1099 not hitherto taken much notice of the matter. This is was the patient released from quarantine than another the more regrettable as the German practitioners in Italy case was reported. This patient has since died. The are scarcely inferior in number to the English and American. real nature of the case was beyond dispute, most careful There are German medical men in nearly every one of the investigations by the expert bacteriologists of the Board- larger towns, from Venice and Milan in the north to Palermo of Health having proved that it was unquestionably one in Sicily, and in the health resorts of the Riviera there is of true bubonic plague. The victim was a sailmaker almost a superabundance of them. San Remo, for instance, living near the wharves and the infection is attributed has not less than nine medical consultants of German to rats. Three cases have since developed in persons nationality, not to speak of those who come from other having business relation in Sussex-street, where the first countries where German is spoken, such as Austria and case occurred. One of the patients, an employe of Switzerland, and in Rome their number is still greater. a steamship company, has died. All the people, to the It is therefore very desirable that favourable consideration number of 48, residing in the premises occupied by should be shown to a number of professional brethren, the infected persons have been placed in quarantine, some of them in the fulness of years, and naturally and the houses have been isolated and disinfected. The unwilling to present themselves before an examining com- authorities have issued circulars to householders with mission which would certainly do everything to prevent them regard to the prevention of the plague, especially from passing. advising the extermination of rats and personal and house- The Warwar in South Africa. hold cleanliness. The other Australian colonies are The German medical attaches. Dr. Schmidt and Dr. subjecting all passengers from Sydney to rigid medical Krummacher, who were mentioned in my last letter as examination and are inaugurating a crusade agairst rats, having returned home from the war in South Africa, have and attempts are made to prevent rats escaping to land from been speaking at a meeting of the Vaterlandischer Frauen- vessels arriving from Sydney. The Board of Health in Mel- Verein (the ladies’ branch of the Red Cross Society). I was bourne is prepared to inoculate persons who desire it with present at the meeting, which was attended by a great Haffkine’s prophylactic serum of which a full supply has number of members and medical men, especially army been obtained. In Sydney the Government bacteriologist, medical officers. Princess Hohenlohe, daughter of the Chan- Dr. F. Tidswell, applied for permission from the Government cellor, was in the chair. Both gentlemen spoke in very eulo- to import the bacilli of bubonic plague, cholera, and glanders gistic terms of the British officers and soldiers generally and and to propagate them and manufacture prophylactic serums, of the Royal Army Medical Corps specially. They said that and after some consideration the application was granted. they were treated with great courtesy by the British The supposed plague patient quarantined at Adelaide is now authorities, civil and military. On their arrival at Cape officially reported to have been suffering from typhoid fever Town they were received at once by Sir Alfred Milner and with enlarged glands. It will be remembered that the pro-’ had luncheon. They were then sent to the Modder River, fession in Adelaide from the first doubted the diagnosis where they were attached to an ambulance of Lord of plague and that the local branch of the British Medical, Methuen’s division. On their arrival at the camp cheers Association asked for an independent inquiry. were the given for German Emperor and complete cordiality Adelaide between the British and the German officers Hospital. prevailed during The feud between the Government and the their stay with the British forces. Dr. Schmidt was long-standing over the seems astonished to see the soldiers into action in medical professional Adelaide Hospital likely going high to be settled at last. have been in for spirits and in as good humour as if they were on their way Negotiations progress some time between a sub-committee of the Board of to a wedding. At the battle of Magersfontein, of which past of the and a sub-committee of the he was a spectator, the soldiers attacked the Boer lines with Management hospital the greatest heroism. The members of the Royal Army council of the Adelaide University with the object of arriving Medical Corps exposed themselves to the shower of shell, at some settlement of the despute. As a result of conferences it was decided to recommend and so that several were wounded or killed. Dr. Schmidt saw to the board council the of the resolution :- about 250 wounded soldiers and helped the British sur- respectively adoption following geons in their work. He was much surprised to find On the nomination of the University the following offices be filled on that the British wounded could endure intense the staff of the Adelaide Hospital: Two physicians, two surgeons, one pain one ophthalmologist, two assistant physicians, two Their was won- gynecologist, without complaining. self-control really assistant surgeons, one of the four assistant officers being appointed derful. After the unfortunate issue of the battle joint pathologist. there vras some depression, but no trace of the Further, every member of the senior staff, present or future, at the Adelaide shall be a clinical teacher, and his name shall demoralisation which some continental had Hospital styled newspapers appear in the University Calendar as such. reported. There was no animosity against Lord Methuen The recommendation has now been both the who when he rode through the camp was greeted with the adopted by University council and the hospital board, and the way is same