Instances have occurred where balls have lodged in the cerebrum without giving rise to serious symptoms of danger for a long time. Such cases might lead to throwing surgeons off their guard in making a prognosis, from supposition that the ball by some accident had not lodged. The case of a soldier wounded by a ball in the posterior part of the side of the head is mentioned by Mr. Guthrie. The wound healed, and the man returned to duty; a year afterward he got drunk, and died suddenly. The ball was found in a sac lying in the corpus callosum. Another soldier wounded at Waterloo had a similar recovery, and also died after intoxication. The ball was found deeply lodged in a cyst in the posterior part of the brain. An artillery soldier was wounded, in the Crimea, by a rifle–ball, which entered near the inner angle of the left superciliary ridge. The wound progressed without a bad symptom until a month afterward, when coma came on, and death shortly followed. The ball was found in a sac, in which pus also was contained, at the base of the left anterior lobe of the brain. =Treatment.=—The treatment of the various kinds of fractures from gunshot, and their complications, may be considered together. Formerly, a gunshot wound of the head was supposed to be in itself a sufficient indication for the use of the trephine; indeed, even where no fracture was caused, an opening was recommended by comparatively recent surgeons to be made in the cranium, to meet symptoms which might be expected to result. Modern surgeons, however, generally have made use of the trephine only when there was reason for concluding that depressed bone was leading to _permanent_ interruption of cerebral function, or that an abscess had formed within reach, and was capable of evacuation. Preventive trephining has been proved to be useless, as well as dangerous, and is no longer an admissible operation. The tendency of the most recent experience has been to limit the practice of trephining to the narrowest sphere; and when the very great difficulty of making accurate diagnosis in these cases is considered,—whether as to the distinguishing signs of compression; the precise seat of its cause, if the compression exist; the space over which this cause, when ascertained, may extend; its persistent or temporary character; its complications; and certain dangers connected with the operation itself,—no wonder need be excited that this tendency should exist. Besides, the numerous cases which have now been noted where bone has evidently been depressed, but the brain has accommodated itself to the pressure without serious disability being caused, or where compression from effusion has been removed by absorption under proper constitutional treatment, are further causes of hesitation in respect to trephining. In the Surgical Report of the Crimean Campaign, it is stated that the trephine was only successfully applied in four cases (and none of these were from rifle–balls) during the whole war;