The more one sees of these cases, the more one is impressed with two things: first, that a certain percentage of them would make a complete and uncomplicated recovery, even if they were entirely untreated (undoubtedly this number is larger than we think, especially in children); second, that the usual treatment is entirely inadequate in those cases in which there is an especially virulent infection or a lowered resistance of the tissues. When antigonococcic serum was first developed and its action observed in cases of acute gonorrheal ophthalmia, the results were, as in acute urethritis, disappointing. Many oculists are of the opinion that the serum is entirely without value in acute blenorrhea, even though its use be indicated in metastatic eye disease of gonorrheal origin. Of late, however, at least two men in America have written enthusiastically of serum-therapy in acute gonorrheal conjunctivitis, advocating its employment in the usual manner and also its use locally, i.e., dropped into the conjunctival sac in place of the usual antiseptics. It would seem that the data now available hardly warrant a positive statement in regard to the serum-therapy. The pathological findings in gonorrheal ophthalmia are simple but significant, in that the gonococcus of Neisser is found, not only on the surface and in the superficial cells of the conjunctiva, but also, often within forty-eight hours, has invaded the deeper layers of the epithelium and the subepithelial connective tissue. This at once makes clear the reason for the inefficacy of the local antiseptics, particularly those like silver nitrate, the action of which is very superficial. Organic silver preparations and irrigations of various kinds are equally powerless to reach any but the most superficially situated of the bacteria. Since the destruction of the bacteria lying on the surface is not sufficient to control the disease, it may be stated that the problem of the destruction or inhibition of the deep-lying bacteria is the essential problem in curing gonorrheal ophthalmia. The gonococcus numbers among its biological peculiarities an unusual intolerance of extremes of temperature, its growth in culture being inhibited by temperature above 38° C. or below 18° C. Text-books on bacteriology state that exposure to a temperature of 60° C. for a period of ten minutes destroys the gonococcus. Experimentation in the laboratory of the Dimmer Clinic in Vienna in April and May, 1913, with cultures from forty-two cases of acute gonorrheal urethritis, seemed to indicate that this point may be placed from one and one-half to two degrees lower than this, i.e.,--from 58° C. to 58.5° C.