IRELAND

1771

IRELAND.(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENTS. )

Visit of the King to Ireland.IT is now-definitely arranged that His Majesty the King ito visit Ireland during the third week in July and aftespending some time in Dublin he will go north and the:south, while in Ulster he will open the new Royal Victori.Hospital which is now almost completed and which has bee]erected by the citizens as a memorial of his late motherQueen Victoria.

Queen’s College, Cork: Triennial Tisitation.The triennial visitation of the Cork Queen’s College wa

held on June 6th. The visitors were the Right HonLord Justice Holmes (chairman), the President of the RoyaCollege of Physicians of Ireland (Dr. A. V. Macan), and th,President of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (DrL. H. Ormsby). The president of the College, in address

ing the visitors, referred to the excellent discipline maintained and to the distinguished positions which were

obtained by past students of the College in variou;

parts of the globe since the last visitation was held. H<

deplored the fact that there was no endowment for : achair of pathology but he was happy to be able to infornthem that the council of the College had succeedecin securing the services of Dr. A. E. Moore, a distinguisheclecturer on pathology, who devotes his whole attentionto the subject. Lord Justice Holmes mentioned that hi.

colleagues were anxious to ask some questions and Dr. Macarthen said that he was anxious to learn what opportunitieithe students had for gaining a knowledge of clinical mid.wifery and clinical gynaecology. He also inquired whethe]the professor of midwifery was ex-officio appointed a memberof the staff of a midwifery and gynaecological hospital. II]

reply, Professor H. Corby named the institutions in whichthose subjects were taught and gave details. He said thathe was not appointed to any position in a clinical hospitalbecause he was professor of midwifery, but, on the otherhand, one of the reasons for his having obtained the chair ofmidwifery was because he already held those hospitalappointments, as it was considered that he could not ade-quately discharge the duties of the chair if he had nothad experience in clinical teaching in those subjects.Dr. Ormsby, who had notes of various subjects on whichhe desired information, asked amongst other questionswhat were the facilities for giving clinical instructionin medicine and surgery. Professor W. E. A. Cummins

gave interesting particulars on the subject and expressedan emphatic opinion that a Cork student was fortunatein having such an amount of clinical material at his

disposal. Dr. Ormsby also inquired as to the methodsadopted for imparting instruction in pathology and bacterio-logy. Dr. Moore gave particulars with regard to the patho-logical laboratory and mentioned that he had both theoreticaland practical classes. Just as the visitors were aout toadjourn to visit the departments of the College, ProfessorCorby, who in the meantime had procured a copy of the lastreport of the Royal Commission on Irish University Educa-tion, mentioned that he had given evidence before theCommissioners and as part of his evidence had refer-ence to some of the subjects on which the visitors desiredinformation he asked permission to read portions of theevidence. Lord Justice Holmes said that they would be gladto hear it. The pith of the evidence was that the averagenumber of Cork students who had passed the final examina-tions in medicine at the Royal University of Irelandsince its foundation was 18 8 of the whole ; that clinicalexaminations formed part of those examinations ; that theinspectors of the General Medical Council had reported inlaudatory terms of those clinical examinations ; that sincethe foundation of the Royal University honours-first or

second class-at the final examinations were awarded to 78students and 23 of those 78 students received their educationin Cork-that is to say, out of all the students who obtainedhonours at the Royal University at the final examinations inmedicine 29 5 per cent. were students of Queen’s College,Cork. To put it in another way, the students of the CorkQueen’s College who obtained their medical degrees formednot quite one-fifth of the whole yet they managed to carryoff not very far short of one-third of all the honours awarded.In a word, in proportion to their numbers they won nearlydouble the honours as against all the other candidates,

though not a single one of the clinical examiners was con-

nected with the Cork School of Medicine. Lord JusticeHolmes, in giving the decision of the visitors, said that theyconsidered that in the circumstances the College was exceed-ingly well equipped and they hoped that a chair of pathologywould be established. They found absolutely nothing tofind fault with and they considered that the professors hadgiven them very full information.

Cork-street Fever Hospital, Dublin.The managing committee held its usual monthly meeting

on June llth when the registrar reported that there was afalling off in the number of cases admitted during the monthof May as compared with the previous month, those admittedbeing chiefly cases of scarlet fever and diphtheria withseveral severe cases of chicken-pox. The cases of entericfever were few in number, as were also those of measles.

Dispensary Medical Officers’ Salaries.Mr. R. M. Blake, medical officer of the Ravensdale dis-

pensary district, having applied to the Dundalk guardiansfor an increase of salary on the grounds that his district wasthe poorest in the union, that he had to attend 800 peoplewhose valuation was under &pound;4 10s., that he had 25 years’service, and that his salary after 25 years’ service was stillthe same as when he was appointed-viz., .E100 as dispensarymedical officer and &pound; 25 as sanitary officer-the guardiansunanimously agreed to grant an increase of .E25 per annum.It will be interesting to know whether the Local GovernmentBoard will approve of this increase or whether it will, as ithas done in other similar cases, decline to indorse it.-At themeeting of the Cookstown board of guardians on June 13th,application was made by Dr. C. H. P. D. Graves, medicalofficer of the Cookstown workhouse and fever hospital, askingfor an increase of salary on the ground that he had been 12years in office at the same annual salary- &pound;50-as whenappointed, while his predecessor had .E90 per annum. Theclerk is to submit at the next meeting a return showing theemoluments which Dr. Graves had received from the guardiansand council and also whether he was a member of the TyroneMedical Association and also if there was no agreement atthe time of his appointment regarding increase of salary.-Mr. H. Harris of Stewartstown also applied for an increaseof salary as dispensary medical officer and medical officer ofhealth. He has been 20 years in office without any increaseof salary, though other officials had not been treated in thisway. The Cookstown board of guardians had approved of aresolution passed by the Abbeyleix Union, requesting the IrishParliamentary party to take steps to have medical officersexcluded from the benefits of the Superannuation Bill unlessthe present unreasonable (?) demands of the medicalprofession are withdrawn.June 16th.

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PARIS.(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

Hydrophobia in Paris.M. PROUST in his report to the council of hygiene upon

hydrophobia in Paris for the year 1902 states that neverbefore has the position in regard to that disease been sofavourable in the department of the Seine. In 1902 therewere treated for hydrophobia at the Pasteur Institute 1016persons ; in 1901 the number was 1321. In 1902 thestatistics of the institute showed a mortality of three, but onlyone of these three persons had been bitten in the departmentof the Seine. In 1901 the deaths numbered 12 and of thesenine persons had been bitten in the department of the Seine.In 1900 the deaths of persons bitten in the departmentnumbered ten. The number of rabid dogs has also dimi-nished. In 1901 they numbered 846, but in 1902 only 474.The reports of the Pasteur Institute have never beforeshowed such a low mortality from rabies-namely, 0’ 18 percent. M. Proust hopes that the results for 1902, as well asthose emanating from foreign countries where the campaignagainst rabid dogs is carried out, will encourage the prefectof police to apply with great strictness the regulationsalready put forth by the council of hygiene, the good resultsof which are now beginning to be appreciated.

Reform of the Quarantine System.I mentioned in a former letterl how M. Teissier, Professor

at the Faculty of Medicine at Lyons, lost his son, who was

1 THE LANCET, March 21st, 1903, p. 844.