It is as though one had but to cross the Sierra eastward from San Francisco to find again at its base the tide line of the sea. And the geographical peculiarity does not cease with the head of the Gulf, for northward still for hundreds of miles stretches the great alluvial valley of the Colorado river, with its moist lowlands, its summer floods, and its open pathway for the winds of the sea on into the heart of the continent; for on and beyond its broad lowlands and its water-worn cañons the great valley still winds and opens up until far north of Salt Lake the melting snows of the Rocky Mountains feed the head-waters of its river. One mountain in that chain, Fremont's Peak, sends from its slopes the head-waters of the three greatest river systems of the United States, the Colorado southward to the Gulf of California, the Columbia west to the North Pacific, the Yellowstone northward almost to the British line, then east to join the waters of the Missouri, and then on its long course down to the Gulf of Mexico. This Colorado river system, which forms the background for Southern California, has upon the Pacific Coast only two possible rivals in extent, the Columbia and the Yukon. It is this great river valley, with its tributaries and its natural grades to the sea, which gives to Southern California the key to the transcontinental railroad system. It is the same valley, reaching from the waters of the tropics almost to the British line, and which is only open to the coast through the Southern California passes in the Sierra, which gives the key and the clue to many climatic peculiarities. But another feature is to be noted. Opening out eastward from the confluence of the rivers at Yuma is the great valley of the Gila, carrying its waterway and the easy slope of its watershed directly eastward into the heart of the continent. And then, just over the divide, one looks down upon the water line of the Rio Grande as it winds on its way to join the waters of the Atlantic through the Gulf of Mexico. Years and years ago, when the old Santa Fé trail was to the frontier trade of the southwest the opening into a land of wonders, the adventurous trader and the toiling emigrant discovered what commerce has since been quick to avail itself of, that this was the line of shortest distances and easiest grades across the continent. From sea to sea on the line of San Francisco is a dis tance of some 2500 miles. From sea to sea on the line of Southern California and the Gulf is only 1200. While, instead of crossing the Sierra at an elevation of nearly 8000 feet and the Rocky Mountains at an elevation of 8500, the former is crossed at the San Gorgonio pass with an elevation of less than 2600 feet, and the backbone of the continent at only a little over 4000. What has all this to do with climatic laws? Much. OPERATION FOR CANCER JUSTIFIED. 1. CANCER is essentially a local disease, and can be cured by operation in spite of recurrence. 2. Operation, when it does not cure, prolongs life and diminishes the total amount of suffering. 3. Operations should be repeated as often as there is any chance of entirely removing recurrent growths. 4. The earlier and more thoroughly the operation is performed, the better. 5. The disease, when it recurs, is generally of a milder type than that of the original growth, less painful and less exhausting. 6. Antiseptic surgery makes more radical operations possible, with better ultimate results, than formerly obtained.-Dr. Shrady, 247 Lexington Ave., New York Medical Record. INSOMNIA. O God of Mercy, give me sleep, And let this weary brain have rest! O throbbing brow! O beating heart! O tensing nerves relax thy strain, And fight no more this struggling will; O restful slumber, now, I pray, Come where sad vigils lone I keep; -John Wentworth in "Good Housekeeping." A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF MEDICINE AND ALLIED SCIENCES. Communications are invited from physicians everywhere, especially from physicians of the Pacific Coast, and more especially from physicians of Southern California and Arizona. Address EDITORS SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA PRACTITIONER, No. 237 South Spring Street, Los Angeles, Cal. Subscription Price, per annum, $1.50. We have no Advertising Agents. All Contracts must be made directly with us. ADVERTISING RATES: 9 Months. $50 00 Address all Business Communications to STOLL & THAYER, Publishers Southern California Practitioner, 12 Months. 3 South Spring Street, Los Angeles. The Southern California Practitioner-Its Special Work. THE PRACTITIONER, While devoting itself to the discussion of all matters pertaining to the science of medicine and surgery, has mapped out for itself one particular field as its specialty, viz.: The careful investigation of the climatic peculiarities and climatic laws of Southern California, and of that great inland plateau which embraces Arizona, New Mexico, and the elevated portion of the Mexican interior; the effects which these climatic peculiarities may have upon race types, race development, and race diseases; the local changes which, through human agency-such as irrigation, drainage, cultivation, planting or clearing of timber-may be produced in climate; the question of race habits of food, drink, and manner of life; the physiological and pathological effects of the crossing of bloods where noticed; and all of these questions as affecting the Anglo-Teuton in taking up his race abode in this, to him, new climatic belt. It is a new, a broad and a heretofore-unworked field, and many of the questions will require