now in vogue, and among the best operators always the so-called _dry_ method of operating, which means that, so far as possible, nothing not absolutely needed at the moment should come in contact with the field of operation. This has been, in many respects, a great advance over the older antiseptic method, though based upon absolutely the same recognition of causes, being only an improvement in technique. The benefits of Lister's studies, and of that which has grown out of them, are simply incalculable. The surgical infections which, thirty years ago, were the dread of all operating surgeons, have practically disappeared from civil and military hospitals. I esteem myself fortunate in this,--that I have been a living witness of the benefit of change from the old to the new, since when I began my work, in 1876 (over twenty years ago), as a hospital _interne_, in one of the largest hospitals in this country, it happened that during my first winter's experience,--with but one or two exceptions,--every patient operated upon in that hospital, and that by men who were esteemed the peers of any one in their day, died of blood poisoning, while I myself nearly perished from the same disease. This was in an absolutely new building, where expenditure had been lavish; one whose{327} walls were not reeking with germs, as is the case yet in many of the old and well-established institutions. With the introduction of the antiseptic method, during the two years following, this frightful mortality was reduced to the average of the day, and in the same institution to-day is done as good work as that seen anywhere. The same was true without exception in the great hospitals of the Old World; and in Paris, where, thirty years ago, famous surgeons would go from one end of the building to the other, handling one patient after another without ever washing their hands, and where erysipelas and contagion of various kinds were thoroughly distributed, as it were, impartially, now the successors of these very same men, employing modern methods, get results which challenge comparison. The world has seen few extensive wars since the introduction of the antiseptic system; but, in such as have occurred, its incalculable value in military hospitals has been amply demonstrated. The modern soldier is now taught how to make a prompt occlusive and antiseptic dressing of the wound which he may receive upon the battle-field, which, from the moment of its attention, continues to be treated according to the same enlightened method after he reaches the field-hospital, or when sent to the rear; so that men now receive extensive injuries to joints and to viscera, which previously were either promptly fatal, or fatal within a few days from erysipelas and hospital gangrene, from which they recover with useful--often with nearly perfect--limb or function of part restored.