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whenever learned, might be practised in all countries andunder all circumstances in which men are stricken by diseaseor accident and seek to escape from death. No portion ofmedical training could for a moment vie with engagingstudents in the hospital, to which all other branches ofmedical education should be made subservient. Pupilagedid not end on emancipation from the terrors of examina-tion. These but guard the portals of that wide domain ofscience which the longest life would not suffice them toexplore thoroughly. In Dublin they had up to that timeescaped any permanent settlement of those erratic medicalhybrids - the lady doctors, despite the encouragementafforded them by the Irish College of Physicians in theirhopeless contest against Nature’s laws. There were somemasculine women, just as there were some effeminate men.Neither were good types of their kind, and it needed noserious argument to prove the futility of any attemptfounded on such exceptional cases on the part of either sexto fill the place and assume the functions of the other. Hewho would worthily fill the office of a true physician shouldpossess a heart attuned to sympathy with suffering humanity,as well as a mind stored with the science which ministers toits relief. He recommended the cultivation of some tastefor literary pursuits, and especially for the ancient literatureof their profession. Those young men about to commencethe study of medicine might be congratulated on the nearprospect of having a feasible system of University educationwithin their reach. In the new Royal University theymight hope to find an institution in which every Irishmedical student might seek, and if worthy might obtain, thegreat advantage of a university stamp on his medicalqualification. -

RICHMOND HOSPITAL.

MR. STOKES discussed some of the practical effects onmedical and surgical science of the promulgation of the

germ theory. A special interest attached itself now to thissubject, as it had been the means of bringing about a re-volution in surgical practice, which would be attended withas great, or even greater, benefits to humanity than even thediscovery of Jenner. What it had done for surgery was

. already clear and defined, and he would be bold indeed whowould fix the limits of what antiseptic surgery may yet do.In medical science the results were not yet perfectly tangible,but sufficiently so to prove that we are on the threshold of dis-covery of a therapeutic knowledge, to be made use of notmerely for the cure, but also for the prevention of disease.The germ theory dealt simply with the competence of livingorganisms to produce the phenomena of disease, and didnot necessarily take cognisance of the question whether ornot organisms may originate de novo, and putrefaction hadbeen proved beyond a doubt. The competence of germs toproduce one kind of fermentation was admitted by all ;but the competence of germs to produce the phenomenaot disease was the special subject of discussion be-tween the supporters and the opponents of the germtheory of disease. Referring to the loss they hadsustained by the death of Sir Dominic Corrigan,the lecturer stated that even from his early boyhood SirD. Corrigan was distinguished for zeal, earnestness, andassiduity, and his great success in after-life was mainly tobe attributed to these qualities. Though not a voluminouswriter, the contributions to medical literature of Sir D. Cor-rigan were, some of them, in truth, essentially classical.The outcome of close, diligent, and accurate observations,rendered fruitful by study, his contributions stood out in boldrelief in the medical literature of this century as gems, thebeauty and truthful lusti e of which time could never tarnish.The present was a time in the history of the profession thanwhich none was ever more important or critical. Neverhad public opinion been more or as much directed on it asat present, as evidenced by the deep interest now taken inall matters connected with sanitary science, in the effortsthat have been made, and are being made, to reform profes-sional examinations, in the fact of the universities.

LEDWICH SCHOOL OF MEDICINE.MR. BENSON having alluded to the death of his pre-

decessor, Dr. Rainsford, said that there was no professionpossessed of such versatility, none in which so much libertyof thought and action was allowed, as in Medicine. Every

medical man worthy of his calling was an eclectic free to followwhatever line of action or investigation he might prefer, andbound only to succour the needy, to be present where therewas disease or death. Were he to deal with the much-vexedquestion of medical education reform, he would have ad.vocated a one-portal system for each of the three divisions ofthe kingdom, a minimum pass examination, held underGovernment, the passing of which was to be the sine quânon for registration, advising at the same time that therights and privileges of the now existing schools, colleges,and examining bodies be so far unchanged that no studentshould be allowed to present himself for this examinationuntil he had first obtained the double qualification fromsome of the recognised corporations-that, in fact, thestudent be allowed to study how he liked, and obtain hisdiplomas where he pleased, as at present, with this excep.tion only, that it should not be possible for him to registeruntil he had passed the Government, nor to present himselffor this examination until he had obtained the double quali.fication. The tendency would then be to level up instead ofdown, and the only one to suffer would be the much-enduringstudent, who would have three instead of two examinationsto pass; but the third being a repetition of the formerwould cause him little anxiety if he knew his work for theothers. The lecturer concluded by referring to the uses ofthe ophthalmoscope as an aid to medical diagnosis.

SCHOOL OF PHYSIC, TRINITY COLLEGE.THE inaugural address was delivered by Dr. John Malet

Purser, King’s Professor of Institutes of Medicine. Dr.Purser, in the course of his remarks, referred to the improve.ments in the new Physiological Laboratory, and impressedupon his hearers the great importance of a knowledge ofphysiology in medical education. He also drew attention tothe amount of lectures required at the present time formedical students, declared it was overdone, and sympathisedwith those present at the large number of lectures at whichattendance was required.

FILARIA DISEASE.

DR. PATRICK MANSON, of Amoy, in some "AdditionalNotes on Filaria Sanguinis Hominis and Filaria Disease,"in the eighteenth issue of the valuable Chinese Medical

Reports published by order of the Inspector-General ofCustoms at Shanghai, which has just reached us, continuesthe report of his extremely valuable and praiseworthy reosearches, and supplies additional evidence in support of theparasitic causation of Elephantiasis Arabum. Stimulated

by the criticisms of the late Dr. Tilbury Fox, he speciallyset himself the task of gathering fresh proofs wherewith tomeet the objections raised by that physician. It will be reomembered that Dr. Fox argued that it was not proved thatE. Arabum and lymph-scrotum are the same disease, butthat the escape of chyle in the urine and into the scrotumprobably marks quite a different condition of things fromthe ordinary effusion of lymph into the tissues. He saidthe chylous discharge might be due to niarise or the adultnematoid, but its occurrence in the same subject withE. Arabum was merely a coincidence, just as chyluria andleprosy may coexist. To this Dr. Manson replies that itixat the outset a highly significant fact that the coincidence isnot an infrequent but a common one, and he proceeds to addsome very important new facts. From a consideration ofsix cases (met with in the course of nine months) of a "groupof cases which belong strictly neither to pure elephantiasisnor to pure lymph-scrotum, but are either a combination ofthese diseases or the transitional stage of one passing intothe other," he was struck by the fact that there was onefeature common to all-viz., enlargement of the groin glands.Ou drawing off the lymph from these glands, he alwaysfound n]arise present, apparently old and moribund, thoughhe could get none from the blood of the finger. But he alsoexamined the lymph from the enlarged groin glands in acase of elephantiasis of the leg uncomplicated by any scrotaldisease, and found filarise both on the side affected and onthe opposite side, though there were none in the blood. In