It may appear strange that tinnitus aurium, or noise in the ear, is not enumerated among the affections specified in this classification; but I have long since convinced myself that it is but a symptom, and not a special disease; and so variable an attendant is it, that like muscæ volitantes in the eye, which it very much resembles, we cannot, as yet, accurately determine what are the particular morbid states which is symptomatic of it, or accompanies. The value of tinnitus aurium, as a means of diagnosing diseases of the brain and diseases of the ear, as well as the peculiarity of the sensations accompanying certain morbid conditions of these organs, would form a very valuable addition to our pathological knowledge.

BIBLIOGRAPHIC NOTICES.

Remarks on the Use of Vivisection as a Means of scientific Research; in a Letter addressed to the Earl of Caernarvon, President of the Society for preventing Cruelty to Animals. By RICHARD JAMESON. 1844. Pamphlet.

THIS is a very clever letter, defending the expediency of performing experiments on living animals to elucidate physiology and surgery, and to improve the manual dexterity of the surgical operator. It was written in consequence of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals having passed a severe censure on those members of the Profession who had performed experiments on live animals. We cannot wonder, where the utility of the end is often so obscure, that the casual observer should view with disgust and abhorrence the mutilations which the practised physiological investigator performs, with such apparent sang froid, on animals that have such claims on our sympathies as the faithful dog or the noble horse-when, even to those who see clearly the end and aim of those slicings of the brain, those prickings of the nerves, those incisions down to lungs, heart, or intestines, the sight is repugnant, and the science of medicine appears in a garb far from attractive, when it demands the sacrifice of such hecatombs of poor, inoffensive brutes, by means which would appear to the uninitiated wanton devices of cruelty to increase the natural pain attending dissolution, by wounds short of death, by tearings and breakings of limbs, by starvation, or the exhibition of deleterious food, and by the excruciating tortures of poison. But most men of science will allow that medicine has been materially benefited by experiments on living animals, and that Cooper, Harvey, Haller, Hunter, and others have arrived at important truths by such means, unattainable by any other. But while we allow this, and fully agree with Mr. Jameson, that bad as the means may seemingly be, they are often fully justified by the aim to be attained, we cannot but feel, that, in Paris especially, it has been overdone, and that the return has not been commensurate with the outlay

of animal suffering and animal life. And though the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals have gone rather far, as most enthusiasts do, yet as enthusiasm generally obtains some portion of its object, so this Society will doubtless have some effect in making the ignorant pause before they cut.

Mr. Jameson is a very hard hitter, and we think our readers will not fail to be amused with the manner in which he handles the Rev. Mr. Styles. With regard to the great exaggeration of the number of experiments performed on living animals, he

says:

"Foremost in the list of exaggerators, I must place the Rev. John Styles, D. D. He is the author of an Essay which gained a prize of £100, as being the best out of thirty-four papers sent into the Committee of your Society, and may, therefore, fairly be regarded as the chosen champion of its cause; I shall bestow as much space as the limits of this letter will allow, in exposing some of his most glaring misrepresentations. But few words are necessary to do this, for the statements refute themselves by their very absurdity.

"He informs the public, that every surgeon's apprentice thinks himself entitled to find his way into the arcana of nature, by scalping cats and rabbits to see where their brains lie.' The transactions,' he adds,' of the college of the medical craft in this sense would convict them before a convocation of Ashantees.' Very likely-and why? Because the Ashantees, like Dr. Styles himself, are unable, from ignorance of physiology, to appreciate the end for which vivisections are employed. Supposing that the Ashantees would be shocked at experiments on living animals, how much more horrible would they think a surgical operation performed on one of themselves! What needless cruelty to wrench a fine firm tooth out of a poor child's jaw; or stab him in the arm with a poisoned weapon; or make a gash in the thigh of a man who has only a little swelling behind his knee; or, when a person has been stunned by a fall, what wanton barbarity to cut his scalp and saw off a piece of his skull ! How could such cruel experiments answer any good end?' would be the wise remark of some Ashantee Doctor of Divinity.

"Where Dr. Styles collected his information about the 'surgeon's apprentices' I know not, but it looks exceedingly like a hoax practised on his credulity by some waggish student, who thought to satisfy the Doctor's love of the marvellous, by telling him horrible stories of what they did at the hospital.' I will give one or two proofs how excessive his credulity is. He gravely asserts, that oxen are compelled to travel for many days without food, their hoofs worn off, and on bleeding stumps." He might just as well have said at once, with their heads worn off." The only instance at all parallel to this of the hoofs, is to be found in the Surprising Life and Adventures of Baron Munchausen.' He had a famous greyhound that ran till he wore his legs away, but was not useless even then, for being a staunch dog, says the Baron, he made a capital pointer.

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