ANXIOUS.—A high temperature may be a sign of a fatal disease or it may signify nothing. It therefore may or may not be harmful. But taking medicines to reduce the temperature is almost invariably harmful, for all such drugs are exceedingly powerful. We once knew a woman who had five children, and having heard that a high temperature was a serious thing, bought a thermometer and an ounce of antipyrin, and took the temperature of each child every morning. And when the temperature of any of them was above 102° F. she gave her a dose of antipyrin. Every one of her children is now dead, and we feel certain that at least one of them was poisoned by antipyrin. The physician does not seek to “cure” a high temperature, but he finds out what is the disease which is causing the increase of heat, and by removing that cause he reduces the temperature. It is only when the temperature, _per se_, is threatening life that steps are taken to reduce it, and then it is by the application of cold, and scarcely ever by drugs, that cooling is brought about. A GAIETY GIRL.—It is one of the most vexed subjects in modern medicine whether or not pneumonia is an infectious disease. For ourselves we feel convinced that it is infectious, but it is only right to add that there are many great authorities who do not hold the same view of the matter as we do. It is a most difficult thing to prove whether a disease is really infectious, especially when it is not commonly infectious. A disease is infectious if it can be caught from one person by another directly. Obviously all such diseases must be due to germs. With such a disease as measles or scarlet fever, infection is obvious, and is the usual, possibly the invariable, manner by which the disease originates. Typhoid fever is infectious in a different manner; it is only very seldom caught from person to person, being almost constantly due to drinking infected water. Then again, some diseases are epidemic and infectious, such as the plague, and the various outbreaks of scarlet fever and diphtheria, which occur so frequently. But other diseases are epidemic but not infectious, such as influenza. In this case the poison is conveyed by water, or possibly food or air, but the disease is not caught from one person to another as a rule, although we feel confident that such does occasionally occur. Then again, some diseases are endemic, that is, confined to one locality, but are not necessarily infectious. Yellow fever and many other diseases are limited to tropical countries, and are yet infectious; but cretinism, goître, and malaria, etc., are also limited to certain districts, and are not infectious. So you see how complicated is the subject. Pneumonia frequently occurs in several members of the same family, and also many cases may occur in the same street, but at the present time it cannot be said whether the disease is infectious or epidemic or endemic. We feel pretty certain that it is one of these, and very