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a worse plight, or that Newhaven is not responsible for allthe filth deposits in the harbour. When Newhaven hasremedied its own defects, there can be but little doubt thatit will find a means for preventing the pollution of its

riparian water by Lewes. It is satisfactory to find that theLocal Board, as such, declined to join in this protest, andwe may hope that this indicates a determination on theirpart to provide the needed remedies.

GASTRIC ULCER.

AN interesting discussion on the diagnosis, treatment, andpathology of gastric ulcer took place at the Medical Societyof London on Monday last, introduced by an instructivepaper by Dr. Stephen Mackenzie. The most importantfeature of the paper was the narration of two cases of appa-rent gastric disease, in which post-mortem examinationfailed to reveal any certain evidence of disease of the

stomach, though the gastric symptoms were even definiteenough to excite more than a suspicion of the presence ofgastric ulcer. Indeed, one of the cases had been diagnosedby more than one physician as a typical clinical case of theaffection. Dr. Sansom and Dr. C. T. Williams advocated

strongly the " starvation treatment" of gastric ulcer. Dr.

Angel Money suggested that in a few cases of acute per-forating ulcer the ulceration might be regarded as an acci-dent occurring in the course of apepsia nervosa. Dr. StretchDowse went much further than this, and appeared to thinkthat perforating ulcers of the stomach were invariably ofnervous dystrophic origin. -,-

ALLEGED CRIMINAL ABORTION.

AN inquest was held on Nov. 27th and 30th at theCrowndale Hall, Crowndale-road, by Dr. Danford Thomas,coroner for Central Middlesex, touching the death of a

young woman named Charlotte Louisa Clifford, which tookplace at the residence of Mr. Turnbull, surgeon, 146, Hamp-stead-road, on Nov. 20th. From the evidence it appearsthat the deceased was a barmaid at the Boston Arms Hotel,Junction-road, Holloway, and that on Nov. 9th, the dayon which she went to reside at Mr. Turnbull’s, she wasseen by several of her relatives, who believed that, apartfrom a cold, she was in good health. She, moreover, toldher friends that she was leaving her situation and was

going to Devonshire to have a week’s holiday. Her parentsnever saw her alive again, and the first news they heardof her was from Mr. Turnbull, who two days after herdeath went to Croydon and had an interview with thefather of the deceased, whom he informed of his daughter’sdeath. Mr. Turnbull, both in a letter and by oral com-munication, related how she went to his house to resideas a patient, and gave the nature of her symptoms on

admission-viz., sore-throat and diarrhoea. The certificateof death was to the effect that there had been " typhoidfever seven days; congestion of the lungs three days."Mr. Clifford, not feeling satisfied with the explanation givenhim, communicated with the police and then with thecoroner, with the result that an inquest was ordered and apost-mortem directed to be conducted by Mr. Pepper andDr. Montague Handfield Jones, assistant obstetric phy-sician to St. Mary’s Hospital. These gentlemen foundnone of the lesions of typhoid fever, but from their investi-gations came to the conclusion that death had arisen fromperitonitis and septicsemia, the result of a recent abortion.They fixed the duration of pregnancy at between two andthree months. There were no products of conception in theuterine or vaginal canals, but the uterus itself was in everyway enlarged, its cavity being considerably dilated Itcontained pus, which could be traced into the Fallopiantubes and so to the peritoneal cavity. In the right ovary

was a deep orange-coloured corpus luteum, with a centralaltered blood-clot, which measured five-eighths of an inchin diameter. The inner wall of the vagina showed threesuperficial lacerations, beneath which was some extravasatedblood. The throat was much congested, but it presented nocharacteristic lesions-in fact, was affected only in such a wayas might be expected in death from an acute septic fever. Themother of the girl had suspected pregnancy from an incidentconnected with the washing of the clothes of the latter;and she even taxed her daughter with it, but the fact wasdenied. So far the only real evidence of pregnancy havingexisted was furnished by the medical men who made thepost-mortem inspection. At the close of the inquiry onNov. 27th, a practitioner—Mr. Watts, of Fortess-road,Kentish-towm-came forward and deposed that a barmaidat the Boston Arms, whom he subsequently identified by aphotograph as the deceased, had consulted him six weeksbefore with regard to her belief that she was enceinte. Shewent so far as to say that if the doctor thought her statewas such as she had grounds for concluding, she should getmarried. Mr. Watts did not see her again, but hisnotes went to show that pregnancy had probablyadvanced nearly three months. This information was

confirmatory of the opinion previously formed by Mr. Pepperand Dr. Jones. The jury returned a verdict in accordancewith the medical evidence as to the cause of death, and,after an exhaustive summing up by the coroner, they furtherfound that Mr. Turnbull and Mrs. Nottage-a certified mid-wife, who lived in the same house as Mr. Turnbull, and actedas his housekeeper-were chargeable with having causedthe death by procuring abortion. It transpired that thedeceased, so far as the evidence went, had no intention ofgoing to Devonshire, and in this way she deceived herrelatives and friends, for on the same evening on which sheleft her home with the avowed purpose of going to thecountry she went to reside at Mr. Turnbull’s house. In thecourse of his evidence Mr. Pepper said that he was unable tospeak with any degree of certainty as to whether the vaginalinjuries were caused by an attempt to initiate abortion, or toremove the products of conception after abortion had com-menced. On the 2nd inst. Mr. Turnbull and Mrs. Nottagewere brought before the magistrate at Marylebone Police-court, when the case was adjourned. Mr. de Rutzendeclined to accede to an application for bail, saying that thecharge was a very serious one. As the case is sub judice,we defer comment for the present.

NON-BACILLARY PHTHISIS.

DR. TRUDEAU has addressed himself to the question ofthe infectiousness of cases of phthisis in the sputa ofwhich no specific bacilli can be detected. The method of

inquiry and results are given in a paper contributed to thecurrent number of the American Journal of the MedicalSciences. It is a point of considerable importance whetherthere exist cases of phthisis in which the bacilli are absent.The reply to such a question will depend partly on the exactdefinition that is adopted in regard to phthisis, and partlyalso on the views of the replier. Trudeau does not concernhimself with those chronic inflammatory conditions of thelungs which are the result of some distinct and thoroughlyappreciated irritation, such as nailers’ and stonecutters’

phthisis, but to the " undoubted occurrence," as acknowledgedby Koch and insisted on by Formad, Prudden, and others,of a small proportion of typical phthisical cases where

expectoration during life is found at all times free from

bacilli, and in whose tissues after death, though manylesions morphologically identical with tubercular disease arepresent, the most careful research fails to reveal any ofKoch’s specific micro-organisms. If there be such cases,then phthisis owns at least a duality. Inoculation of