There is no reason to exclude lead from the category of drugs which may be absorbed through the medium of the skin, and, as several observers have shown, animals may be poisoned by lead on applying a plaster of lead acetate to the skin. Amongst these experiments may be quoted those of Canuet[19] and Drouet[20] on rabbits. Some observers, among whom may be mentioned Manouvrier[21], have attempted to prove that paralysis of the hands occurs more often in the right hand in right-handed people, in the left hand with left-handed people, and from the various experiments showing absorption of lead through the unbroken skin they seek to connect the lesion of the nerve with absorption direct through the skin of the hands. Many objections can be urged against acceptance of this theory. Lead workers who are constantly manipulating lead in a state of solution with bare hands do not appear as a class to be more subject to wrist-drop than do persons who are exposed to inhalation of fumes or dust of lead; in fact, incidence of paralysis and of nerve lesions generally is more severe among persons exposed to prolonged inhalation of minute quantities of lead through the respiratory tract. The greater the exposure to dust, the greater the number of cases of anæmia and colic, whilst in other industries, as has already been stated, where lead exists as an oleate on the hands of the workers day in and day out for many years, paralysis and even colic are of rare occurrence; in other words, persons especially exposed to the absorption of lead through their hands show a much smaller incidence of lead poisoning of all types than do those exposed to lead dust. Further, the pathology of wrist-drop and similar forms of paresis tends to show that the nerve supplying the affected muscles is not affected primarily, but that the initial cause is hæmorrhage into the sheath of the nerve, producing ultimate degenerative change. The hæmorrhage, however, is the primary lesion. REFERENCES. [1] GOADBY, K. W.: A Note on Experimental Lead Poisoning. Journal of Hygiene, vol. ix., No. 1, April, 1909. [2] LEGGE, T. M.: Report on the Manufacture of Paints and Colours containing Lead (Cd. 2466). 1905. [3] DUCKERING, G. E.: Journal of Hygiene, vol. viii., No. 4, September. [4] MEILLÈRE, G.: Le Saturnisme, chap. iv. Paris, 1903. [5] ARMIT, H. W.: Journal of Hygiene, vol. viii., No. 5, November, 1908. [6] TANQUEREL DES PLANCHES: Traité des Maladies de Plomb, ou Saturnines. Paris, 1839. [7] STANSKI: _Loc. cit._ [8] GAUTIER: Intoxication Saturnine, etc. Académie de Médecine, viii., November, 1883. [9] THRESH, J. C.: The Lancet, p. 1033, October 7, 1905. [10] _Ibid._, January 5, 1909. [11] THOMASON: Report of the Departmental Committee on Lead Manufacture: Earthenware, China, vol. ii., appendices, p. 61. 1910. [12] _Ibid._ [13] DIXON MANN: Forensic Medicine and Toxicology, p. 495. 1908.