MANUAL OF PRESCRIPTION WRITING AND DOSOLOGY. Prepared for Students and Practitioners of Veterinary Medicine. By H. D. HANSON, D.V.S., of New York City.

THIS, the second work of Dr. Hanson, and which has been in contemplation and preparation for some time, has just reached us. It has been dedicated by the author to Professor M. H. McKillip, founder of the McKillip Veterinary College of Chicago, as a fitting testimonial to his modest support and deep interest in the welfare of the veterinary profession.

Divided into ten chapters, covering fully prescription writing, grammatical prescription construction, Latin terms and abbreviations; combinations of drugs, and incompatabilities, solubility of drugs; weights and measures, officinal preparations, tables of doses, to which are added a large number of favorite prescriptions of prominent veterinarians. From the purely veterinary stand-point this subject has never been so completely treated of, and it will prove a helpful assistant to the student, while the older practitioner, grown careless and indifferent as to his prescription writing, will do well to spend an hour or two each week delving into its valuable contents. There will be a wide sale of this work because of its containing many favorite prescriptions of successful practitioners, and we trust it will well repay the author, who has spent so much time in the preparation of his contributions to veternary literature.

GUIDE TO PRACTICAL MEAT-INSPECTION. BY DR. F. FISCHOEDER, late Director of the City Abattoirs and Stock-yards, Bromberg, Germany. Translated by A. T. PETERS, D. V. M., Investigator of Animal Diseases, Nebraska Experiment Station. Published by Alex. Eger, Chicago, Ill. THE translator of this work, well known to the members of the American Veterinary Medical Association, has endeavored in the production of this work to translate only those parts of the author that cover in general the subject of meat-inspection, and special laws and ordinances of Germany not applicable to the United States have been supplanted by the laws and ordinances under which this work is carried on in our country.

The subject has become one of such great importance in our land that everything written or printed in the English language has been eagerly sought and studied. Our national meat-inspection service has grown more rapidly than our men have been properly equipped for the work to do.

After treating in a general way of the construction and functions

of the various parts of the animal body, the normal characters of the organs are explained at considerable length and made clearer by numerous illustrations. The whole field of instructions to our United States inspectors is added, as well as many valuable points from those long experienced in our meat-inspection service. Contagious and parasitic diseases are fully covered, as well as special chapters relating to the detection of trichinosis. The work will be generously received by the veterinary profession at this time and its value duly appreciated. The work deserved more careful preparation at the hands of the publisher and more efficient proofreading before sending it forth from the press.

COMMUNICATIONS.

UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA, DEPARTMENT OF VETERINARY MEDICINE.

OFFICE OF THE DEAN, PHILADELPHIA, January 17, 1900.

DEAR SIR: It has for many years been the practice of the leading physicians in nearly every community to go from time to time to one of the centres of medical education for the purpose of pursuing post-graduate courses of instruction. In this way they have been enabled to keep in touch with the advances in medical science and to freshen their knowledge. Veterinarians, on the other hand, have not adopted this practice, although the need for it cannot be less among members of our profession than among physicians. This condition is, no doubt, due in part to the fact that no arrangements have been made for providing short courses in the kind of work that practitioners of veterinary medicine wish to pursue.

It is now proposed to offer a six-day practical course in State veterinary medicine, bacteriology, meat-inspection, and dairy inspection. The plan provides also for clinical demonstrations in surgery, for visits to at least two of the best dairy farms in the country, and for free discussion by the members of the class of all of the subjects taken up in the course.

This course is provided especially for the veterinarians of Pennsylvania who are interested in the broader public aspects of veterinary science (those who act as inspectors for the State Livestock Sanitary Board), but it will include instruction in many subjects of use in everyday private practice.

Among those who will take part in the discussions are Drs.

Ravenel, Harger, Adams, Hoskins, Conard, Klein, and Pear

son.

It is proposed to begin this course at the Veterinary Department of the University of Pennsylvania, Tuesday, February 27, 1900, at 8.30 A. M. This time has been selected because the State Veterinary Society meets on Tuesday, March 6th, and it is known that many veterinarians will come from distant parts of the State to attend this meeting. By coming one week earlier, advantage

can be taken of the special course and the meeting at one visit.

While there is always some difficulty in leaving a practice for a week or ten days, it is to be remembered that the purpose in so doing is to acquire knowledge and experience that will make the services of the veterinarian of more value to his clients.

There will be no charge for tuition and no other fee, so the only expense will be for board and railroad fare.

This course is offered to all legally registered veterinarians in Pennsylvania.

