Electro-physiology and electro-therapeutics : showing the best methods for the medical uses of electricity / By Alfred C. Garratt.

ivory electrodes, whose pea-sized sponge tips are wet with clean water only. These are to be placed — the one at the outer and the other at the inner angle of the closed eye, above or below, so that the current may traverse the nerve branches that ramify the orbicularis palpebrarum, as well as the fibres of that muscle, and the eyelids, and other tunics and glands about the eye, when the electrodes are held lightly ; or through the deeper parts, and the eyeball itself, when these electrodes are more firmly pressed, so as to embrace the globe between the poles. This effect is still more profound, if they are planted firmly at the outer corner of each eye, and the current is suddenly reversed; and still more so, if the positive electrode, a large sponge, is placed at the back of the neck, while the other, a smaller sponge, is pressed upon the eyeball, so that the cur- rent passes through the closed eyelids ; and this is still greater, if the current is occasionally — say every quarter minute — suddenly broken and reversed, for a second or so, but maintained mostly so as to run from the nucha to the eye, thus producing true ganglionic reflex action. E. Note 1. (See pages 338, 398.) Operations about the genital organs. For Faradaizing the rectum, urethra, bladder, vagina, or uterus, as required for cases of atony, or weakness, for prolapsus, enuresis, local palsy, &c, we may employ long, slim, insulated silver, or glass, or gutta percha electrodes, with sponge or silver tips, made expressly for these purposes, and which, for such cases, must be connected with the negative pole. (See page 680.) The other, positive pole, may be a moist sponge, which, with a moderately brisk current that is often intermitted, and occasionally but for a moment reversed, (see notes on page 282,) is to be moved, every quarter or half minute, up or down the back, in short stages, and in an elliptical order, (see Notes F.,) i. e. up one side of the spine, and down the other; then vice versa, and so over the roots of all the spinal nerves, and their respective ganglia; and finally along the sides of the body, and over the abdomen, during this part of the seance. Next, exchange the internal electrode for a surface sponge electrode, still neg- ative, and by bringing the two near together, make them to promenade up and down the back a few times, with quite a strong direct current; then move them in small double circles over spine and back muscles; then, leaving the positive at rest on the back, or rather now and then moving it a little, proceed with the negative to bathe over the lower bowels, with very sharp currents, for some time, and so finish this seance. I should have said that this latter pro- cedure has been my most successful method for atonic Amenorrhea. E. Note 2. When the aid of electricity is resorted to in midwifery prac- tice, as it is and can be most judiciously and effectively performed any where, and by any earnest practitioner; for instance, as for those cases where " the waters have broke," and hours have elapsed, and yet, notwithstanding the hot tea, the room promenade, and a well-dilated os uteri, still the labor does not set in in earnest; or where the pains have been for some considerable time "grinding" and unavailing, the harassed patient and everyone else is being " worn out," and yet the labor has scarcely progressed; also in those cases of