enthusiasm as before. Dr. Schmidt then described the impressive spectacle of the burial of General Wauchope, the now open for the re-admission to the staff of the profession, commander of the and the words the resumption of clinical teaching, and the restoration of Highland Brigade, spoken Adelaide Medical School to its former by Lord Methuen on this occasion. Dr. Krummacher, the position. other attaché, described the details of the British medical Prince Alfred Hosgrital, Sydney. service, the field hospitals, and the great military hospitals The annual report of the Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney, at Wynberg, near Cape Town. The system of organisation read at the seventeenth annual meeting of the governors and very much resembled that of Germany. The mark subscribers, showed that despite all the efforts of the "made in Germany" was often to, be seen on the directors to reduce expenditure, the deficit had increased surgical dressings and, as the British officers jocularly during 1899 by £1149, and now stood at .f.2102. The income observed, even the Boer shells were "made in Germany." for the year was .f.15,704, of which the Government contri- Dr. Krummacher then drew attention to the army nurses, an buted £9536. The number of patients under treatment institution unknown in an Germany, where organised corps during the year was 3517. Of these 1854 were cured, 743 of nurses belonging to the army does not exist, the nurses were relieved, 361 were unrelieved, 340 died, and 219 remained being supplied in time of war by the religious communities in the hospital on Dec. 31st last. The number of beds in the and the Red Cross Association. had by When the attaches hospital was 236, the average number resident daily was 221 ;; finished their of the inspection medical arrangements at the the mean residence of patients in days was 26, the average base desired to return to they again the scene of war, but rate of mortality per cent. (deducting the 50 deaths which Lord Roberts and Lord Kitchener meanwhile taken having occurred in patients within 24 hours of admission) was 8 24; the command were not they allowed to do so and therefore the rate of mortality per cent. over total cases under treat- returned home. ment was 9 66, the number of attendances in out-patients and April 9th. ______casualty departments was 43,789 ; and the number of indivi- dual patients in these departments was approximately 11.000. AUSTRALIA. The number of typhoid fever cases admitted was 146, as against 150 during the previous year. The mortality was (FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.) 8 97 per cent. A tabulated illustration, showing the growth of the operative work of the hospital since its opening in The Bubonic Plague. 1883 was given in the report. In the year 1883 the number THE bubonic plague still continues in Sydney and is of operations performed was 147, or 13’75 per cent. of the causing the health authorities much anxiety. The first case number of admissions. Last year the number of operations discovered proved to be mild and recovered, but no sooner was 1634, or 49’3 per cent. of the number of admissions. 1100

The work of the operative department bad during the year appointment of Maclagan. During Maclagan’s long tenure been greatly facilitated by the opening of a new operating of the chair of Medical Jurispruaence he was the adviser theatre, in order to secure which, without immediate con- of the Crown in many cases of the highest importance struction of new premises, the clinical lecture theatre had and as a witness his evidence was always marked by its been sacrificed. The provision of an alternative operating- extreme clearness and fairness. One of the most terrible room could, in the directors’ opinion, be no longer delayed, cases in which he was concerned-the Prichard case- and they were reluctantly obliged to take the only means at occurred shortly after he was elected to the chair of Juris- their disposal for the provision of the needed accommoda- prudence. In this atrocious case a medical man murdered tion by transforming the lecture theatre into a second his wife and mother-in-law with different solutions of operating theatre. antimony and aconite, and Maclagan’s report upon the organs of the deceased was of the first assistance in putting the rope round a cruel murderer’s neck. From this time forward he was considered a leading British authority in Obituary. toxicology, and every case in Scotland which required for its elucidation the employment of high chemical attainments combined with Experience and great common sense was sure SIR ANDREW DOUGLAS MACLAGAN, M.D., to be placed in his hands. Although be became as a conse- LL.D.EDIN., LL.D. GLASG., F,RC.P., quence more widely known as a chemist than as a sanitarian, F.R.C.S., F.R.S. EDIN., Maclagan carried out the duties implied by his professorship EMERITUS PROFESSOR OF JURISPRUDENCE AND PUBLIC HEALTH IN THE of Public Health every whit as conscientiously. He was an, UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. excellent teacher of his subject and a progressive authority, By the death of Sir Andrew Douglas Maclagan, which and on resigning the active duties of his chair in 1896 he occurred at his residence in Heriot-row, Edinburgh, on received the special thanks of the University for the great. Thursday, April 5th, the medical profession of the United stimulus which he had given to the teaching of hygiene in the University. His lectures on this has lost one of its best known and most dis- subject. Kingdom were full and lucid, and seme 16 years ago he- tinguished representatives. opened a hygienic laboratory, now under the care Andrew Douglas Maclagan was born in Ayr in April, 1812, of Dr. Hunter Stewart, which gave to the Edinburgh and had therefore reached the ripe age of 83 years at the student those practical facilities for learning the technique time of his death. He was born of medical stock. His of public health work which are now essential to the