The Head Lice.—They are grayish in color with blackish margins and show a reddish tinge due to the blood they have sucked from their victim. The eggs or nits are seen attached to the hair shafts on the scalp at some distance from the end of the hair and are tiny white or grayish pear-shaped bodies seen upon close examination.

The treatment today, 100 years after this treatment was written in the Book of Medicine, things are not a great deal easier.  Its not like a person can even brush their hair with some sort of device that would zap head lice like air can be purified with an IQAir filter.

TREATMENT.-It is necessary to remove eggs and adults at the same time, so wet the hair thoroughly with crude petroleum (from any drug store) keep hair wet for three hours, then wash whole head with warm water and soap. Repeat this wash once a day for three successive days. The eggs can then be removed by combing the hair with a fine tooth comb wet with vinegar. Where possible the treatment can be made more thorough and permanent if the hair is cut short.

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

• Quantity of Water Needed
  
  

  Quantity of Water Needed.-the quantity of water needed by man and animals must therefore be very carefully calculated. Repeated experiments upon a very extended scale in England have shown that a healthy man requires daily as drink from 2 to 4 pints of water, this amount being in addition to that which is swallowed as moisture and food. The amount required for cooking is estimated at from having gallantly gallon or more. To this quantity, Dr. Parkes considers should be added for daily ablution, including a sponge bath, 5 gallons; daily share of kitchen and other utensils, and house washing, 3 gallons; and share of clothes washing, another 3 gallons; making up a total of a little over 12 gallons for each individual daily. In the poorer districts of the city of London, the amount used is stated to be only about 5 gallons daily. A shower-bath will require about 4 gallons extra, and a plunge-bath from 40 to 60 gallons. Where water-closets are used in additional quantity of from 4 to 6 gallons daily for each person must be provided.

  In general this is actually one of the more interesting paragraphs that I found in this book. It describes several things that I believe could be rather unique. First it discusses the quantity of water needed for human consumption. It describes experiments done in England and considering that this book was published sometime around the turn-of-the-century around 1916 by my estimates, this would seem to indicate a human water consumption estimates of 2 to 4 pints presented 20 years before the FDA guidelines written by a bureaucrat that suggested that people should drink 8 cups of water a day.

  Furthermore I find this one interesting from the perspective that it discusses how much water people may have used around the turn-of-the-century. I live in the Southeast of the United States and today we are in a drought.. Water consumption is definitely an important issue for the Southeast United States and many other areas of the world. And therefore when I listen to and read some of the items here that describe how much water should be used or could be used, it seems strikingly different than what we might use today, especially as we have many more appliances that use water, and many newer appliances that are designed to be energy-efficient.  Very very interesting section, some of those water estimates seemed very high by todays standards and some seemed relatively low, at dollhouses levels.

• Muscles of the Eye
  
  

  Muscles of the Eye.-I’m turning the flap we see four of the six delicate, who with all strong muscles which I would hold I firmly in its bony orbit, but also moved upward toward the canopied vaults of heaven, downward to view the beauties of nature on earth; or sideways to the right or left, Spain have to horizon at a single glance! The next illustration gives us a graphic and faithful to limitation of the beautiful arrangements of the numerous curtains, humors, lenses, pigments, membranes, nervous coats and blood vessels which enter into the composition of this remarkable organ, each of which is exquisitely adapted to the respective functions has to perform.

  As you can tell, we are getting back on track with this effort after a couple month hiatus mostly do to (ironically) poor health.  No other projects are going to slow us down and we now have a promoter that will even help us hire more transcriptionists as we cover Wilmington real estate.

   

  del.icio.us tags: history of medicine, eye, eye muscles
• The Thorax
  
  

  The Thorax.  — The thorax derives its name from the Greek word thoreo, and signifies “I leap,” because the heart leaps in it.  It is covered on the front part by large muscles; the pectoralis major, or large muscle of the breast, is observed on the left side of the chest, Wilson on the right it is removed and exposes the pectoralis minor, or small muscle of the breast.  The dovetailed muscle observed on each side is the Seratus Magnus, and is employed in expanding and contracting the chest in the act of breathing.  The muscles of the chest walls, in a deep inspiration, exert a force equal to lifting a weight of 750 pounds.

  I do not know Greek but I found it interesting to learn that little bit of Greek above about the thorax.  It’s a very descriptive word actually and I suspect if I understand it correctly preferring to the movement of the Adam’s apple?  I would use the word Adam’s apple is a form of layman term, and I’m somewhat surprised that they didn’t use a layman term in their description as the audience for this book is supposed to be house wives and mothers.