an
almost reckless freedom. Many practitioners have come to exclude it
altogether, and to rely wholly on ammonia, ether and foods.

In Cameron's "Hygiene" is this sentence: "In candor, it must be admitted
that many eminent physicians deny the efficacy of alcohol in the
treatment of any kind of disease, _and some assert that it is worse
than useless_."

ACCUMULATIVE TESTIMONY.

Dr. Arnold Lees, F.L.S., in a recent paper on the "Use and Action of
Alcohol in Disease," assumes "_that the old use of alcohol was not
science, but a grave blunder_." Prof. C.A. Parks says: "It is impossible
not to feel that, so far, the progress of physiological inquiry renders
the use of alcohol (in medicine) more and more doubtful." Dr. Anstie
says: "If alcohol is to be administered at all for the _relief_ of
neuralgia, it should be given with as much precision, as to dose, as we
should use in giving an acknowledged _deadly poison_." Dr. F.T. Roberts,
an eminent English physician, in advocating a guarded use of alcohol in
typhoid fever, says: "Alcoholic stimulants are, by no means, always
required, and their indiscriminate use may do a great deal of harm." In
Asi