BY AD. LIPPE, M. D., PHILADELPHIA, PA.

After some weeks of varied indisposition and much mental anxiety, Dr. R., aged 35 years, was taken ill on the 22d day of October, 1861. He felt great general prostration; a great heat all over; a strong desire to sleep, with sleeplessness; pain in all his limbs; a want of appetite and aversion to light. He took for these symptoms one dose of Bell.²⁰⁰ The following morning, the 23d, he was visited by Dr. Hering and myself, and the following symptoms were ascertained by our examination: he had not slept the night previous, his mind was too active, but they were always the same ideas which disturbed him; a continued hacking cough, from a tickling in the bronchial tubes, aggravated and excited by motion or talking; he raised at times tough green mucus; the cough causing violent stitches in the head; the head pained all over and felt numb. The tongue was coated white, the edges showing the impression of the teeth; pulse small, empty and frequent, vacillating between 94 and 106; no appetite; very little thirst; utter prostration of strength; very low spirited and taciturn; no passage from the bowels for forty-eight hours; urinating but seldom, and the discharge very scanty. There could be no doubt that a very serious disease was developing itself, and that we had to expect a case of typhoid fever. As the Doctor had taken Belladonna on the previous evening without any result as yet, we concluded to wait until evening before prescribing so that we might be certain that Belladonna was not developing any curative or other symptoms. We met at five, p.m.. and found all the symptoms we had observed in the morning aggravated, the tongue was whiter, the edges softer, the cough more frequent, the pulse not as full, the prostration greater. The patient received four pellets of Calcarea carb.²⁰⁰ (Lehrman), and another dose of Calcarea carb. was left with the direction to be given in a solution of water, should there be no improvement in six hours. The next morning it was found that no further medicine except the one dose administered at five, p.m., had been given as the patient had slept soon after taking it. The cough had become less frequent and the head much relieved; the pulse was softer and fuller; the skin moist; an increased expectoration of green phlegm had much relieved him from the incessant tickling cough; the tongue was less coated and clearing off from the edges. He continued to improve from day to day; five days after taking the one dose of Calcarea carb. he was able to sit up, his appetite returned and he has been quite well since.

Calcarea carb. cured this case because it was the only remedy that had similar symptoms among the provings. — The utter sleeplessness from over-activity of the mind, the same ideas always disturbing the patient correspond only with Calcarea carb.; while the tickling, hacking cough aggravated by talking and motion corresponds with Calc. carb., Chin., Phos., Silicea, etc. In this case no aggravation appeared after the exhibition of the medicine, but that invariably beneficial sleep, indicating that the true curative remedy had taken effect, and that an improvement was to be anticipated. The improvement was gradual and steady leaving Dr. R. without the sequel of disease and medicine, and in the possession of full health.

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Mrs. L. aged 45 years, had been suffering from diarrhea for ten days during the hot days of August. The diarrhea commenced in the following manner, was painless bat was relieved only for a short time by Sulph.²⁰⁰, a few days later a watery discharge became more frequent in the evening and caused a great deal of burning for which Phos. was given with but little relief. On the tenth day the following symptoms were present: watery diarrhea, grey, oftener during the day, worse after eating, the discharge passing with a gush; before the discharge, cutting pains in the upper part of the abdomen, the desire to stool very sudden and after the stool burning and soreness in the anus and rectum which were worse in the evening and during the forepart of the night; after the stool great weakness, sensation of sinking in the lower part of the abdomen and frequent perspiration. One dose of Nat. carb.²⁰⁰ was given in the morning. About ten minutes after taking the medicine a discharge came on very suddenly with not much straining, consisting of green lumps and white mucus; the next discharge was brown and in a few days the normal condition returned.

Nat. carb. has not all the symptoms related very strongly pointed out under the provings, but no other remedy has all the symptoms of the case. The time of the day is not strongly pointed out in the provings, but Nat. carb. has aggravation of diarrhea after eating. See Hahnemann's Chronic Diseases: symptoms 485 and 486, the violent gushing stool is found, Ibid 494, and reads “violent sudden desire to go to stool, followed by a liquid discharge, which passes and gushes with violence from the patient.” The burning and soreness in the rectum is Ibid: 413 and 414. The remedy which has next to Natrum carb. the greatest similarity with the symptoms of the disease is Croton tiglium; but Croton tiglium has more diarrhea after drinking, and also motion always increases the desire to evacuate; the gushing discharges and the burning after stool in the anus and rectum arc characteristic of both remedies.

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