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country : hence the idea to undertake a collective investiga- Mauritius, the son of an American and a Frenchwoman, he- tion throughout Germany similar to that pursued in inflaenza lived, as all our readers know, and practised successively in by the Berlin Society of Internal Medicine, on the lines France, the United States, and in this country, passing the originated by the British Medical Association. In this last twenty years of his distinguished career once more in scheme they have the support of Drs. Leyden, Litten, Renvers, Paris, with which city he had always kept up the closest ties. Henbner, Behring, Ehrlich, and Guttstadt. The cards to be M. Dupuy does full justice to the work of the subject of his filled up by practitioners can be obtained from the office of address, cosmopolitan and extensive as it was. Dr. Brown- the journal. It is proposed to close the inquiry on April lst, Séquard, according to him, was characterised by an 1895. Whilst expecting no final judgment on the serum enthusiasm, an acuteness, and in particular a capacity question from this inquiry, it is hoped that there will result for seeing the bearing of his own observations on other more certain grounds for its therapeutic employment than men’s difficulties that are rarely met with in com- hitherto, and that it may serve to solve some doubts as to its bination. In this country he devoted himself chiefly to- value. elaborate into the and ___ investigation physiological patho- logical working of the nervous system, being one of the "THE LANCET" RELIEF FUND. original staff of the National Hospital for the Paralysed and THE" App1icatio Form" of THE LANCET Relief Fund Epileptic, and there receiving the cooperation of Sir J. Russell will be found in our present issue. It can easily be removed, Reynolds, Dr. Hughliogs Jackson, and Dr. Buzzard among filled up, and forwarded to the Secretary, Mr. Edward Davies, others. His lectures at this institution, which has no counter.. THE LANCET Offices, 423, Strand, . We take the part, says M. Dupuy, except the Salpêtrière in Paris, were opportunity of directing the attention of those of our readers published in THE LANCET, and stimulated the scientific who may have occasion to employ the form or to sign one study of epilepsy and of paralysis due to disease of the of the required accompanying certificates to the necessity spinal cord which have led to marked advance in our know- of carefully noticing the conditions on which applicants ledge of those obscure diseases in the last twenty years. As. become entitled to a participation in the benefits of the a physiologist, as a physician, and as a man who, through Fund. numerous vicissitudes and much trouble, found time to ___ accomplish as much work as would suffice for several men of DEATHS OF THE AGED AND LONGEVITY. great capacity, his name will always be held in honour in the world of science. No one can read the tribute of THERE is a certain grimness of humour in the persistence graceful M. to his without a of admiration for with which paragraphists, on the advent of cold or foggy Dupuy memory feeling its weather, which is invariably fatal to many old people, sum- subject. -- marise the deaths of octogenarians and nonagenarians an- THE Home Secretary has consented to receive a nounced in the obituary columns of the daily press and head deputa- tion from the United Kingdom Police Asso- their paragraphs 1IL3ngevity." It is, to say the least, Surgeons’ ciation this month, on a day to be fixed later. The paradoxical that exceptional mortality among the aged will before him the -. should be referred to as evidence of longevity. An indus- deputation bring following points : (1) the inadequate amount of the fees and allowances trious correspondent of a contemporary recently reported to medical witnesses distant sessions and that the obituary columns of that paper during 1894 an- attending the of the nounced the deaths of 196 nonagenarians, of whom 89 assizes ; (2) importance issuing instructions to the for the examination were males and 107 were females ; and, as is usual in these given metropolitan police of with criminal assaults on to all communications, the correspondent adds that their aggre- persons charged females (3) the of gate ages were 18,203 years." It is such useless figures provincial police authorities ; desirability having a surgeon in all counties and towns where as these that bring discredit on statistics. They convey police appointed none at present exists ; and to ask that, in the event of no definite idea and do not even suggest whether we should (4) medical certifiers of the cause of death being the be struck with the number being high or low. Probably not appointed, interests of be many of these paragraphists and correspondents bave the police surgeons may safeguarded. slightest idea of the fact that at the last census in 1891 no fewer than 9185 nonagenarians were enumerated in ON Thursday, Jan. 3ed, Dr. Patrick Heron Watson, and Wales; and that as, according to the English Life F.R.S. Edin., Surgeon-in-Ordinary to the Queen in , rather more than one of three nona- Table, every living was entertained at a dinner in by his former house- dies it follows that more than 3000 genarians annually, surgeons and presented with his portrait, and an album nonagenarians die in England and Wales annually. Of what containing the photographs of the subscribers. The portrait is it to know of the 3000 possible interest, therefore, that, was painted by Sir George Reid. nonagenarians whose deaths were probably registered in England and Wales in 1894 196 bad their deaths announced THE Lettsomian Lectures will be delivered before the- in any particular obituary column. As evidence, however, of the greater longevity of females it is worth noting that of Medical Society of London on the evenings of Mondays, Jan. Feb. and Feb. 18th, Dr. F. T. the the 9185 nonagenarians enumerated in 1891 6173 were 21st, 4th, by Roberts, announced the Combinations of Morbid Con- females and only 3012 were males. The English Life subject being ditions of the Chest. Table, notwithstanding this disparity, shows but slight ___ difference between the rate of mortality of male and of MR. F. J. WALDO, M.A., M.D. Cantab., D.P.H., medical female nonagenarians, although this difference is, of course, officer of health to St. and to the Inner in the favour of females. George’s, Southwark, __ and Middle Temples, has been appointed Tutor in Public Health to St. Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School. THE LATE DR. BROWN-SÉQUARD. THE January number of the Comptes Rendus de la Soci6ti A CONFERENCE in connexion with the Matronsr de Biologie contains an appreciative notice by the President, Council will be held on in M. of the life and work of the remarkable Thursday, Jan. 17th, at 8.30 P.M., Engene Dupuy, the Medical Rooms, 11, Chandos-street, Cavendish- one of the most in the Society’s man-certainly striking figures history square, when a paper entitled Infirmary Matrons under the of experimental physiology and of clinical medicine-whom Poor-law " will be read by Miss Mollett, matron to the Royal death a short time ago removed from among us. Born in South Hants Infirmary, Southampton.