asy striking distance in the tissues about
them, to make it successful. Not less than sixty-five to seventy-five
per cent of all cancers in women occur in atrophying organs, the uterus
and mammary glands.

A rather alluring suggestion was made by Cohnheim, years ago, that
cancers might be due to the sudden resumption of growth on the part of
islands or _rests_ of embryonic tissue, left scattered about in various
parts of the body. But these are now believed to play but a small part,
if indeed any, in the production of true cancer.

Finally, what can be done to prevent or cure this grotesque yet deadly
process? So far as it is conditioned by age, it is, of course, obvious
that little can be done, for not even the most radical vivisector would
propose preventing in any way as large a proportion as possible of the
human race from reaching fifty or sixty, or even seventy years, to avoid
the barely six per cent liability to cancer after forty-five.

As regards the influence of chronic inflammations and irritation, much
can be done, and here is our most hopeful field for prevention. Warts
and birthmarks that are in any way subject to pressure or friction from
clothing or movements should be promptly removed, as both show a
distinctly greater tendency than normal tissue to develop into cancer.
Cracks, fissures, chafes, and ulcers of all sorts, especially about the
lips, tongue, mammary gland, uterus, and rectum, should be early and
aseptically dealt with. Jagged remnants of teeth should be removed, all
suppurative processes of the gums antiseptically treated, and the whole
mouth-parts kept in a thoroughly aseptic condition.

Thorough and conscientious attention to this sort of surgical toilet
work is valuable, not only for its preventive effect,--which is
considerable,--but also because it will insure the bringing under
competent observation at the earliest possible moment the beginnings of
true cancer.

For the disease itself, after it has once started, there is, like
treason in the body-politic, but one remedy--capital punishment.
Parleying with the rebels is worse than useless. Pastes, caustics,
X-rays, trypsin, radium,--all are fatally defective, because they
suppress a symptom only and leave the cause untouched. Only in one form
of surface-cancer, the so-called flat-celled or rodent ulcer, which has
little or no tendency to form spore-cells and attack the deeper organs,
are they effective.

Nothing is easier and no