The Price of a Kiss.

Since my return from Europe I have had three cases almost identical in all their heart-breaking features. To report one will therefore suffice:

A nice young lady, from a good respectable family, goes away to the mountains for a short vacation. She is a strict Catholic, chaste and virtuous, but a little flirting, when away on a summer vacation, is not considered very sinful; and submitting finally to the entreaties of a gay young fellow she permits him to kiss her-once or twice. Whether he kissed her more than once or twice I do not know. The patient insists that only once or twice. Be the number of kisses what it may, four weeks later, the young, 18 year old girl-really a childdevelops a sore on the lip, which her family physician, not suspecting the nature of the trouble, treats with zinc oxide ointment and similar worthless applications. The sore does not heal; on the contrary it gets worse, the glands in the neck swell, the throat becomes sore, and when she is sent to me for treatment, the diagnosis is so plain, that a blind man could make it. The poor girl presents a fully developed case of syphilis, with all its terrible characteristics. The girl's life is ruined, probably forever. Her mother's heart, of whom she is at present almost the sole support, will break... And all for a kiss. Certainly a dear price to pay for one or even for a dozen kisses. (That she is virtuous, there is no question, for I examined her and found her a virgin)."

Whether the young man knew that he was infectious or he thought himself cured and harmless, there is no means of knowing. Confrontation is not so easy and feasible in this country as it is in Europe. If he knew that he was infectious (there are such wretches) he ought to be in prison; if he did not know, he ought to be in a hospital. In any case the advice to girls away on a vacation is: Be careful whom you kiss or whom you allow to kiss you. And the same advice may be given to young men.

And another thing: We believe the time has come to make the transmission of venereal disease a criminal offense. When it can be shown that the person-male or female-who transmitted the infection was aware of the nature of the disease, the offense should be punished as a felony.

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P. S. I wonder how many hundreds of men and womenold, middle aged and quite young-return from their vacations, domestic and European, with physical and moral blemishes? Chaperons who really chaperon are not altogether a superfluity. In some cases they are an absolute necessity.

Will you please renew your subscription without waiting for a bill? $1.00 a year, but better $3.00 for 4 years or $10.00 for life.

Imprisonment for a Kind Act.

A girl employed in the telephone service in Berlin (which in Prussia is a government monopoly), recently became pregnant, but had a spontaneous miscarriage. She called in a physician to treat her and when she got well and had to return to work she had to bring a medical certificate, stating the cause of the absence and the nature of the disease. Naturally the poor girl asked the doctor not to reveal the true nature of her trouble, as if that became known, she would at once lose her position. The doctor did what every decent doctor would do-he filled out a certificate stating that the patient had suffered from influenza. Unfortunately, the truth became. known to the dragons of the law, the doctor was arrested and tried for knowingly giving a false certificate. Tho it was shown that the doctor gave the certificate not for pecuniary reward, but out of good nature to save the girl from disgrace and from losing her position, and tho the press and his professional colleagues asked for clemency, still the judges were adamant and sentenced the poor "culprit" to one month's imprisonment. It is a bad thing to get into the clutches of Prussian judges. The Aertzekammer (the Medical Chamber) will petition the Kaiser for pardon, but whether he is pardoned or not, all honor to our confrère, who only did what any decent physician and man would do.

Lie to Your Patients Whenever it is for Their Good.

Dr. Richard Lehman describes interestingly in the Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift a very severe case of gangrenous appendicitis which he had gone thru. An operation which was undertaken immediately revealed a gangrenous appendix and several ounces of free pus in the peritoneal cavity. General peritonitis developed, also obstruction demanding the operation of colostomy, and for several days the doctor's life was hanging on a thread, of which fact the doctorpatient was fully cognizant. He demanded of the surgeon that he tell him the true state of affairs, and the surgeon assured him that everything was well and that he would soon be up and about. The doctor writes that, tho he knew perfectly well that the surgeon was not telling the truth, that he could feel no such assurance of his recovery, as his words indicated, still that reassuring answer made him feel much better mentally and physically. And the lesson he draws from his personal experience is, that no matter how a seriously-ill patient may demand the truth, no matter how much he may think he wants the truth, what he really wants is not the truth; he wants to be deceived, he wants to be given a favorable prognosis, and it is the surgeon's or physician's duty to lie and to

give a favorable prognosis, even when deep in his heart he feels no justification for holding out any hope.

A favorable prognosis given deceitfully often helps toward a favorable issue in reality.

Pulling the Chestnuts for Despots.

Carlo De Fornaro was sentenced on November 8th to one year's hard labor in the penitentiary for having libeled one Espindola, a Mexican who edits a paper in the interests of the Mexican despot, President Diaz. Our newspapers with their usual keen discernment of what is important and what is unimportant, have devoted but a few lines to this item, and in an inside page. On the first page, and in big headlines, of the same issue are such important items as the following: "Mrs. Astor obtains divorce," "Mrs. Flagler hurt in auto," "Horse Show opens: Biggest opening attendance," "Farmer held as masked robber," etc., etc. As I said, the keen discernment of our newspapers is truly remarkable.

Yes, conditions in this country are becoming serious. Irresponsible and uncultured officials constitute themselves censors of our press, ignorant and brutal policemen prohibit and break up meetings without any warrant or justification in law; illegal and highhanded arrests are reported almost daily; and now our officials are beginning to play the rôle of bloodhounds for the cruel tyrants of Europe and other continents.

