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lunar caustic, and especially when applied to inflamed and
irritable gums ; and in this disease it is found highly bene-
ficial. The sulphate of copper is also used, but the medical
attendants are now satisfied that this latter remedy, often from
its acrimony, is itself a cause of inflammation. In looking
over the records of some cases, I was struck with the fact.
Another injurious property of this remedy, and one of seri-
ous moment to the enfeebled child, is, that a part of the wash
is often swallowed, which uniformly produces violent vomit-
ing, which in some cases, no doubt, by enfeebling the child,
has hastened rather than retarded the fatal termination. I
do not know as we are to expect any other benefit from the
sulphate, than from its astringent properties. When I first
began to treat diseases of the gums, I made use of the sa-
line astringents, as the sulphate of zinc, sal saturni, &c. but
I soon remarked their acrimonious qualities, and immediately
exchanged them for the vegetable astringents, as quercitron
bark, pulverized galls, &c. which last, without any acrimony,
is as powerfully astringent as any remedy we desire.

SECTION III.

TUMOURS FROM THE GUMS, CARTILAGINOUS EXCRESCENSES,
DISEASED GROWTH, &C. &C.

Independently of scurvy and cancrum oris, the gums are
liable to other states of disease, such as tumours from their
cartilaginous excrescenses, diseased growth, &c. These are
almost uniformly produced by some irritation in or near the
gums, occasioned by the influence of dead pieces of bone,
diseased fangs of teeth, or of the teeth themselves, &c. &c.