Some time after the introduction of iodine into practice, a few cases of severe spasmodic affection of the stomach and bowels occurred. They were attended with violent and incessant vomiting, excruciating pain of stomach and bowels, strong spasms of the back and legs. The tongue was commonly furred, and the bowels sometimes violently purged, at other times obstinately constipated. The pulse was generally extremely frequent, small and depressed—the eyes sunk and hollow—the countenance ghastly and pale. These accidents were usually imputed by the patients to the iodine they had taken. The Physicians by whose advice the medicine had been given, would not allow this origin of the disease, till a repetition of similar cases determined that the sufferers were right. The vomiting, pain of the bowels, and the cramps of the legs, are extremely severe. They are also with the greatest difficulty allayed, continuing sometimes for many days, and renewed during weeks, and even months, after taking food. The legs sometimes swell in the first instance, and afterwards become rapidly thin and meagre. There is another symptom, which, though common to almost all diseases, is peculiarly the sign of this. The emaciation which attends this irregular action of iodine is so rapid and so extreme as to strike terror into the minds both of patients and physician. A magistrate of Geneva, high in office, robust, corpulent, and of an athletic form, was so much reduced in flesh, that he was not known by his oldest acquaintances. I have seen emaciation, in one case, proceed to such an extent in a short time as is almost incredible. A young English lady, at a boarding-school, at Paris, had for some time been afflicted with goitre. Her brother was prosecuting the study of medicine there. With the characteristic zeal of a young man, as soon as he heard of the wonderful effects of iodine, he determined on making trial of its powers on his sister. He did not find much difficulty in persuading her to become the subject of his experiments, nor did he encounter more difficulty on the part of the French gouvernante to whose care she was confided. The remedy succeeded, as usual, in greatly diminishing the tumour; and for some time no bad effects were apparent. A small hard knot only remained in the situation which had been occupied by a considerable swelling before; and the desire to get rid of this little tumour was the cause of the remedy having been pushed too far. Its deleterious effects first showed themselves by gnawing pain at the upper part of the stomach, great anxiety, and oppression. These symptoms were disregarded, and the remedy was persevered in for a week longer, during which time the patient became very much emaciated; she was frequently affected with vomiting, the pain of the abdomen became more frequent and more severe, and the thirst was very distressing. I was sent for early in the morning, in consequence of an alarming