DRUGGING AT PUBERTY.

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cise, ventilation, bathing, &c., would, in almost all cases, remove them in a short time.

But, instead of this, the doctor is called upon, and emmenagogues, or "forcing medicines," are resorted to. The patient is sorely and sadly damaged with the preparations of iron, mercury, iodine, antimony, and opium, or other narcotics, when a warm bath or a fomentation, with rest and quiet for a day or two, were all that nature required. And here is the origin of many distressing chronic diseases of the reproductive organs, which often render the patient infirm and miserable for life. The extensive and increasing prevalence of uterine diseases and displacements is attributable to the drugs administered for the trivial ailments which attend the early stages of the menstrual effort, more than to all other causes combined, with the exception of fashionable dress. I have had scores of bedridden women to treat, whose long years of chronic disease, uterine inflammation and ulceration, prolapsus and other displacements, utter helplessness and dreary future, were all and wholly owing to a few weeks' drugging at fifteen or sixteen years

of age.

I have never found any difficulty in speedily overcoming all the disorders of incipient menstruation by means of hygienic appliances, when all drugs were kept out of the way.

SCIENTIFIC DRUGGERY,

People are little aware of the horrible mischief which is produced by the ordinary scientific treatment of the diseases of woman. A brief glance at the authorities may shed more light on the terrible delusion which prevails here than a long argument; all can understand facts, though few may appreciate logic. Let us see precisely what are the remedies which are recommended by the standard authors, and approved by the text-books of medical schools.

One of the late standard authorities is "The Disease of Females, by Fleetwood Churchill, M. D., F. R. S.," and it reflects very fully and very fairly the prevailing practice of the profession.

It should be remarked that all of the maladies under consideration are conditions of weakness and obstruction-so recognized by all authors. By whatever name the disorder may be known in the nosological arrangement, or by whatever cause it may have been produced, its essential elements are obstruction, or debility, or both. Well, then, what shall the medical man do to remove obstructions and invigorate the functions? Churchill recommends for

Amenorrhoea.-Bleeding, leeches, cupping, blisters, aloes, assafetida, wine, iodine, ergot, carbonate of iron, copperas, metallic iron, madder, strychnine, cantharides, turpentine, savin, aconite.

SCIENTIFIC DRUGGERY.

35

Vicarious Menstruation.-Leeches, cupping, blisters, muriatic acid, aqua fortis, oil of vitriol, aloes, iron, opium, sugar of lead.

Dysmenorrhea.-Bleeding, leeches, cupping, blisters, caustics, opium, scarifications, morphine, henbane, poison hemlock, camphor, Indian hemp, acetate of ammonia, ergot, alcohol, preparations of iron, zinc, tincture of Spanish flies, borax, hellebore, senega, snake root, salts, mercury, iodine, tartar emetic.

Menorrhagia. Bleeding, leeches, cupping, opium, sugar of lead, ergot, Indian hemp, ipecac, blue pill, elixir vitriol, sulphuric acid, nitric acid, hydrochloric acid, iron, copperas, logwood, drastic purgatives, gallic acid, oxide of silver, nettle juice, turpentine.

Cessation of Menstruation.-Leeches, blisters, issues, setons, purgatives, hydrochlorate of ammonia.

Chlorosis. Blisters, mercurial inunction, rhubarb, aloetic purgatives, ammonia, metallic iron, copperas, iodide of iron, chalybeate spring water, tannate of iron, citrate of iron, lactate of iron, proto-muriate of iron, hydrochlorate of iron, blue pill, henbane, mineral tonics generally, vegetable tonics generally, glauber salts.

Leucorrhoea.-Leeches, cupping, blisters, balsam, copaiba, copperas, muriate of iron, ergot, logwood, cubebs, colchicum, crab's eyes, Spanish flies, conium, iodine, opium, henbane, lunar caustic.

Irritable Uterus.-Leeches, cupping, blisters, scarifications, henbane, deadly nightshade, camphor, assafetida, mercury, arsenic.

All of these prescriptions amount to nothing more nor less than an indiscriminate routine of the most deadly drugs and destructives to be found in the materia medica. But the great question back of all this is, Do these things cure? We have the testimony at hand which settles this question in the negative.

SCANZONI vs. CHURCHILL.

There has recently been issued from the press an elaborate work-a work of nearly seven hundred pages, on "The Diseases of the Sexual Organs of Woman," by F. W. Von Scanzoni, Professor of Midwifery and Diseases of Females in the University of Wurzburg, Counselor to His Majesty the King of Bavaria, Chevalier of many Orders, translated from the French of Drs. H. Dorr and A. Socin, and annoted with the approval of the author, by Augustus R. Gardner, A. M., M. D., Professor of Clinical Midwifery and the Diseases of Woman, in the New York Medical College, author of "The Causes and Curative Treatment of Sterility;" editor of "Tyler Smith's Lectures on Obstetrics;" etc.

The work of Dr. Scanzoni is the largest and the latest European work which the medical profession has given to the world on the diseases

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of woman; and the imposing parade of authorship ought to satisfy the most incredulous that the statements of the author are entitled to respectful consideration.

Well, what does the learned professor, who has had so large an experience in the treatment of the diseases we have named, say of the ordinary remedies? I extract his testimony in relation to a single one of these ailments, Hysteralgia. It is in the following words :

"We have almost exhausted all the series of medicaments recommended in the books of modern authors; narcotics in large doses; powerful purgatives, iron, mercurials, quinine, arsenic, and many other means we have tried without the least result. Topical applications have been no more useful. We have omitted neither deep scarifications of the mouth of the womb, so much recommended, nor the applications of leeches, nor the dilatation of the cervical canal, by means of sounds and prepared sponge; the introduction of narcotic agents or pieces of ice into the vagina; lavements of the tincture of opium and the extract of belladonna, etc., etc., but all without relief. Only once we produced some relief to a patient by the local application of the fumes of chloroform; but this good effect was not of long duration."

Could any commentary add force to this stinging condemnation of the popular practice?