I never in my life saw a case of "hybrid" scarlet fever--nor do I believe in it. Scarlet fever and measles are both blood poisons, each one being perfectly separate and distinct from the other. "Hybrid" Scarlet fever is, in my opinion, an utter impossibility. In olden times, when the symptoms of diseases were not so well and carefully distinguished as now, scarlet fever and measles were constantly confounded one with the other, and was frequently said to be "hybrid"--a cross between measles and scarlet fever--to the patient's great detriment and danger, the two diseases being as distinct and separate as their treatment-and management ought to be. 223. _What is the treatment of Scarlet Fever?_ [Footnote: On the 4th of March 1856, I had the honour to read a _Paper on the Treatment of Scarlet Fever_ before the members of Queens College Medico-Chirugical Society, Birmingham--which _Paper_ was afterwards published in the _Association Journal_ (March 15 1856) and in Braithwaite's _Retrospect of Medicine_ (January--June, 1856) and in Rankings _Half Yearly Abstract of the Medical Sciences_ (July--December, 1856), besides in other publications. Moreover the _Paper_ was translated into German, and published in _Canstatts Jahresbericht_, iv 456, 1859] _What to do_--Pray pay attention to my rules, and carry out my directions to the letter--I can then promise, _that if the scarlet fever be neither malignant nor complicated with diphtheria_, the plan I am about to advise will, with God's blessing, be usually successful. What is the first thing to be done? Send the child to bed, throw open the windows, be it winter or summer, and have a thorough ventilation, for the bedroom must be kept cool, I may say cold. Do not be afraid of fresh air, for fresh air, for the first few days, is essential to recovery. _Fresh air, and plenty of it, in scarlet fever, is the best doctor_ a child can have let these words be written legibly on your mind. [Footnote: In the _Times_ of Sept 4, 1863, is the following copied from the _Bridgewater Mercury_-- GROSS SUPERSTITION--In one of the streets of Taunton, there resides a man and his wife who have the care of a child This child was attacked with scarlatina, and to all appearance death was inevitable. A jury of matrons was as it were empanelled, and to prevent the child 'dying hard' all the doors in the house all the drawers, all the boxes all the cupboards were thrown wide open, the keys taken out and the body of the child placed under a beam, whereby a sure, certain, and easy passage into eternity could be secured. Watchers held their vigils throughout the weary night, and in the morning the child, to the surprise of all, did not die, and is now gradually recovering.