Those who wish to take this course are requested to send their names as soon as possible to the undersigned.

Respectfully yours,

LEONARD PEARSON.

NOTES.

HOG INSPECTION IN GERMANY. Dr. Vosburg Rekow and Edmund Wirth, the former a Director of the Imperial Central Bureau of Commercial Treaties of Germany, and the latter a large manufacturer and President of the Chamber of Commerce in Seraw, Brandenburg, have just concluded an inspection of the Chicago packing, houses.

They expressed their pleasure and astonishment at the cleanliness of the methods. They admitted that hog-inspection in this country is a great deal better than the German method, because, they say, if any trichniæ are found in Germany the meat after being cooked for a certain period is put on the market; whereas here if the smallest defect is found the pork is used for byproducts.-Sanitarian, January, 1900.

The Board of Health of Columbia, S. C., is conducting a prosecution of one of its principal butchers for the slaughter and exposure for sale of a number of carcasses of hogs from a carload

shipped into that city, many of which had and subsequently died of hog-cholera. There is entirely too much latitude given certain dealers and butchers in allowing them to go out and openly buy diseased stock or animals from infected premises, and rapidly prepare the same for market. A few prosecutions and vigorous punishment to offenders would have a salutary effect in breaking up this unscrupulous and dangerous practice.

South Carolina has suffered much the past year in great losses of swine from hog-cholera which prevails in many districts. In certain sections of the State where the stock law is rigidly enforced the reduction in outbreaks of Texas fever have been most marked. The cattle tick has disappeared from these sections. Along the coast and southern districts of the State the disease prevails, and cause many losses. The State has no laws for the control of animal diseases, and many loads of cattle from infected districts. are shipped to Columbia, Charleston, Richmond, and Norfolk. The last Legislature authorized the State Board of Health to establish such quarantine measures as will protect the live-stock interests of the State, and co-operate with the Department of Agriculture. The State Board of Health has no veterinarian upon its board, and the lack of knowledge of those upon the board makes the law practically a dead letter.

Berlin, Germany, has become quite a centre of distribution of the American heavy draught horses, some of them being shipped from this centre to Italy.

Brood mares are again bringing excellent prices, and reports from all over the country indicate a return to breeding again on a broader and better scale.

Secretary of Agriculture Wilson visited the National Farm School at Doylestown, Pa., during the Christmas holidays. Among those who assisted in entertaining him were State Veterinarian Pearson and Dr. W. G. Benner, who teaches veterinary science at the Farm School.

The British Government has purchased two shiploads of common. horses in the North Pacific country for use in South Africa. The horses which went begging for $10 a head last year were sold for $47 each.

The two Arabian stallions which were presented by the Sultan to General Grant when the latter was in Constantinople on his way

around the world, are still alive. One of them, Linden Tree, who is now about twenty-five years old, is owned by General Colby, of Beatrice, Neb.

A series of experiments which have been carried on for some time past by the Agricultural Department at Washington have recently developed a new use for cornstalks, from which a very valuable horse and cattle food can now be made by grinding the dry cornstalks, leaves, and tops to a powder and mixing it with blood or molasses or both. This is pressed into cakes under a

hydraulic press.

C. W. Williams names his horses alphabetically, and by remembering the year he started it is an easy matter to get at the age of any horse he ever bred. Mr. Williams began breeding in 1885. His first foals came in 1886, and their names all began with "A," as Axtell and Allerton. The next year Barnhart came. The name of every foal he raised ten years later begins with "J,” the tenth letter of the alphabet. He has now been in the business fourteen years, and the name of every foal of 1899 begins with

"N."

The representatives of the British Government who have been buying mules in Missouri, Texas, and other Southern States and shipping them to South Africa for use in the campaign against the Boers, have received instructions to purchase 10,000 more good animals. A prominent mule dealer of Austin, Texas, recently received a telegram from one of the representatives, now in New Orleans, offering good prices for as many animals as could be furnished him. The shipment of 2000 mules from Fannin County to South Africa by way of New Orleans began December 14th.

TUBERCULOSIS AMONG BELGIAN CATTLE. Consul Roosevelt, of Brussels, August 22d (Consular Reports, No. 230) transmits the following:

The Minister of Agriculture has invited provincial agricultural societies to make known to farmers and cattle breeders through the medium of lectures, notices, and circulars the means of fighting the increase of tuberculosis among cattle. Their attention is to be notably drawn to the hygiene of stables, as in many districts, especially the Campine and Ardennes, the stables are very badly kept. The peasants are afraid of leaving the doors of the stable open on account of draughts, which they think highly injurious to