In erythema, the mere outer surface of the skin only being slightly affected, and not to any very great extent, advantage sometimes results from the application of nitrate of silver. A strong solution may be pencilled upon the part, or, after being wetted, the affected surface may be gently rubbed over with the solid caustic. The pain and uneasy sensations in the part being thereby diminished or removed, and extension of the disease seeming to be arrested. Discoloration caused by such practice is of little consequence, as desquamation must follow. It is questionable how far it may be safe to apply lunar caustic to any extensively inflamed surface, more especially of the head and face, lest metastasis should occur. The inflammatory action in the skin is subdued by the application, whilst it may advance, in the cellular tissue, to suppuration and sloughing, if other means are not adopted; and from the hard and blackened state of the cuticle, the condition of the subjacent parts is not readily perceived. The remedy is only applicable to erythema, and most advantageously as a means of bounding it. The line should be drawn at some distance from the affected tissues; and if so, it is seldom that the disease oversteps it. Local abstraction of blood, by puncture or incision, proves exceedingly beneficial in cases of erysipelas, whatever its degree. It must be borne in mind by the practitioner, when called to treat the disease, that the state of parts is very various, and this may depend upon the original nature of the disease, upon its site or duration. The surface of the skin only may be affected—that and the subjacent cellular tissue may be involved, gorged with serous, lymphatic, or purulent infiltration—there may exist great tension of the parts, with a sloughy state of the cellular tissue, established in addition to suppuration—and again, there may be infiltration of the subfascial and intermuscular tissues, leading ultimately to exposure and exfoliation of bones or disease of articulations. From inattention to these circumstances, the treatment being often directed to the name of the disease, great discrepancy of opinion, as to the most proper local management, has arisen; there has accordingly been a controversy as to whether the blood should be drawn from mere punctures from limited incisions, or from long gashes extending from one joint to another.