Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 1.djvu/125

 disorder. Though I have, for some years back, paid especial attention to the urinary secretion in children, during disease, I have only lately succeeded in detecting this form of disease in early life. The last case was that of a boy, æt. 3½ years, who, but a few months before, had slowly recovered from the measles, and was beginning to regain his strength. Without any apparent cause, his appetite failed, his stools were irregular, and the symptoms assumed the form of remit tent fever. No worms were seen in his stools, and the urine was, for some time, little more than common. Nor did it appear of a chyliferous character, and the quantity not, perhaps, so excessive as is recorded by Dr. Venables. About five pints were said to have been voided in one day. Many weeks elapsed before the appetite returned, and the stools became natural. He was relieved by the use of the nitric acid, and subsequently by the sulphate of quinine. The local treatment consisted in the frequent application of spir. terebinth, to the lumbar region, and, occasionally, small blisters to the same part.

Nor should I, in stating the peculiarities of infantile diseases, overlook the singular susceptibility to morbid action in the organs of respiration, at that tender age. Not, indeed, that the diseases of those parts are more numerous or more complicated than in after-life, but the delicate texture of these organs, and their yet imperfect development, tend to impart certain peculiarities to disease. To this should be added that nervous excitability, and extreme irritability, of fibre, so peculiar to this stage of life. Nor, among the least important of these organs, should