a. Substitute the words "idiots or cretins" by "idiots and cretins."

b. Place at the head of every document a short description of the method of enumeration followed.

c. Preserve the terms of the programme concerning the number, sex, and age of the individuals, as well as the profession and the degree of comfort of the parents; only, to add the race and nationality of the parents.

d. Preserve the paragraph relating to the congenital origin of the infirmity. e. Complete the paragraph "Topographical Situation" with the following words: denote the altitude and aspect of the places enumerated, the configuration and geological nature of the soil; indicate the chemical composition and the temperature of the drinkable waters.

f. Indicate the absolute number, and the proportional number to population, of idiots and cretins-1st, in towns; 2nd, in country.

g. For the chief centres of endemicity, indicate both the number of individuals and the total of the population.

h. Indicate the civil state of the infirm, and the number of marriages between cretins.

As to the interrogation of the individuals admitted into special establishments, the Section adopts the programme with the following additions:

1. Indicate of the treatment directed against the infirmity itself.

2. Indicate the principal particular complications-epilepsy, deaf-dumbness, scrofula, goître.

3. Indicate the principal diseases for which idiots and cretins have been admitted state, if there be occasion, the pathological immunities. 4. Indicate if the idiots and cretins are born of

A father idiotical or cretin;

A mother idiotical or cretin;

Father and mother idiotical or cretin;

Parents affected with mental alienation proper.

Such is, Gentlemen, the programme which, in the name of your First Section, we have the honour to submit for the approval of the Congress.

THE DISTRICT HOSPITALS FOR THE INSANE IN IRELAND.

SUPERANNUATIONS.

In our last number we called particular attention to "No. 2 Bill," then before Parliament, "to explain and amend the Acts relating to Lunatic Asylums in Ireland."

That Bill, we have now to state, was withdrawn by Government, owing to the manner in which it had been mutilated in its original fair proportions after passing through Committee in the House of Commons. For several reasons we do not lament this result. One is, that we decidedly objected to the clause it contained of interfering so seriously with the existing admirable management of the Irish Asylums, by endeavouring to have introduced into them an element of discord by mixing together pay and pauper patients—a change which, we take for granted, could never have received the sanction or approval of the able and thoroughly practical Resident Physicians of those establishments, or of the Government Inspectors, Doctors White and Nugent. A plan of procedure more clumsy or utterly destructive to all harmony of action could not have been conceived, or one worse calculated to be a relief to the parties for whom it was intended to serve-viz., patients neither paupers nor in independent circumstances. At another time we may more fully go into this point, contenting ourselves for the present in again simply protesting against what

was proposed to Parliament in this respect. A second reason we have for rejoicing rather at "No. 2" Bill sharing the fate of the "Innocents," is that the amendments it sustained in committee were of too sweeping a nature, so far as placing the entire appointment of officials in the hands of the Local Boards of Governors, which would not have been a step in the right direction in the sister country, but exactly the reverse. The principal executive appointments in them, we have no hesitation in saying, ought to be vested solely in Government, as they are at present; otherwise the Irish Asylums would soon degenerate from the high position they have so creditably and justly reached, and ultimately become mere offshoots of the Union Workhouses. With regard to the vexed question of Chaplains, we are clearly of opinion that their appointment in Ireland should not be compulsory, as was, and evidently still is, aimed at by certain parties, but simply permissive; and that the Local Boards themselves, being for many reasons the best judges of the necessity or otherwise of such functionaries, should be the authority to take the initiative in their appointment. Another cause we have for not weeping excessively at the fate of "No. 2 Bill" is, that its superannuation clause did not, in our mind, go far enough, inasmuch as it gave no claim to a pension, such being made to hinge upon, firstly, the recommendation of the Inspectors; and secondly, it being a sine qua non that the party seeking such should be proved to be the subject of mental or bodily infirmity. Under a certain term of years, we think such a restriction as the latter would be only reasonable-indeed, indispensable. But in the case of those who had faithfully and efficiently served twenty years in the anxious and unspeakably arduous duties of unbroken attendance in the care and management of a public asylumn-duties which will surely be admitted to be of a most harassing and trying nature-we hesitate not to say that they are pre-eminently entitled to claim as a right the enjoyment of their full salary thus fairly and hardly won; for we maintain, without fear of contradiction, that twenty years of unremitting labour in the daily-and nightly, too-anxieties of a lunatic asylum, are fully equal to double that number in any other department of the public service, and should be requited accordingly; the wear and tear of mind and body the individual so circumstanced has sustained, most righteously deserving this small reward for all that he has undergone during that period of time in the discharge of duties impossible to overestimate in their importance to society at large. We accordingly objected to this clause in "Bill No. 2" in our last number, seeing that it was so scant and illiberal in letter and spirit, and therefore were pleased that the Bill fell to the ground, in the full expectation that a better, to say nothing of a worse one, would be forthcoming in the next meeting of Parliament. But, sooner than we anticipated, the pensioning of the Irish Asylum Officials was again specially taken up, just before the late Session concluded, by a private member of the House; Sir Robert Ferguson, of the city of Derry, bringing in a Bill for that worthy object alone, the same proving to be totidem verbis the precise clause as contained in the defunct "Bill No. 2" of Government. This new Bill passed the several stages of a first and second reading, and through committee, without any amendment or objection of any kind—as it did, it should be specially observed, in its original Governmental shape, as one of the clauses in "No. 2;" but on its third reading, Sir Robert Ferguson moved certain amendments, which were passed as a matter of course, and which were supposed to be merely formal, there being no debate, explanation, or remark made on them in the House, either by him or any other member, to say nothing of sufficient notice being given to parties most interested. In fact, the whole affair was quite a surprise. This Bill, however, in its new phase as an Act (19 & 20 Vic., c. 99), proved a most miserable and discreditable affair. Instead of containing the grain of wheat in the bushel of chaff which it merely did originally, it was plundered even of that simple grain, those amendments referred to of Sir Robert's placing the conferring

