We shall conclude with a few words on a disease which is the most painful and hopeless of all the disorders to which humanity is liable—cancer of the womb. It is a disease whose leading features as thus graphically—we may almost say, painfully— described by Dr. West: "Pain, often exceeding in intensity all that can be imagined as most intolerable, attended by accidents which render the sufferer most loathsome to her self and to those whom strong affection still gathers round her bed; the general health broken down by the action of the same poison as produces the local suffering, and all tending surely, swiftly, to a fatal issue, which skill cannot avert; from which it can scarcely take away its bitterest anguish." ' The three most constant symptoms are pain, and hemorrhage, and discharge. From an examination of 132 cases by the above-named physician, the first symptom was found to have been, In 58 instances, or 43.9 per cent, hemorrhage without pain.
" 26 19.6 " pain of various kinds.
" 18 13.6 " hemorrhage with pain.
" 18 " ' 13.6 " leucorrhma or other discharge without pain.
" 12 10.3 " pain and discharge sometimes offensive.
It is unnecessary to enter into further details regarding the symptoms of this disease, as cases of this nature must always be under medical superintendence, and for the same reason we need only say regarding the treatment, that it is divisible into the palliative and the curative, the former being directed toward the three great symptoms, and the general symptoms of the cancerous cachexia (or constitution), while in the latter are included the operation of extirpating the whole womb, or removing the neck of the womb by ligature or excision. It is difficult to speak with accuracy regarding the fre
quency of this disease. An approximate estimate may be formed from the fact that. in 1877, the mortality from cancer in England amounted to 3,023 males and 8,038 females; the excess in the latter case, amounting to 4,115, must be due to cancer of the breast or womb; and according to Tanchou, a French pathologist, cancer of the'womb is more frequent than that of the female breast in the rate of 26 to 10. Hence the yearly deaths 'from uterine cancer in England amount to about 2,972. The last-named writer calcu lated, from ten years' observation of the French records of mortality, that this disease causes 16 per 1000 of all female deaths. The disease is very rare before the 25th year and by far the most common period of its appearance is between the ages of 40 and 50 years. Its average duration is 16 or 17 months, but it may prove fatal in 3 or 4 months. On the subject of cancer of the womb, Walsh On Cancer may be consulted; and for further information on the subject of this article generally, the reader is referred to the standard works of Churchill, Lever, Simpson, etc.