occur in slightly less abundance: 8.006 grammes instead of 8.554. The difference is more particularly in the chlorides and in the carbonate of iron. These two springs contain, besides, a very notable quantity of carbonic acid gas: the Rakoczy, 0.779 gr.; the Pandur, 1.011. A quart As to the Maxbrunn, it is scarcely considered as a mineral source. of its water only contains 3.924 grammes of fixed principles. On the other hand, it is the most gaseous spring of Kissingen. Patients are in the habit of going to the springs at a very early hour in the morning. The signal to awake is given at five o'clock every day, by a band of musicians parading the town and making it resound with their noisy flourishes. What animation and movement at the Rakoczy! The balustrade that surrounds the source is literally besieged. Most patients drink the waters just as they issue forth from the earth, but some cause a portion of the gas to evaporate before drinking them, by dipping their tumblers into water heated at little furnaces that are lighted around the source. They then go and take a quick walk in the alleys of the park, or beneath the long and handsome galleries of the Kursaal, returning in fifteen or twenty minutes to take another glass. This lasts about two hours, during which time it would be thought, from the variety of aspects and idioms, that all the nationalities of the world were assembled at Kissingen. There is the same crowd over again in the evening, from six to eight o'clock, only the Pandur has its turn then. It has the preference in the evening on account of its less energetic properties, which do not disturb the night's rest as the Rakoczy spring would do. The dose in which these waters are drunk is made a good deal a matter of indifference it is generally from three to six glasses in the morning, and from two to four in the evening, but beginning with less. As a general rule, the patient ought not to imbibe more water than the stomach can bear with comfort. The waters of Kissingen, more especially of the Rakoczy spring, are essentially penetrating and laxative. Their therapeutic action is admitted to be remarkable. They are solvent and eliminating, yet at the same time the presence of iron and carbonic acid counterbalances the too debilitating effects of the chlorides. Diseases of the liver, more especially simple hypertrophy, find (says Dr. Constantin James) a most powerful medication in the waters of Kissingen, which by their good effects remind one to a certain extent of the justly celebrated springs of Vichy. Let us remark at the same time, that if the waters of both these localities deserve the title of fondantes, or solvent, this qualification applies itself much more to the results obtained than to the mode of action of the mineral water. We know, in fact, that Vichy is in great part indebted for its faculty of resolving congestions to the manner in which it disassociates the materials which have congregated to give origin to the said congestions; now Kissingen disassociates the matters in the same manner, but it also further eliminates these materials by the greater activity which it imparts to all the secretions, and in particular to the intestinal secretions. I think, then, that it is not wandering into the errors of a merely humoral medicine to signalise this depurative action of the waters of Kissingen as materially favouring their solvent action. These waters are most useful, then, in all cases of congestion, whether of the liver, spleen, kidneys, uterus, or any other organ. In gout they are most useful, when the arthritic principle is active in the abdominal viscera, producing what the Germans call venosity, and the French ob struction. Bathing is also a good deal practised at Kissingen, both with the waters of the Pandur and of the Solensprudel, a very remarkable saline intermittent spring. A splendid thermal establishment has been instituted at this latter spring, and associated with it is a complete bathing arsenal. Kissingen is a very pleasant place. The Kursaal, built in the style called Neo-Germanic, invented by the Chevalier de Gaertner, presents a magnificent colonnade 800 feet in length, and which extends by its right wing to the Rakoczy. In the centre of the edifice there is a capacious saloon. The environs of Kissingen also present pleasant walks, and one of the favourite spectacles is the action of the intermittent spring. The artesian spring of Schonborn also presents the rarer phenomenon of bursting out in a high column of water whenever the sounding-rod is removed. Patients have not far to go from Kissingen to get a tonic should the saline waters prove too debilitating. There are excellent ferruginous and gaseous springs at Bocklet close by. The spring called Bruckenaur, at Bruckenau, in Bavaria, is generally deemed to be one of the purest of all the ferro-gaseous springs in Europe. It was much frequented by Louis of Bavaria, who had a magnificent Kursaal erected there, but it has gone out of vogue since it has been no longer frequented by royalty. The springs of Heilbrunn, also in Bavaria, are rich in iodine and bromine, like the waters of Challes and Wildegg, and are said to be positively "des sources amaigrissantes." Dr. C. James says that he has himself seen persons who were troubled with fat get lean without their health suffering materially. Waters of such potency must, however, have some effect upon the glandular structures, and cannot be too cautiously taken or too strictly watched. It is obvious, for example, that if some springs are celebrated for their fecundating virtues, these, as also indeed most alkaline waters, would have precisely an opposite effect. The springs of Frankenheil, in Bavaria, present the peculiarity of a combination of carbonate of soda, iodine, and sulphur, such as is not met with elsewhere, and that in proportions which are considered to be happily adapted to enhance their efficacy; for the principle must not be lost sight of that the therapeutic value of a