of pensions under the regulations of the Civil Service Pension Act (4 & 5 Wm. IV.), which, for seventeen years' service, handsomely allows a party to crare, as a matter of grace and favour, three-twelfths of the paltry and inadequate salary he might have enjoyed, and so on up to fifty years' service, when the maximum of eight-twelfths is all that would be granted; and not even then, unless the party had plaintively repeated "pity the sorrows of a poor old man,' by proving himself to be infirm in mind or body (both of which he could do beyond fail, only that long before he would have paid the last debt of nature), and to have "discharged the duties of his situation with diligence and fidelity" all that time! We cannot trust ourselves now to express our opinion of the conduct pursued by Sir Robert Ferguson in relation to the above short and simple statement of facts. By the courtesy of Parliament, he has the title of "honourable;" nor do we mean to hint that he is not entitled to such a style of address, or that anything not perfectly honourable and straightforward was intended in the above proceedings in the "Honourable House," in which he was the facile princeps on this occasion; but this we will say, that the whole proceeding bears a very extraordinary aspect, and loudly calls both for explanation, and a repeal of an Act passed under such remarkable circumstances, and which is neither more nor less than a sham. And further, as we have seen elsewhere pertinently stated on this subject, we may observe, that "if either individual members assumed to be independent, or the Legislature at large, are desirous to maintain a character for plain dealing, they should beware above all things of enactments so smuggled through Parliament as to compel those more immediately affected to feel almost (altogether?) as if they were simply swindled."

Part Third.
Reviews.

Nomos: an Attempt to demonstrate a Central Physical Law in Nature. (Anonymous.) London: Longman and Co. 1856.

THIS is a very remarkable and clever book, equal in interest, but very different in its principles and objects, to the celebrated "Vestiges of the Creation." The author's speculations in the world of physical science will undoubtedly excite much attention among reading and philosophic men. He is undoubtedly an original thinker, and writes with great vigour and clearness. We are much mistaken if this volume has not a very large circulation. The author's object is to establish that the world of inorganic nature is ruled by one physical law, and not by several physical laws. He endeavours to demonstrate that the phenomena of electricity, magnetism, light, heat, chemical action and motion, are not to be understood unless they are regarded as signs of one and the same action, in ordinary matter. It is impossible, however, to give any accurate idea of the writer's views without going more into detail. The whole of the work must be read in order to be fully understood. Obscure Nervous Diseases popularly explained, in Six Letters to a Physician on the many Nervous Affections resulting from Dental Irritation and other sources of Reflex Nervous Disturbance. By J. L. LEVISON. Dedicated, by permission, to Dr. Conolly. London: Effingham Wilson, Royal Exchange. 1856.

WHEN any attempt is made to render our knowledge of the nervous system more satisfactory, or to explain the morbific causes of some of the anomalous

forms of nervous diseases which particularly affect civilized man, the person who thus enlightens us is entitled to our best thanks. The latter Mr. Levison has done. The work before us is worthy the attention of medical men, although it is written in a clear and popular style, and nearly divested of all technical phraseology; and yet its physiology and doctrine of diseased conditions are strictly scientific.

Mr. Levison practised many years as a surgeon-dentist, and applied himself with great ardour and zeal to the elucidation of the nervous affections, more or less complicated, which were induced by dental irritation, and also others resulting from disturbing influences of another kind: and he has brought some addition to the existing knowledge by tracing the tissues directly or indirectly implicated, demonstrating in the clearest manner that dead stumps, polypi at the fangs, &c., may affect the brain, nervous systems, the heart, lungs, stomach, &c.; and cites cases where extensive disturbance of these organs has occurred, when there did not appear any pain or uneasy sensation in the mouth -the actual seat of the primary disturbance-and yet, after years of suffering, the nervous affection had been mitigated or cured by the removal of the offending and irritating bodies.

