However gentle they may be, their effect is uniformly and most decidedly noxious. In the first and acute period of this affection of the alimentary canal, it is almost impossible to quiet the disturbance which a purgative occasions. A remedy which ought never to be neglected is the warm bath. It will be found a most powerful coadjutor in restraining the violence of the spasms, and in moderating the perturbed action of the stomach. But the greatest difficulty will be found in treating the second or chronic stage of the complaint, when the symptoms we have mentioned as characterising it are prolonged in a mitigated form. I am inclined to believe, that in this state there is actual ulceration of the mucous membrane of the intestines. I have only seen one case of this kind, of which I have given the history above. But several similar instances have been communicated to me, and they must be of frequent occurrence wherever iodine is used ignorantly and rashly. In all those cases of chronic affection of the alimentary canal, with the particular history of which I have been able to become acquainted, the symptoms differed widely from those which marked the accession of the disease. Instead of the small vacillating pulse of the first period of the complaint, it was bounding and firm, the extremities were no longer cold, nor the system collapsed; the diarrhœa had assumed a dysenteric form, the fæces being retained, and the dejections consisting chiefly of maturated mucus or pus. In such cases, I believe, the conjoined operation of aperient medicines and opium will be found most advantageous in quieting the symptoms. By this plan at least I succeeded best in relieving the single case that has yet occurred to me.