mineral water is not solely determined by the amount of substances held in solution, but by the facility with which these substances are absorbed by our organs and afterwards assimilated. Hence these waters are of great value in certain exanthematous, scrofulous, scorbutic, and other eruptions, as also in cases of hypertrophy of the liver and spleen. Wildbad, situated in one of the most picturesque valleys of the Black Forest, has several mineral sources, very slightly saline, but which are much in vogue as baths. Nowhere is the system of the piscina better understood or more pleasantly and effectually carried out. It is no longer the narrow cell, the small and inconvenient bath, only fit for King Procrustes, a mixture of hot and cold water, often made at hap-hazard, a total absence of frictions, no couch for repose, an abrupt transition from the heat of the bath to the cold air, without any other protection than a little linen, neither warmed nor aired, as is the case in most modern baths; every piscina at Wildbad has its own source, all repose on native granite, having a bottom of fine and light sand, which forms a kind of soft carpeting, upon which the patient can luxuriate in a reclining posture. The mineral waters make their way bubbling through this bed of occur in slightly less abundance: 8.006 grammes instead of 8.554. The difference is more particularly in the chlorides and in the carbonate of iron. These two springs contain, besides, a very notable quantity of carbonic acid gas: the Rakoczy, 0.779 gr.; the Pandur, 1.011. A quart As to the Maxbrunn, it is scarcely considered as a mineral source. of its water only contains 3.924 grammes of fixed principles. On the other hand, it is the most gaseous spring of Kissingen. Patients are in the habit of going to the springs at a very early hour in the morning. The signal to awake is given at five o'clock every day, by a band of musicians parading the town and making it resound with their noisy flourishes. What animation and movement at the Rakoczy! The balustrade that surrounds the source is literally besieged. Most patients drink the waters just as they issue forth from the earth, but some cause a portion of the gas to evaporate before drinking them, by dipping their tumblers into water heated at little furnaces that are lighted around the source. They then go and take a quick walk in the alleys of the park, or beneath the long and handsome galleries of the Kursaal, returning in fifteen or twenty minutes to take another glass. This lasts about two hours, during which time it would be thought, from the variety of aspects and idioms, that all the nationalities of the world were assembled at Kissingen. There is the same crowd over again in the evening, from six to eight o'clock, only the Pandur has its turn then. It has the preference in the evening on account of its less energetic properties, which do not disturb the night's rest as the Rakoczy spring would do. The dose in which these waters are drunk is made a good deal a matter of indifference it is generally from three to six glasses in the morning, and from two to four in the evening, but beginning with less. As a general rule, the patient ought not to imbibe more water than the stomach can bear with comfort. The waters of Kissingen, more especially of the Rakoczy spring, are essentially penetrating and laxative. Their therapeutic action is admitted to be remarkable. They are solvent and eliminating, yet at the same time the presence of iron and carbonic acid counterbalances the too debilitating effects of the chlorides. Diseases of the liver, more especially simple hypertrophy, find (says Dr. Constantin James) a most powerful medication in the waters of Kissingen, which by their good effects remind one to a certain extent of the justly celebrated springs of Vichy. Let us remark at the same time, that if the waters of both these localities deserve the title of fondantes, or solvent, this qualification applies itself much more to the results obtained than to the mode of action of the mineral water. We know, in fact, that Vichy is in great part indebted for its faculty of resolving congestions to the manner in which it disassociates the materials which have congregated to give origin to the said congestions; now Kissingen disassociates the matters in the same manner, but it also further eliminates these materials by the greater activity which it imparts to all the secretions, and in particular to the intestinal secretions. I think, then, that it is not wandering into the errors of a merely humoral medicine to signalise this depurative action of the waters of Kissingen as materially favouring their solvent action. These waters are most useful, then, in all cases of congestion, whether of the liver, spleen, kidneys, uterus, or any other organ. In gout they are most useful, when the arthritic principle is active in the abdominal viscera, producing what the Germans call venosity, and the French obstruction. Bathing is also a good deal practised at Kissingen, both with the waters of the Pandur and of the Solensprudel, a very remarkable saline intermittent spring. A splendid thermal establishment has been instituted at this latter spring, and associated with it is a complete bathing arsenal. Kissingen is a very pleasant place. The Kursaal, built in the style called Neo-Germanic, invented by the Chevalier de Gaertner, presents a magnificent colonnade 800 feet in length, and which extends by its right wing to the Rakoczy. In the centre of the edifice there is a capacious saloon. The environs of Kissingen also present pleasant walks, and one of the favourite spectacles is the action of the intermittent spring. The artesian spring of Schonborn also presents the rarer phenomenon of bursting out in a high column of water whenever the sounding-rod is removed. Patients have not far to go from Kissingen to get a tonic should the saline waters prove too debilitating. There are excellent ferruginous and gaseous springs at Bocklet close