Though I have no personal experience in the treatment of this affection, I should feel disposed to try, where the bladder was in volved, a solution of corrosive sublimate as a wash (1 in 10,000) ; its use as a bactericide holds out some hope that it might be serviceable in the destruction of this parasite. Where perineal section is em ployed, as illustrated in the cases referred to, for the purpose of clearing the bladder of the excrescences formed within its interior by these parasites and their ova, irrigation with a suitable solution of corrosive sublimate seems worthy of trial.
This disease, though chiefly affecting the urinary apparatus, is not limited to it, but frequently involves the intestinal canal, producing symptoms simulating dysentery and disease of the lower bowel. Among the specimens which have been forwarded to me for examination is a polypoid parasitic excrescence in reference to which Dr. Mackie states : " This is a tumor removed by the 4craseur from about four inches up the rectum of a man who came to me complaining of dysen tery and prolapse of the bowel; he is now about, the dysentery and pro lapse having disappeared since the operation. The man had also ova in his urine, but passed only a drop of blood at the end of micturition."
When we consider the serious injury which is done to native popu lations by this disease, in addition to the risk of contracting and spreading it that is incurred by troops and others visiting these dis tricts, the importance of a more thorough knowledge of it, in relation to its prevention and treatment, must be admitted.
From an examination of numerous specimens it is found that car cinoma often occurs with bilharzia as a complication. Prolonged investigations in places where such cases are common, relative to the frequency with which bilharzia, cancer, and calculus coexist, and the order of their appearance, would be of value in reference to certain points in the natural history and pathology of these three affections. Whether the parasite merely plays the part of an irritant in a person in some way predisposed to generate cancer, or whether the relation ship between the parasite and the proliferous tissue growths which we are accustomed to speak of as cancer is even more connected and intimate, are points among others which naturally become prominent in connection with the pathology of this disease.