Fame? Fortune? Who could care for them in exchange for the trinity of love in the rounded home? For what would one give such priceless memories as that of

MY CALIFORNIAN

Sturdy little native son
Of four,

In nightie, ready to sail
The dream ship journey
To the Sandman's palace,
Gazed intent at colored map.
"This is Cal'fornia
Where I was borned,"

In triumphant announcement;
And then,

"Was you, Muvver, and Daddy, Borned in Cal'fornia, too?" Just Hoosier-born,

We had to confess

Our position

Outside the pale of the elect.

A puzzled look on

That eager, earnest face,

Then a smile.

"But I had you, Daddy and Muvver,
In Indiana."

Confession once again,

To that little

California lad.

In Love's young honeymoon
"On banks of

The Wabash far away,"
Full fruition had not come
To consecrate our altar.
Undaunted, undismayed,
Our California sunbeam
Quickly flashed
Triunphant answer:
"But I wanted you,
Muvver and Daddy,
An' I cwied and cwied,
An' you tame
Across the desert
An' the mountains
To get me in Cal'fornia."

President Frederic Burk of the San Francisco State Normal School recently wrote me that "Robert is teaching you a great deal more than you are teaching him." This is true. What a lesson for physician and layman alike for these little ones whose life star "cometh from afar" and "trailing clouds of glory from God which is its home." Nearer to the original soul-stuff of God are these little ones, and well may we sit at their feet in worship. Let us be wise men today and take to the cradles of childhood precious gifts of opportunity to live ever close to their god-hood and in communion with their soulself, that important part of life.

THE ROMANCE OF DR. AND MME. ALEXIS CARREL

News from France of rare honors conferred by the most distinguished savants of the republic upon Madame the Marquise Anne Carrel, wife of the famous Franco-American surgeon, Dr. Alexis Carrel, has brought to light one of the most absorbing romances that ever proved the old Spanish parable, "Genius without love is like a sun without warmth."

In ancient Spain, where love bloomed as radiantly as the luscious pomegranate, no wise man was so highly honored by his disciples as that one who had courted and won the most charming senorita in his village. No wisdom, the philosopher declared, could be complete without a knowledge of love's mysterious revelations.

The romance of Dr. Carrel, the most famous scientist the war has produced, and his beautiful marquise, has proven all over again that the philosophy of ancient Spain is just as true today as then.

Almost everyone thinks of science as the merciless foe of every kind of emotion. And hardly anyone who sponsors love would like to have that erotic state of mind submitted to cold scientific analysis.

Yet almost everybody will admit that love is the geratest of all inspiration toward big achievements, and the love which Dr. Carrel and his talented wife found in their laboratory among the cultures and microscopes with which they courted science has proved their stepping stone, their friends declare, to scientific greatness.

Early in the war the world was electrified by reports of the marvelous advances in war surgery by Dr. Carrel, who had gone to France from the Rockefeller institute.

Now Dr. Carrel declares that whatever his successes have been, he and the world owe them to the help given him by his beautiful young wife, Mme. Carrel, herself showered with honors few men have ever attained, pleads that her triumphs merely are the fruition of her love for her husband. Each has been the scientific as well as the physical and sentimental complement of the other. Together they have proven that even science needs romance to make its triumphs possible.

In 1909 Dr. Carrel, then a young surgeon attached to the clinic at the Rockefeller institute, in New York, first came to the notice of his profession by performing one of the most dramatic operations in the history of surgery. As an experimentalist in the transfusion of blood he watched with close attention developments in the case of the infant son of a brother physician whose blood had been exuded from the blood vessels into the tissues of the body.

Distinguished surgeons who were led into. consultation were unanimous in the decision that

the child must die, the only remedy for such a condition being direct transfusion of blood, impossible, they believed, in the case of so young a child.

Dr. Carrel, learning of the outcome of the consultation at midnight, telephoned the baby's father and offered to try tansfusion. The father eagerly grasped at the desperate resort. Hastily calling other surgeons, Dr. Carrel appeared at once at the child's bedside and, using the father as the person to furnish the new blood, carried through successfully a delicate operation. The child became well and the young surgeon became famous.

Madame Carrel was Anne de la Mott, a laboratory student of the distinguished French surgeon, Tuffier, in the latter's hospital at Paris, when she married the Marquis de la Marie, a patron of the arts. She continued her research work. She was the first French woman to win a degree for proficiency in scientific bacteriological research.

It was early in 1912 the young surgeon, Dr. Carrel, whose work at the Rockefeller institute already had distinguished him as one of the foremost surgeons of the day, met the marquise, whose husband died soon after her marriage. Even then Dr. Carrel was working upon the method of treatment for poison-producing wounds, such as soldiers incur, which since has become the greatest achievement of the century in physical healing.

