BY CARROLL DUNHAM, M. D., NEWBURGH, N. Y.

The late Dr. Wahle, of Rome, one of the most distinguished of Hahnemann's own pupils, and well known by his acquirements in the science of Materia Medica, considered the proving of Mezereum, which was first published in the fourth volume of the Archiv, to be both erroneous and defective.

It is no very uncommon thing to find a Homoeopath who considers a portion or the whole of our Materia Medica defective. But the peculiarity which distinguished Wahle was this: whenever he saw an error or a defect, he thought it his duty rather to go to work and correct the error or supply the defect, than simply to expose them and denounce the Materia Medica, taking credit meanwhile for his own acuteness. Accordingly he instituted a new proving of Mezereum, of which a number of the symptoms are here given. They were given me by his son, the present Dr. Wahle, from whom we may expect a volume of his father's provings when peace and liberty shall prevail in the Papal States!

1. The head is covered with a thick, leather-like crust, under which thick and white pus collects here and there, and the hair is glued together.
2. On the head, great, elevated white scabs, under which ichor collects in quantity, and which begins to be offensive and to breed vermin.
3. The scabs on the head look chalky and extend to the eyebrows and to the nape of the neck.
4. Grey, earthy complexion.
5. The child scratches the face continually; it becomes covered with blood. The face and forehead are red and hot, with great restlessness and peevishness. In the night the child scratches its face so that the bed is covered with blood in the morning; and the face is covered with a scab which the child keeps constantly tearing off anew, and on the spots thus left raw, large “fat” pustules form.
6. The ichor from the scratched face excoriates other parts.
7. The skin of the face is of a deep inflammatory redness, and the eruption is “fat” and moist. (Impetigo).
8. A honey-like scab around the mouth.

9. Sticking in the kidney and pain as if torn.

10. Menses too frequent and lasting too long.

11. In the larynx a tickling as if with a feather, which causes coughing. When he has eaten anything he must cough until he vomits it up again. The vomited matter is sour or bitter.
12. Cough with retching and scratching, or scraping in the pit of the throat as if something sweet lay there which cannot be coughed up.
13. Between 6 and 7 A.M. moderate cough — at no other time.
14. Dry cough day and night, with emaciation and loss of strength, with tensive pains across the thorax.
15. Sticking in the right side of the thorax.

(Note by Dr. Wahle. — Mezereum cures no small proportion of cases of Whooping cough.)

16. Between the Glutaei, four large scabs surrounded by dark redness and on hardened bases.
17. Itching in the hollow of the right knee.
18. Pains in the periosteum of the long bones, especially the tibiae, worse at night and in bed; at this time the least touch is intolerable.
19. The whole shin is covered with elevated white scabs.

20. Itching and burning in the arms and legs, and on scratching, violent stickings as with needles.
21. The fiery red inflammation of the knuckles of the left foot extends over the instep and calf, and hard tubercles form in the cellular tissue which itch on the slightest touch, and violent burning pains ensue.

22. Blotches break out over the whole body.
23. Eruption — pale red, itching after scratching. The scabs are adherent and depressed in the centre.
24. Ulcers, covered with thick, whitish, yellow scabs, under which thick yellow pus collects.
25. Throbbing around the ulcer, and, encircling it, a bright red areola with burning pain.
26. In the ulcers, burning pain in the evening in bed.
27. Around the ulcers, fiery red areolae, shining like a mirror.
28. Vesicles appear around the ulcers, itching violently and burning like fire. After eight days these vesicles dry up, leaving scabs, the tearing off of which causes great pain and retards the healing.
29. The parts affected, feel on being touched, as if swollen, which is not the case.
30. Linen or charpic sticks to the ulcers; when it is torn away they bleed.

These symptoms suggest at once the applicability of Mezereum to Crusta lactea, to various forms of pure Impetigo, and to some of those mercurial or mercurio-syphilitic ulcers on the lower extremities which often prove so difficult to cure. I have frequently had occasion to witness the prompt curative action of Mezereum in these affections, in which I have generally used the 200 potency. This has proved efficacious in cases in which the lower dilutions have been inert.

The characteristics of the Mezereum skin-disease are well defined in the above symptoms; viz:

Itching occurring in the-evening when in bed, aggravated and changed to burning by touch or by scratching. Sensitiveness to touch.

Ulcers with an areola, sensitive and easily bleeding, painful at night — the pus tends to form an adherent scab, under which a quantity of pus collects. A close relationship is shown by these symptoms to exist between Mezereum and Arsenicum, Asafetida, and Mercurius.