Such facts prove only that the antiseptic treatment is available up to a certain point. To attain the results, however, such large quantities must be used that the treatment can be applied only in special cases and at long intervals. More use can be made of simple purgatives which do not kill the microbes but eliminate them by the normal channel. It has been urged repeatedly that calomel, which is often used as a purgative, acts also as an intestinal antiseptic; but it is probable that its influence in reducing the intestinal flora is merely mechanical. It has been shown that calomel, like some other purgatives, lessens intestinal putrefaction, the evidence being the decrease in the sulpho-conjugate ethers in the urine. But although the diarrhœa induced by purgatives generally has such a result, spontaneous diarrhœas such as those of typhoid fever and of intestinal tuberculosis are associated with increased putrefaction.[125] It is clear, however these matters may be settled, that regular activity of the bowels, increased by the occasional use of purgatives, must diminish the formation of intestinal poisons, and therefore also the damage done by these to the higher elements of the body. When I asked the relatives of Mde. Robineau if they could tell me of any special circumstance which in their opinion had contributed to the extreme duration of the life of this old lady, they replied as follows:—“We are convinced that a slight bodily derangement, present for the last fifty years, has tended to prolong the life of the old lady. It cannot be said that she has suffered from diarrhœa, but she has been often subject to frequent calls of nature.” It was most remarkable that the old lady showed no traces of sclerosis of the arteries. I may mention the strongly contrasting case of one of my old colleagues to whom a natural desire to empty the bowels came only once a week. A more frequent call was a sign of illness in his case. Now sclerosis of the arteries appeared in so marked a form that he died from it before he had reached the age of fifty years. This may be added to the list of facts which point to a close association between sclerosis of the arteries and the functions of the digestive tube.