He found the young widow continuing her experiments in a Paris hospital. To him she was a beautiful example of splendid young womanhood, devoting her life and energies to the discovery of new ways to alleviate human suffering. To her he was the great surgeon, successful, but still striving for greater triumphs-her ideal of efficient, purposeful manhood.

The hospital world in Paris detected the budding romance, although love had not yet been spoken of between the two young people whose lives were devoted to the same cause. Dr. Carrel explained that the beautiful marquise was interested in him only because of his work. She was sure, she told her friends, the promising young surgeon's attentions to her merely were a sign of the interest of one scientist in the labors of another.

When Dr. Carrel invited the marquise to become his laboratory assistant at his hospital at Lyons, which the French government had established for his experiments during his occasional visits to his native land, Paris was sure indeed their scientific association eventually would become more sentimental.

Late in 1912 Dr. Carrel again astounded the medical world by proving that the long dreamed of feat of transplanting human organs, such as the heart, kidneys or lungs, actually could be ac

complished. While the foremost surgeons of al nations stood aghast he demonstrated by a series of remarkable operations, that the ailing heart for instance, of a patient whose affliction ordin arily would have been pronounced incurable might be removed from his body, treated sepa rately and replaced without destroying the pa tient's life.

For this amazing demonstration Dr. Carre was granted the highest honor that can come to a member of his profession-the Nobel prize for medicine. It made of him the world's most famous surgeon. In 1913 he received the award of $39,000 which accompanies the prize, and then it was he dared to ask his capable assistant at Lyons, the young marquise, to become his wife.

Paris nodded its head with an "I told you so." when the engagement was announced, but the blushing marquise declared "she had never dreamed of such a thing" until the noted surgeon told her he wished to complete the joy his Nobel prize had brought him by making its money endowment the nest egg of a home.

They were married in the holiday season of 1913, the Rockefeller Institute granting Dr. Carrel a six months' leave of absence for his honeymoon. The wedding was in a little tumble-down church near the bride's home in the picturesque French village, Bretagne.

They traveled through Europe, visiting together the great hospitals of Germany, Austria, Italy and Russia, staying long enough at each to conduct new experiments and hold widely heralded clinics at which Mme. Carrel was honored quite as much as her distinguished husband.

When Dr. Carrel returned to New York his bride remained in northern France for research suggested by her husband. She was caught in the great onrush of the German invasion and. retreating step by step with the French, she threw herself into the thick of the rescue and salvation work, organizing hospital staffs in the very teeth of the advancing Germans.

For her splendid fortitude and bravery she was mentioned in army orders and decorated by the French commander-in-chief.

Dr. Carrel performed marvels of surgery the hospital at Compiegne which the French government established for him. Here he made the first extensive tests of his widely discussed method of filtering malignant bacteria from the wounds of badly torn soldiers by a process of irrigation. To his success made in this achievement is due the reconstruction of crippled men into a semblance of their former selves. It is one of the greatest epochal advances in the history of surgery.

While her husband was directing clinics at Compiegne Mme. Carrel went out to the base and receiving hospitals to teach his methods to the army surgeons at the front. Meanwhile she

perfected the technique of the application of the Carrel discoveries and mastered a system of teaching it so that the most inexperienced hospital nurse might acquire a working knowledge of its details. She accomplished wonders in skin grafting and transfusion.

When Dr. Carrel returned to the United States to establish an army base hospital at the Rockefeller institute for the training of American army surgeons Mme. Carrel took his place at Compiegne. The highest honor the French government can bestow upon her has just been conferred.

A YOUNG MAN OF SEVENTY DESCRIBES HIS DAILY LIFE

Now, at seventy, I am still dancing privately, at least twice a week, and walk when it is convenient. In the summer I swim, play tennis, and enjoy other forms of exercise.

But exercise is not the only essential to health, as I see it. I never smoked, and there is no nicotine or alcoholic poison in my system. Early rising always seemed beneficial, and hard work was never detrimental.

Much of my exceptional health and strength is due to absence of worry. I never would carry the annoyances of business back to the home, and allow them to interfere with home duties and pleasures. As important as anything else. was the attempt always to be cheerful in spite of setbacks, planning tasks for myself and never being satisfied until they were accomplished, and cultivating a spirit of helpfulness for others.

Now, at seventy years, I feel as active as I did at forty; and my physician tells me that I have the blood-pressure of a man of thirty. I rise at six, breakfast at seven, reach the office at eight, and follow a vigorous business day, laid out on schedule. Lunch is taken as a rest. At 5:30 I start for home, and often have to attend a meeting at night. I retire between ten and twelve o'clock, after evening devotion.

The day's work with me involves many different businesses. These include the large printing house of which I am the head, and several allied enterprises. I am also a director or active participant in many organizations of a business kind and others of a religious, fraternal, or philanthropic character.-Charles Francis in the American Review of Reviews.

