931

the law, whilst they deeply interested the PanelConference, did not, however, take up most of itstime. Deficiencies or inaccuracies in the presentmachinery were suitably exposed, and the interestingquestion of collecting statistics was discussed at somelength. It is admitted that the available informationon panel and private practice, its costs, and theirrepayment, is at present deficient, and if a clearercase is to be 1,.--:sented for raising capitation fees andaltering present, conditions it is very desirable thataccurate knowledge should be obtained. In answerto a proposed scheme it was suggested (to misquoteJ. M. Barrie), that the fault, dear Brutus, lay not inour staffs but in ourselves, and it is undoubtedly truethat whatever organisation comes into being for collect-ing statistics must have the real personal cooperationof members of the profession if it is to accomplishanything useful. ----

THE SIZE OF THE THYMUS.

THE real facts about the weight of the thymushave been fairly well known for some time, but thegeneral opinion of morbid anatomists has been always sa good deal coloured by their own experience. Andit is in connexion with the thymus that the rarity ofchances of carefully dissecting the normal human bodysoon after death has been particularly misleading-truly ignorance of the anatomy of the averagepeople who walk about the streets is one of themain obstacles to the further progress of pathologyespecially along statistical lines. In the currentnumber of the Journal of Pathology and Bacteriologywill be found an analysis by Dr. A. B. Bratton ofdata which, collected in Prof. H. M. Turnbull’sInstitute at the London Hospital, probably formas satisfactory a mass of material as can behad. They comprise 337 persons up to 16 yearsof age who died from accidents, burns or scalds,asphyxia, under anaesthesia, or from the imme-diate results of these. In other words, the ordinaryhospital population is excluded, for it is now

realised that it is difficult for a child to get intoa hospital and more difficult for it to reach the post-mortem room without suffering from something whichcauses wasting of the thymus. In line with this,Dr. Bratton shows that the thymus is larger andpersists longer than is commonly supposed. Itincreases rapidly in weight during the first two years,then changes little till the seventh year, when it againincreases to fall slightly after the eleventh year tillthe sixteenth. But more important are two otherconclusions which emerge. In the first place, theweight of the normal thymus at any age is so variablethat it is practically impossible to say in any individualcase whether it is too large or too small. Thus themean weight at 5 years is about 25 g. But thecoefficient of variation of the weights of which thisis the mean is about 35, so that a range from 16 to 34 g.will exclude about a third of the cases, and one cannotsay that any one thymus is abnormally large unlessit weighs fully 42 g. or too small unless it is lessthan 8 g. The second conclusion is that " we knowof no gravimetric evidence that such a condition as, status thymicus ’ exists." It seems time that somecaution should be exercised in finding in a normalthymus a satisfactory cause of a healthy child’sunexpected death. ____

THE LONDON SCHOOL OF HYGIENE ANDTROPICAL MEDICINE.

IT was on August 1st, 1924, that the London Schoolof Tropical Medicine became merged in the newLondon School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.At a meeting of the court of governors on Oct. 22ndsome account was given of the present position andprospects of the school. The site for the new buildingis near the British Museum and has frontages onKeppel-street, Gower-street, and Malet-street. It wasbought by the Ministry of Health in 1923 for 252.610,and it is hoped that on the plans of the architect,Mr. P. Morley Horder, the new home of the school

will be ready for occupation in 1928. One cause ofanxiety to the governors has been removed by thegenerous action of the trustees of the RockefellerFoundation, who have amended their original under-taking, to provide a sum of$2,000,000 by promisingto pay z460,830, which is the value in sterling of themoney offered in 1922. By this the RockefellerFoundation has cancelled the loss due to the gradualrise in the cost of sterling which threatened the schoolwith a diminution in the value of the gift of morethan .850,000 if conversion had been made at therate of exchange now established. Concurrently withthe task of preparing for the building, the EducationCommittee and the Director have given considerablethought to the general educational organisation, andthe Board has recognised the necessity for taking earlysteps to secure the services of piospective heads ofdivisions in order particularly to have their adviceand assistance before the details of accommodationin the new building and of its equipment are finallysettled. A grant has been made by the UniversityGrants Committee for this purpose, and in order tosupplement in some essential respects the teachingfor the Diploma in Public Health, which is now givenat University College, Middlesex Hospital, and at theRoyal Institute of Public Health. Arrangements willalso be made for the equipment and organisation ofthe museum, which will play an important part inthe educational work of the school. The Director,Dr. Andrew Balfour, has issued a report on the workof the Tropical Division for the year 1924-25. Thenumber of students was 227, which was a record, andon the research side there have been importantdevelopments. A field station ha been established inSouthern Rhodesia, in pursuance of the view thatavailable research funds shou Id be a ’plied primarily tosetting up field stations, though fxpditionary workmay be undertaken in excepLionni circunances.Four research studentships in London have beenarranged, and the general courses in tropical medicine;and hygiene will in future be spread over 20 WP’.K&bgr;instead of 13, and much more time will be given toclinical demonstiations and to the teaching of tropicalhygiene. There is no doubt that this will equipstudents far more fully for their work abroad, andthat the already excellent reputation of the schoolwill be enhanced.

____

SHAKESPEARE AND MEDICINE.

ON the occasion of the first social evening of thesession of the Royal Society of Medicine a very largegathering of members and guests assembled at1, Wimpole-street, W., to hear the President, Sir StClairThomson, discourse on Shakespeare as a guide inthe art and practice of medicine. Having introducedhimself as a lecturer, in a neat and witty speech,the President referred to the remarkable knowledgedisplayed by Shakespeare of the history of medicine,to the references to the status of medicine in his ownday, and to many startling clinical pictures scatteredthrough his plays, and then proceeded to consider inhow much the wisdom of the great dramatist couldassist the doctor as a guide in the practice of his art,for " If our virtues did not go forth of us, ’twere allalike as if we had them not." From a large andbrilliantly compiled selection of quotations we mayselect a few, seriatim, which any modern doctormight study with profit. No finer panegyric of themedical profession could be written than that putin the mouth of Cerimon:-

By turning o’er authorities, I have(Together with my practice) made familiarTo me and to my aid, the blest infusionsThat dwell in vegetives, in metals, stones ;And can speak of the disturbances that NatureWorks, and of her cures ; which doth give meA more content in course of true delightThan to be thirsty after tottering honour,Or tie my treasure up in silken bags,To please the fool and death. Pericles, iii., 2.

It is to be noticed that Shakespeare, in these lines,recognises even in those Elizabethan days of super-stition and wholesale drug-taking the vis medicatrix