sis is capable of
inducing. In the history of the case the phimosis and the resulting
retention in the preputial cavity no doubt were the causes of the
calculus found there; and the succeeding calculi and abnormal condition
of the urinary organs, we can safely assume, were a subsequent creation
to that in the prepuce. The case is taken from Henoch's "Lectures on
Diseases of Children," Wood Library edition, page 256, and is as
follows:--

"A. L., aged two, admitted November 28, 1877. Quite well nourished, but
pale. Complete retention of urine for two days; slight redness and
marked oedema of penis, scrotum, and perineum. The foreskin cannot be
retracted, on account of phimosis. Abdomen distended, hard, and
sensitive, the dilated bladder extending a few fingers' breadth above
the symphysis. In order to introduce the catheter, it was first
necessary to operate upon the phimosis, during which a calculus, which
completely occluded the meatus, was removed. The catheter, when
introduced into the bladder, removed a quantity of cloudy urine. The
oedema, rapidly disappeared under applications of lead-wash, but on
November 29th vomiting and diarrhoea occurred during the night, with
rapid collapse; December 1st, death. Autopsy: In the bladder, a
sulphur-yellow stone, as large as a hen's egg, completely filling the
organ; similar calculi, from the size of a pea to that of a bean, in the
pelvis of the left kidney; right kidney normal."

In the above case, the oedema of the penis, scrotum, and perineum was as
much a result of the distension of the bladder by the retained urine
interfering with the return circulation from the oedematous parts as the
different appearances of diseased conditions were a result of the
primary phimosis; yet this case, if seen during its early infancy, when
probably the contraction of the preputial orifice was as yet not so
well marked, would have been pronounced one in which it would be
needless and barbarous to perform circumcision upon. We would most
assuredly have to wander aimlessly and unprofitably in the region of
speculation to build up the etiology of the above-related case and reach
the culmination there found, unless we accept the one that it was all,
from first to last, the result of the phimosis.

Jonah, pitched overboard at sea to appease the tempest and swallowed by
the whale, became convinced finally that he had better return to Nineveh
to preach reform; while Pharaoh would not let the chi