generations, rather than years, for their solution, yet the PRACTITIONER hopes to add somewhat to the stock of human knowledge in this direction, and to help toward the solution of these problems; and it will aim to base its investigations upon a solid substructure of facts and carefully-compiled scientific observations, rather than upon the more glittering, but less fruitful, basis of mere speculation. It will, also, endeavor to present the salient features of various sections of this now widely-known climatic belt, so that physicians throughout the Eastern States and abroad, who may be recommending a change of climate to invalids, or persons of delicate constitution, may have accurate information upon which to base a selection. EDITORIAL. SPECIALISM RUN MAD. IT is beginning to be a question what is to be the end of the mania for specialties in medicine. We have been wont to smile somewhat at the practice of our long queued brethren of the Middle Flowery Kingdom, where one man takes medical charge of the brain, another of the stomach, another of the bowels, yet another of the heart, and so on through the anatomical list; yet a glance at our medical journals, or at the cards of physicians in the columns of a popular paper, rather extracts the twist from the smile. The Celestial practitioner of the almond eyes no doubt sagely thinks that the Melican man is becoming a hopeful pupil, and that the halcyon days when the pagoda shall be seen by the banks of the Sacramento and the Los Angeles are not far off. It begins to look as though the days of the general practitioner were numbered. Possibly in that coming day, when the sick man's list of medical attendants shall only be limited by the number of separate organs to the human body, some youthful scion of a specialist progenitor shall exhume from the cobwebs of the old garret some moth-eaten book upon general practice, and with a look of vague wonder upon his countenance shall inquire as he turns over its unfamiliar pages the meaning of it all, and shall receive for reply some such answer as this: "This, my son, is an old heirloom, handed down from a distant ancestor, who in the dimness of the past practiced some rude sort of healing art. It is said, my son, that instead of like myself making a specialty of some such department as diseases of the distal phalanx of the little finger, he even professed to treat diseases of the human body in general. It was a primitive age, my son, an age when such an erudite work as my three volumes upon congenital peculiarities in the anatomy of the nail of the little finger would not have been appreciated. Such refinements of science, my son, were as yet beyond their crude ways of thought." Brethren of the medical profession, shall we not anticipate somewhat that age of advanced science, and even now go more vigorously into the work of specializing? Let us reverse the telescope and minimize. It is true we may miss the constellations, but, ah, the all-satisfying wonders, which reveal themselves in the atom! It is also true somewhat might be said of the narrowing mental effect of the minimizing process of study; that one who sees only one point is apt to forget there is aught else; that the physician who specializes the brain is apt to forget that man has also a stomach; that he who studies too exclusively the nerve is wont to ignore the muscle or the bone. How shall we be narrow and broad at the same time? Brethren, the editorial head has it. Specialize everything. It does not claim originality in the idea. It caught the thought from the card of a physician who advertised twelve specialties besides surgery and general practice. Vive la specialty! P. BLAKISTON, SON & CO. IN LOS ANGELES. SOUTHERN California physicians have long labored under serious disadvantages in getting supplies. Should a physician in San Diego or San Bernardino want a book or an instrument, he would be obliged to send six hundred miles away to San Francisco; nine chances out of ten the San Francisco dealer would-after getting the order-send to New York or Philadelphia to have it filled, and the San Diego doctor would be fortunate if he received his desired article in a month from the time he sent the order. San Francisco merchants have, with the exception of Wm. L. Duncombe & Co., usually charged us exorbitant prices, and our dealings have, as a rule, been very unsatisfactory. With longing eyes we have looked forward to a day of deliverance. Deliverance from morose, bigoted merchants, who have taken every possible advantage of our unfortunate situation. Our day of independence is now at hand. Chas. W. Kolbe, the surgical instrument manufacturer, of No. 15 South Ninth street, Philadelphia, began the work, and Howard M. Sale, No. 268 South Spring street, Los Angeles, now-as Mr. Kolbe's agent-carries a full line of surgical instruments. Mr. Kolbe's house is one of the oldest in the United States, and his instruments are unexcelled. Mr. Sale is enabled to sell this line of goods at an average of ten per cent. less than they are sold for in San Francisco. Another great stride forward we are now enabled to report: Messrs. P. Blakiston, Son & Co., the well-known medical book publishers, have recently appointed Messrs. Stoll & Thayer, No. 3 South Spring street, their agents for this section, and will hereafter keep a full line of their publications on sale at this old established Los Angeles book-house. We feel justified in calling attention editorially to the enterprise of these two Philadelphia firms. As the population of Southern California increases, other houses will doubtless |