by. The spring called Bruckenaur, at Bruckenau, in Bavaria, is generally deemed to be one of the purest of all the ferro-gaseous springs in Europe. It was much frequented by Louis of Bavaria, who had a magnificent Kursaal erected there, but it has gone out of vogue since it has been no longer frequented by royalty. The springs of Heilbrunn, also in Bavaria, are rich in iodine and bromine, like the waters of Challes and Wildegg, and are said to be positively "des sources amaigrissantes." Dr. C. James says that he has himself seen persons who were troubled with fat get lean without their health suffering materially. Waters of such potency must, however, have some effect upon the glandular structures, and cannot be too cautiously taken or too strictly watched. It is obvious, for example, that if some springs are celebrated for their fecundating virtues, these, as also indeed most alkaline waters, would have precisely an opposite effect. The springs of Frankenheil, in Bavaria, present the peculiarity of a combination of carbonate of soda, iodine, and sulphur, such as is not met with elsewhere, and that in proportions which are considered to be happily adapted to enhance their efficacy; for the principle must not be lost sight of that the therapeutic value of a mineral water is not solely determined by the amount of substances held in solution, but by the facility with which these substances are absorbed by our organs and afterwards assimilated. Hence these waters are of great value in certain exanthematous, scrofulous, scorbutic, and other eruptions, as also in cases of hypertrophy of the liver and spleen. Wildbad, situated in one of the most picturesque valleys of the Black Forest, has several mineral sources, very slightly saline, but which are much in vogue as baths. Nowhere is the system of the piscina better understood or more pleasantly and effectually carried out. It is no longer the narrow cell, the small and inconvenient bath, only fit for King Procrustes, a mixture of hot and cold water, often made at hap-hazard, a total absence of frictions, no couch for repose, an abrupt transition from the heat of the bath to the cold air, without any other protection than a little linen, neither warmed nor aired, as is the case in most modern baths; every piscina at Wildbad has its own source, all repose on native granite, having a bottom of fine and light sand, which forms a kind of soft carpeting, upon which the patient can luxuriate in a reclining posture. The mineral waters make their way bubbling through this bed of sand, keeping both it and the waters of the bath in a constant state of pleasant agitation. Besides this perpetual renewal of the water, every piscina is emptied after each séance, and the sand is washed with an abundant stream. A bath called "of cleanliness," is a condition for admission which is essential to every bather. There are eight of these piscinas, four for men and four for females, but there is one which is very richly decorated, called the Furstenbad, or Prince's Bath, in which the two sexes bathe at alternate hours. The baths of Wildbad are essentially tonic. Dr. Kerner says of them that "they make old men young again, and they restore to those who are exhausted by toil and fatigue new strength and new vigour." Dr. C. James asserts that they have a perfectly marvellous effect in diseases of the spine. The baths of Liebenzell, in the same neighbourhood, are more highly mineralised than those of Wildbad, yet their action is not so potent. The springs of Deinach, also in the Black Forest, are rich in carbonic acid and some salts. The springs of Canstadt, near Stuttgard, in Wirtemberg, resemble those of Kissingen in their properties, and may even be preferred to them where a more rapid determination towards the bowels is desiderated. The thermal springs of Gastein, near Saltzburg, in Austria, are among the least known and yet the most important in Central Germany. The site is itself remarkable, the springs burst forth from granitic rocks at the fall of Enz, one of the most magnificent in Europe, at the extremity of the Pass of Lueg and of the perilous defile of Klamm. A gallery of crystal has been thrown across the waterfall, and the vapour of the springs may be seen ascending from the foam beneath. These waters, used chiefly as baths, are tonic, stimulating, and essentially aphrodisiac. There is some mystery associated with these peculiar properties. The old alchemist Paracelsus declared that they were indebted for these virtues to the presence of arsenic. Dr. C. James countenances these views. There are mines of copper, gold, and silver, he says, highly arsenical in the neighbouring valley of Bockstein. There is even a lake called Pockart, more commonly known in the country as the Poisonous Lake, the waters of which contain so much arsenic that no fish can live in them, no plants grow on their banks, and any living creature that ventures to drink of them dies soon afterwards. Add to this that if taken internally the waters of Gastein always cause nausea or sickness. It is to be remarked that the presence of arsenic in mineral springs is a comparatively recent discovery. The presence of this active mineral and powerful therapeutic agent was first discovered by M. Tripier in Algeria. This was followed up by M. Walchner detecting its presence in the waters of Wiesbaden, and soon after that it was found, as in the case of iodine, that it was in reality commonly present in all mineral waters. M. Chevalier found it in eight mineral waters in France, and these include all the most celebrated-Vichy, Plombières, Bagnères, &c. We have thus (Dr. C. James remarks) a new principle come to take its place among the constituent elements of mineral waters. The perfect harmlessness of these, demonstrated by the experience of ages, attests that the arsenic which they hold in solution does not impart to them any poisonous properties. But does this arsenic play any part in their therapeutic action? There is the great |