If Fornaro's conviction is allowed to stand, it may have far-reaching consequences. Every scoundrel who does the dirty work for the bloody Czar, for the dissolute King of the Belgians, for the Sultan of Turkey, for the Shah of Persia, etc., who has at one time or another felt the lash of honest criticism, will get courage and will attempt to clap his inconvenient critic into prison. And he will find help and encouragement in our district attorneys, in our finely thinking and discriminating judges. A beautiful state of affairs! Perhaps we will have even the pleasure of witnessing the spectacle of a luetic Russian Grand Duke coming over to this land of the free (?) and the home of the brave (?) and demanding life imprisonment for an editor who dared to indulge in discourteous criticism of his private life, of his graft and peculiations, of his brutal murders, of his incitement to massacres, etc., etc. Yes, unless the people awake, we will live to see some peculiar things in this country.

Our Politics.

We are taken to task sometimes for not engaging actively in politics. I know it is wrong for good and clean men to keep away from politics, thus putting all the power in the hands of rascals and mediocrities. But how can one who has watched, for instance, the recent mayoralty campaign in

New York City blame us for keeping away? The filth, the mud, the deliberate lies, the vituperation, the character assassination, the wretched cartoons, the utter lack of fair playno, we are too sensitive. American politics will have to be fumigated and disinfected for a long time before we will be able to touch it with naked hands. And here is a legitimate query: Does the world possess a sufficient supply of sulphur, bichloride, chinosol, and formaldehyde to disinfect American politics effectively?

Prof. Cesare Lombroso.

In the death of Lombroso the world has lost a unique and interesting personality; a man who made the world think, and whose writings on the whole contributed to the world's intellectual advancement. But he was not a genius and we are very far from subscribing to the characterization of him as "one of the loftiest mental phenomena of the nineteenth century." Perhaps it is because we are not a great believer in the heredity theory, and have always ascribed more influence to environment than to heredity. As to his spiritualistic vagaries-old age is not a sufficient explanation. But-de mortuis nihil nisi bonum.

Bitter Truths or Sweet Illusions-Which?

Poincaré, the greatest living mathematician and member of the Institute of France, commences his beautiful book, The Value of Science, with the following statement: "The search for truth should be the goal of our activities; it is the sole end worthy of them." There was a time when such a statement seemed to us so axiomatic, that to question it would have appeared a sacrilege. It no longer seems to us an axiom, and to question it no longer appears to us a sacrilege.

First, we must state that truth is to us no longer the absolute entity that it was in our younger days. There are absolute mathematical truths; there are scientific truths which may be considered fairly definite, tho we can never say when new facts or newly discovered forces will upset our hypotheses and theories which are now accepted as laws of nature; but of philosophical and religious truths few are absolute; in every system truth is mixed with falsehood; the question is only one of proportion. In the domain of morals still fewer "truths" can be considered as absolute. The statement has been made so often as to become worn by repetition, that morals are merely a matter of chronology and geography. We believe this statement is farfetched. There are fundamental principles of morality which are undoubtedly eternal. But there is no question in any advanced thinker's mind that even the thou shalt not of the ten commandments may under certain circumstances become thou mayest or even an imperative thou shalt.

And then besides recognising that truth is not an unchangeable absolute entity, we do not recognize her as the supreme goddess, before whom we must bow and worship even if she slay us. Our only god is humanity, our only fetish is happiness. And we bow before truth only in so far as she serves humanity, in so far as she serves to increase the sum total of human happiness. If a sweet illusion will contribute more to our happiness than a brutal truth, then by all means let us have the sweet illusion.

We physicians are often obliged to conceal the truth from patients; and not only do we conceal the truth, but we often find it necessary to tell direct falsehoods. But we do it for the patient's good and our concealments and untruths often have beneficial results, and we are sure that St. Peter will not count them against us when we knock at the gates of Heaven. And what is true in medicine is true in many lines of human activity.

Be Decent with the Detail-Man.

Some physicians think it is extra-smart and ultra-ethical to behave like a boor to every detail-man who dares to invade the sanctity of their waiting room. We know of cases where the doctor allowed the salesman to sit an hour and a half in the waiting room and then sent word that he didn't have time or didn't care to see him. This isn't fair, to use a very mild term. The salesman, or travelling man, or detail-man, or drummer— call him any name you please—is just as good a man, as you or I. That we have comfortable or luxurious offices, and go out in automobiles, while he has to go from doctor to doctor, humbly and smilingly introducing his firm's wares or books, is merely, as a rule, a matter of accident, of circumstances. It does not show superior brains and energy on our part, nor an inferior brand of these qualities on his part. It is all in the game of life. And therefore let us treat the detail-man decently, politely, gentlemanly. He has a hard enough road to travel as it is.

And in this connection I wish to reprint an item which I think I saw in one of our exchanges.

It is as follows:

The salesman is waiting outside. It may be inconvenient to see him at this hour, but why not take just a moment to tell him so, and do it agreeably? It costs so little, and often means so much to the traveller. You may not want his goods, but there are ways of telling him so which do not sting nor leave tears burning in his heart. He is doing his part in the great implacable game of business. Give him a smile, rather than a thrust. There is a woman far across the land and children whose future depends upon his success. Do some little thing to make his exile from home easier for him. It will do you good.

Thrice blessed is the prompt subscriber. Do us the kindness to remit NOW without waiting for a bill. One dollar a year, three dollars for four years and ten dollars for LIFE.