Abstract
[Your attention is invited to a subject which from the humanitarian standpoint is of the greatest importance and of practical value to us as surgeons. Much of the effort of our profession is directed toward the relief or prevention of pain. Distinct advances in our art followed the introduction of the various narcotics, and the science of surgery took a long step forward when the use of sulphuric ether for anesthesia was discovered Sept. 30, 1846, by Dr. Wm. T. G. Morton, of Wellesley, Mass., and chloroform by Sir James Simpson, of Edinburgh, on Nov. 4, 1847; and these names will ever live in our memory. But the great boon of narcosis is not unalloyed. Thousands have died from the effects of the volatile anesthetics, and every time we administer them we take upon ourselves the responsibility of a human life. Ether kills once in 15,000 administrations; chloroform once in
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