Colicky babies voiding gaseous stools are often markedly relieved by the use of lactic acid bacilli therapeutically.

For delirium tremens-repeated droughts of strong coffee. For "dead drunk" stupor, injections of same into the bowel.

Spirit of the Coeval Medical Press

THE CONTROL OF VENEREAL DISEASES Dr. A. L. Goldwater, in Medical Review of Reviews

The venereal problem is a military and civilian problem, and is undoubtedly the most serious of the present time. The tuberculosis situation is grave and war conditions will probably increase the prevalence of pulmonary tuberculosis, but the great impending question is how to best. control the spread of venereal diseases.

Good sanitation, in conjunction with other effective preventive measures, has practically abolished epidemic diseases, which formerly were the scourges of military camps and especially of such camps during active service. Typhoid fever has been almost unknown during this war, and without exaggeration it may be said that, speaking broadly, contagious diseases are well under control. This happy result is due to the fact that on account of the ability of the various infectious diseases to spread and menace the lives and health of communities, they have been fought tooth and nail with intelligently conceived and strictly carried out laws and restrictions.

However, the most dreadful of all these diseases, the venereal diseases, which are probably the fons et origo of most of the serious physical and mental disabilities to which the human species is subject, have been allowed to proceed to all intents and purposes unchecked and unhindered. It is true that treatment of venereal diseases has greatly improved, but in order to stamp them out or even control them with any hope of success, other measures are urgently called for. The war in Europe has emphasized the menace of the venereal diseases and borne in upon the minds of medical authorities and of thoughful civilians the absolute necessity for devising means whereby the plague may be, at least, stayed. Statistics on the subject are somewhat appalling and go to show that a great deal, perhaps most of the inefficiency of European soldiers is owing to gonorrhea or syphilis. In Great Britain the gravity of the existing state of affairs is now freely recognized and ways and means for checking the venereal peril are widely discussed.

It is allowed on all hands that it is in preventive methods and in public education that our main hope of delivery from this pestilence. lies. A wisely and discreetly conducted campaign of public education should go far to curb the spread of venereal diseases. Up to present times we have been too prudish and bound down by tradition to discuss sexual matters in public.

It was not deemed seemly or polite to refer to such matters except at meetings of medical men, and the result is that the ordinary man or woman is woefully ignorant of the dangers of promiscuous intercourse, how to avoid infection or what to do when disease has been contracted. To some extent the veil of secrecy has been raised and public propaganda has enlightened the youth of the country with regard to the venereal disease question.

Although in America the war has not brought the venereal menace home to the general population as it has in Europe, yet the establishment in all parts of the country of camps filled with men in the full flush of youth and vigor has already opened the eyes of health and military authorities to the necessity for grappling with an unprecedented situation, and one which if not tackled with vigor and promptitude will be much more serious.

Public Health Reports, January 4, 1918, contains some very interesting reading with respect to the control of venereal diseases. For the purpose of organizing a nation-wide control of these diseases, Surgeon General Blue sent out advice and suggestions to the health officers of all the states couched in very forcible language. He considers that the control of such infections in connection with the prosecution of the war constitutes the most important sanitary problem now confronting public health authorities of the Unit ed States.

The Surgeon General further points out that it is evident the prevention of venereal infections. is largely dependent on the degree with which these infections are prevented in the civil community. The Surgeon General, therefore, requests the earnest co-operation of the civil health authorities. He records his opinion that the general public should be thoroughly educated to understand that this disease group will be considered in the same light as are the other communicable infections. In the memorandum drawn up and sent out by Surgeon General Blue are suggestions of a drastic nature and which if strictly carried out would doubtless greatly aid in the control of venereal diseases. However, there is no space here for a consideration of the various methods recommended to check the dissemination of venereal infections, and it must suffice to briefly deal with one method which has been both strenuously advocated and as vigorously reprobated by medical authorities and by civilians. This is the method known as direct prophylaxis. There are those who hold that the only certain means of controlling the venereal diseases is by prevention by the agency of direct prophylaxis. Some medical authorities, indeed, express themselves as confident that not only can the spread of infection be controlled in this manner, but that the diseases can be eradicated

by this and other obvious measures. One medical man of note has stated unreservedly that of all the contagious diseases the venereal are the easiest to exterminate. By direct prophylaxis is meant the use of an ointment as recommended by Metchnikoff, containing at least 25 per cent of calomel, and applied as soon after intercourse as possible, or even as advocated by some, before and after intercourse. The effect of such preventive measures when carried out to the letter is said to be most satisfactory. The prosecution of these methods among the white soldiers in Egypt, a stink hole of vice and venereal disease, is said to have been attended with a remarkable degree of success, and the employment of a similar ointment in Italy and in other parts of Europe is alleged to have kept infection under control. Direct prophylaxis has been employed to some extent in the American army and navy for considerable time, but views as to the results are somewhat conflicting. There are those who say that the method has been useless or worse than useless, while others hold that the disappointing results have been due to the fact that the ointment has not contained a sufficient amount of calomel or has not been applied in time.

