glish Government the
adoption of the strychnine treatment of snakebite in India, and
that this adoption will not be subject once more to the doubtful
result of experiments on the lower animals, which, according to
newspaper reports, were contemplated at Calcutta as a test. It
would have been deplorable to see more precious time lost in these
experiments, whilst the only proper subjects for experiments, the
unfortunate natives, are perishing by thousands. The step taken by
Sir Joseph Fayrer does honour both to his head and his heart, and
if his recommendation is accepted and vigorously carried out it
will still further increase the debt of gratitude which India owes
to British rule, and with regard to its terrible snake plague, to
the one Englishman who of all others has distinguished himself by
an almost life long study of the subject and indefatigable labours
for its alleviation.

Her Majesty the Queen has also been pleased most graciously to interest
herself in this subject. Memorialised by the writer before Sir J.
Fayrer's recommendation to the British Government, above alluded to, was
known to him, our gracious Sovereign, ever intent on the welfare of her
subjects, has resolved on having the writer's method thoroughly tried in
India, and communicated this her intention to him in a despatch from the
Secretary of State for the Colonies to His Excellency the Governor of
Victoria, dated 11th Nov., 1892, inviting him, at the same time, to
forward any proposals he may have to make direct to the Secretary to the
Government of India in the Home Department; and thus adding one more to
the many noble deeds that mark her benevolent, long, and glorious
reign.

UNSUCCESSFUL CASES.

Considering the newness of the strychnine treatment it would be folly to
expect that the conditions necessary to insure success should have been
observed in every case, and that every practitioner should at once have
made himself familiar with it and the theory on which it is founded.
Hence a few failures were unavoidable. Of these a record has been kept,
but for obvious reasons the writer withholds it here. To give names and
dates would be invidious, though the opponents of the treatment have
exultingly pointed to the few deaths that have occurred as palpable
proofs of its uselessness, some of them even going so far as to ascribe
these deaths to the direct action of the antidote. Ther