The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1902-01-09

PLY in future wars gunshot wounds
Will be far less fatal than hitherto.
Thanks to the discovery of antiseptic
methods, which prevent hostile bac-
terra from finding a lodgment in
wounds and propagating their kind in
them, blood poisoning and other COM
plants which killed thousands during
the civil war can be effectually pre-
vented.
One of the strangest curioaities
shown is the lung of a colored man pre-
served in jar of alcohol. 1t is as black
as the blacklist coal. The former own
er dwelt near Richmond, Va, in log
hut which was not well ventilated
Burning pine wood to keep himself
warm, he breathed the smoke for
years. 1t is found that the substance
which has blackened the lung is pure
carbon. Another lung, likewise kept in
a bottle, is black with iron rust. 1t once
belonged to a nail maker. This is par
ticularly a trade disease. Workers in
steel and iron are generally apt to be
inflicted with il.
However, these are only few of the
odd things on exhibition at this muse
UNI. There is a mans breast bone that
has large gap in the middle of it,
One could feel his heart beat by touch
ing his chest, nothing covering that
vital organ but thin wall of flesh. On
this account he wore a protector of
black leather. He died, but not for
that reason. A skull with a few YER
tebras attached to it is from the cata-
combs of Rome. The remarkable point
about it is that they once belonged to
an individual whose neck was broken
and who recovered from the injury.
Not the most attractive of the OBJ
jects displayed are models represent
ing mOnstrous births, such as those
from which the ancients got their no.
lions originally for their figures of
demons and other malevolent spirits.
BY plunging an egg of a chicken or
other fowl into cold water for brief
period during the process of incuba-
ton monstrous chicks with double
heads and other deformities may be
artificially produced, the integrity of
the developing germ being disturbed.
1t is believed that accidents of a sim
liar nature occurring without design
in other animals produce such freaks
as commonly find their way into dime
museums.
The first use of wax models to rep
resent parts of the human body in
disease is attributed to a Scilian priest
named Zambo, who lived in the latter
part of the seventeenth century, He
had been accustomed to making such
counterfeit presentments of diseased
or deformed hands and feet, to be used
as votiye offerings at the shrines of
saints, in behalf of the persons af-
ficted, who hoped for cure by super
natural agency. The fame of these
works of art induced a surgeon of re-
pute to go to the priest and employ
him for the purpose of reproducing
some pathological examples. Hence
the original collection of this kind.
One long case is filled with skeletons,
suspended. and, inasmuch as there are
more than three score of them, thew
look as if they were marching single
file in a funeral or funereal procession.
These ske etOns were furnished by
numerous races, but as the bony struc-
ture betrays no essential difference to
unframed eyes, they are identified by
labels. There are also in the museum
many odd things in the way of bugs,
snakes and other vermin which are
used in medicine making. For exam
pie, here one learns that dropsy can
be cured by the use of an antihydropin
made of dried and powdered cock
reaches. But we will visit the bug
house and chat about it some other
time. SMITH D. FRY.