educa- father, Dr. David Maclagan, surgeon-in-ordinary to the tion of all aspiring to hold public appointments. We have Queen in Scotland and Physician to the Forces, who served said enough to show that during Sir Douglas Maclagan’s long with distinction in the Peninsular War, was President both tenure of the chair of Medical Jurisprudence and Public of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh Health in Edinburgh University, which extended over and of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, 34 years, he fulfilled the double duties of his office in an. and it is a singular thing that the father’s extraordinary dis- admirable manner. tinction of having filled the double presidency has only once His position in the two great medical corporations of been repeated, and then it was repeated by the son whose his city was no less honourable. As has been pointed out. death has just occurred. Douglas Maclagan was the eldest he shared with his fatter, and with him alone, the. of seven sons, one of the younger ones being the present distinction of being elected to the Presidency of both the Archbishop of York, and adds one more to the long list of Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and the Royal. distinguished men who have been educated at the Edinburgh College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. He was President of High School and the Edinburgh University. When the Royal College of Physicians in 1864 and 20 years. 19 years of age he obtained his diploma as a Licentiate later, in 1884, of the Royal College of Surgeons. He of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and also served a term as President of the Royal Society of shortly afterwards graduated in Medicine at the Uni- Edinburgh, to which body he was elected when quite a young. versity. He then followed a practice adopted by many man. He received the honour of Knighthood for his public- young men at that day who were determined to services in 1886. But Sir Douglas Maclagan was not only use their opportunities for the best, and made a tour of a highly honoured physician and surgeon and a great, certain continental medical schools. 60 or 70 years ago medical jurist: he was a fine writer and a good musician, there was not the same interchange of scientific knowledge a poet, and a sportsman, so that it can readily be under- and thought that now prevails under the influences of ready stood that a man with such wide interests, show- and cheap methods of travelling and a voluminous medical ing himself so excellent in such varied walks of life, press, and a continental tour was the object of the hopes of should have a large number of friends and admirers. And those fortunate students whose careers gave sufficient promise this was the case. In all his public capacities he was highly of excellence to obtain for them the necessary funds from appreciated and in private life his qualities and attainments. their parents or guardians. Young Maclagan was ambitions won him a lasting place in the regard of all sorts and con- and had shown tnat he was bound to make his mark. He ditions of personal friends. His verser, which were first pursued his studies in Berlin, London, and Paris for several published half a century ago, under the title, 11 Nug.,e-. years, and upon his return to Edinburgh was elected Canorse Medicsa," were for the most part playful assistant surgeon to the Royal Infirmary. Making, however, dissertations in verse upon medical themes, but - often- a particular study of therapeutics with a strong bias in he displayed imagination of a high order as well as favour of analytical chemistry and toxicology, he became an accurate ear for phrasing. Among the poems is the a few jears later-i.e., in 1845-lecturer on materia "Alma Mater" which, in Sir Herbert Oakeley’s setting, is medica in the Edinburgh Extra-Academical School. Here known to all Edinburgh students, and the " Battle o’ Glen his lectures attracted much attention by their lucidity, Tilt," which was inspired by the attempt of the Duke of for he knew how to be exhaustive without being wearisome Argyll to deprive the public of a right of way along a and how to information in a form in which it could impart beautiful Perthshire glen. He was a som d classic. His. be assimilated and recalled. In 1857 a cause readily easily knowledge of music was turned to account as President which is still remembered on account of its cilebre, many of the Musical Society of the University. He was one of sensational was tried in and features, Glasgow, Douglas the earliest to join the Volunteer movement and was a Maclagan was retained for the defendant, Madeleine Smith, Surgeon-General of the Queen’s Bodyguard for Scotland. "ho was tried for her life on a of being charge poison- He was, in short, a brilliant, many-sided mar. whose death her A verdict of " resulted and ing paramour. I I non-proven leaves a gap that cannot be filled. method of his evidence marked him as an Maclagan’s giving He was buried on Monday, April 9th, at the Dean for he traversed the of Sir Cemetery,. original observer, boldly opinion Edinburgh, among the pall-bearers being his son, Dr. R. C. Robert Christison, the greatest living authority on poisons at Maclagan, and his brother the Archbishop of York. the time, with regard to the consequences of using weak solu- tions of arsenic as a face-wash. Sir Robert Christison, who was then Professor of Materia Medica in the University, became S.T. GEORGE MIVART. PH.D., F.R.S., F.L.S., F,Z.S., Maclagan’s great fIiend, constantly called him in to give M.D. LOUVAIN (HONORIS CAUSÀ). assistance in forensic matters, and when, in 1862, the Univer- sity chair of Medical Jurisprudence and Public Health As we briefly announced last week, St. George Mivart, the became vacant through the death of Professor Trail used, well-known zoologist, died at his London residence some- and used successfully, his great influence to secure the what suddenly on April lst. He was born 72 years ago and<