The objections to direct prophylaxis came mostly, it seems, from the moralists, or rather it might be said from those who see in the legalizing of such a method the opening of the door to unrestricted sexual intercourse. They assert that if the fear of infection were removed that such a result would ensue.

The matter of direct prophylaxis has been discussed because it is at the present time the subject of heated debate in Great Britain, and because the venereal problem is one of the first moment in this country. No really definite conclusions have been reached, but it would appear that the question is one worthy of careful consideration.

Of course, after all, the chief difficulty in the way of successful control of venereal diseases lies in the lack of means for segregating the infected, and especially of segregating infected women. As Surgeon General Blue has pointed out, in order to control infected persons you must know their whereabouts, and this is on the face of it an extremely difficult, almost impossible matter. He has suggested methods by which this objecct may be brought about and, as a whole, his memorandum should be read most carefully.

The venereal problem is the outstanding one of the day, and should be discussed without fear or favor in every medical journal.

Schamberg, Kalmer, Raziss and Gavron, after careful investigation, propose the use of calomel by inunction in place of the old blue ointment.

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

P. I. LEONARD, St. Joseph.
J. M. BELL, St. Joseph.
JNO. E. SUMMERS, Omaha.

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
H. ELLIOTT BATES, New York.
JOE BECTON, Greenville, Texas.
HERMAN J. BOLDT, New York.
A. L. BLESH, Oklahoma City.
G. HENRI BOGART, Paris, Ill.

ST. CLOUD COOPER, Fort Smith, Ark.
W. T. ELAM, St. Joseph.
JACOB GEIGER, St. Joseph.

S. S. GLASSCOCK, Kansas City, Kan.
H. R. HARROWER, Los Angeles, Cal.
JAS. W. HEDDENS, St. Joseph.
VIRGINIA B. LE ROY, Streator, Ill.
DONALD MACRAE, Council Bluffs.
L. HARRISON METTLER, Chicago.
DANIEL MORTON, St. Joseph.
D. A. MYERS, Lawton, Okla.
JOHN PUNTON, Kansas City.

W. T. WOOTTON, Hot Springs, Ark.
HUGH H. YOUNG. Baltimore.

The Editors' Forum

THE AMERICAN CREED

I believe in the United States of America as a Government of the people, by the people, for the people; whose just powers are derived from the consent of the governed; a democracy in a republic; a sovereign nation of many sovereign states; a perfect union, one and inseparable; established upon those principles of freedom, equality, justice and humanity for which American patriots sacrificed their lives and fortunes.

I therefore believe it is my duty to my country to love it; to support its Constitution; to obey its laws; to respect its flag, and to defend it against all enemies.

2. I am, therefore, appealing to you to bring to the attention of the profession at large the necessity for additional volunteers. So far the United States has been involved only in the preparatory phase of this war. We are now about to enter upon the active, or the fighting phase, a phase which will make enormous demands upon the resources of the country. The conservation of these resources, especially that of manpower, depends entirely upon an adequate medical service. The morning papers publish a statement that by the end of the year a million and a half of men will be in France. Fifteen thousand medical officers will be required for that army alone. There are today on active duty 15,174 officers of the Medical Reserve Corps.

3. Within the next two or three months the second draft will be made, to be followed by other drafts, each of which will require its proportionate number of medical officers. There are at this time on the available list of the Reserve Corps an insufficient number of officers to meet the demands of this draft.

4. I cannot emphasize too strongly the supreme demand for medical officers. Will you give the Department your assistance in obtaining these officers? It is not now a question of a few hundred medical men volunteering for service, but it is a question of the mobilization of the profession. In the large centers of population and at other convenient points, as well as at all army camps and cantonments, boards of officers have been convened for the purpose of examining candidates for commission in the Medical Reserve Corps of the army. An applicant for the Reserve should apply to the Board nearest his home.

5. The requirements for commission in the Medical Reserve Corps are that the applicant be a male citizen of the United States, a graduate of a reputable school of medicine, authorized to confer the degree of M. D., between the ages of 22 and 55 years of age and professionally, morally and physically qualified for service.

6. With deep appreciation of any service you may be able to render the Department, I am, W. C. GORGAS, Surgeon General, U. S. Army.

The Illegitimate

Baby's Rights

The rights of illegitimate children and the state's responsibility for seeing that every child, no matter what his parentage, has the nurture, protection, and education essential to his usefulness as a citizen are for the first time given com