We must, from want of space, just glance at the contents of these letters. The first letter enters into an examination as to what constitutes a normal man, and that barbaric races give undue attention to physical training, and civilized man too little; thus, by over mental stimulation, so much injury results.

The second letter deprecates the discrepant and contradictory treatments of some forms of neuralgia; and he then unfolds his views as to how to form a correct diagnosis in such anomalous diseases.

The third letter explains the sympathy of the stomach, alimentary canal, &c., with the buccal cavity.

The fourth letter clearly explains the nervous connexion of the teeth (through the fifth pair of nerves) with the eyes, ears, nostrils, glands, fances, &c., and importance of this knowledge in removing much of human suffering.

The fifth letter is highly important: it treats of dental irritation inducing affections of the muscles of the face, neck, &c., and often paralysis and catalepsy. In this communication Mr. Levison has also discussed what he calls simulated affections, resembling hysteria, epilepsy, hemicrania, and temporary insanity, and clearly points out how to distinguish the pseudo from the ordinary forms of such affections.

The sixth letter contains also much valuable information on sedentary habits, over-anxiety, too much mental application, &c. &c.

Mr: Levison has, to use a legal term, made out a case, and has established an important fact, that it is impossible to arrive at a knowledge of the cause of many anomalous forms of nervous diseases without taking the organs of the mouth into consideration; and we strongly recommend a perusal of this small but unostentatious work.

646

Part Fourth.

Judicial Department.

ANNUAL MEETING OF THE ASSOCIATION OF MEDICAL OFFICERS OF ASYLUMS AND HOSPITALS FOR THE INSANE. THE stated Annual Meeting of the above Society was held on the 1st August, in the Derby County Asylum, at Mickleover, presided over by Dr. Hitchman, the Physician Superintendent of that establishment. The attendance on the occasion was very large and influential: amongst those present were Dr. Campbell, Essex Asylum; Dr. Thurnam, Wilts Asylum (who, however, was obliged to leave before the regular business commenced); Dr. Forbes Winslow, London; Dr. Robert Stewart, Resident Physician, Belfast District Asylum; Dr. Sherlock, Resident Physician of the Worcester County Asylum; Dr. Tuke, Chiswick; Dr. Caleb Williams, York; Mr. Walsh, Surgeon Superintendent, Lincoln Asylum; Mr. Cornwall, Fairford Retreat, Gloucestershire; Dr. Dickson, Resident Physician, Manchester Royal Asylum at Cheadle; Mr. Buck, Medical Superintendent, Leicestershire Asylum; Dr. Mackintosh, Dinsdale Park, Darlington; Dr. McCreipt, Assistant Resident Physician, Somersetshire Asylum at Wells; Mr. Ley, Medical Superintendent, Oxfordshire and Berkshire Asylum; Dr. Lockhart Robertson, London; Mr. Brushfield, Medical Superintendent, Chester County Hospital for the Insane; Dr. Davey, Northwood; Dr. Prichard, Abington Abbey; Dr. Hewson, Physician Superintendent, Coton Hill Institution for the Insane, Stafford; Dr. Buckmill, Physician Superintendent of the County Devon Asylum at Exminster; Dr. Boisragon, Physician Superintendent of the County Cornwall Asylum; Mr. Isles, Cirencester; Dr. Seaton, Sudbury; Dr. Warwick, Salisbury; Dr. Paul, Camberwell House; Mr. Eddison, Nottingham; Mr. Millar, Stone; and Mr. Stilwell, jun., Mickleover.

Several letters of apology for non-attendance were read by the President, and amongst them from Dr. Conolly, of Lawn House, Hanwell; Dr. Kirkman, Suffolk; Dr. Flynn, Clonmel, Ireland; Dr. Williams, Gloucester, &c. &c. Much sympathy was felt, in consequence of the melancholy fatal accident which happened recently to Dr. Williams, the Visiting Physician of the Nottingham County Asylum, who was to have been present, but for his sudden and lamented removal.

The minutes of the last annual meeting held in London were read and confirmed.

Dr. CAMPBELL read the Auditors' Report, which stated that the accounts of the Treasurer had been audited and found correct, with a balance to the credit of the Association.

Mr. LEY entered into a lengthened statement of the past and present condition of the Association as to membership, by which it appeared, that during the past year one hundred members had paid their subscriptions, and that several more would still, it was likely, do so. The Association, he observed, was in a very solvent and flourishing state, financially and influentially, and had every prospect of being increasingly so.

Dr. L. ROBERTSON read a list of new members, thirteen in number, now proposed to be balloted for; also of the following four honorary members, viz., Sir Benjamin Brodie, Bart., Dr. Holland, Mr. Wilkes (late Medical Superintendent of the Staffordshire Hospital for the Insane, now one of Her Majesty's Commissioners in Lunacy), and Dr. Peach (one of the Visiting Magistrates of the Derby County Hospital for the Insane).