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Several letters to the editor are presented in response to articles in previous issues including one related to transportation in the U.S. in the March 20, 1954 issue, one on taxpayers of the U.S. and one on railroads being used as warehouses in the February 6, 1954 issue.

Therapeutic application of physical pressure to various parts of the body has been in use for many years. Pressure has been used to facilitate the healing of wounds, burns, fractures, and chronic ulceration of the skin and in skin grafting. Pressure has also been used to prevent hemorrhage, interstitial cavitation, edema, and accumulation and stagnation of excess interstitial fluid. Smith1 was the first to apply pressure in the maxillary sinus with a balloon. He inflated a balloon in the sinus to apply pressure to and prevent edema in a skin graft in the sinus. Later Shea2 inflated a balloon in the maxillary sinus to hold the walls of the sinus in position after reduction of a fracture.METHOD OF TREATMENTFor several years I have treated certain types of maxillary sinusitis in selected patients by applying local pressure to the mucosa of one or both maxillary sinuses. I

The purpose of this paper is to call attention to some of the more important physiologic and pathologic factors and principles underlying infection of brain tissue and to detail a method of treatment which in my hands has proved satisfactory. In an effort to do this I shall not go into the problems of etiology and symptomatology but shall confine my remarks to a brief summary of the operative and postoperative course in four cases chosen to illustrate three types of disease of the brain-traumatic disease, acute abscess and chronic abscess. I shall quote from textbooks excerpts which I think have a bearing on the method of drainage of abscess of the brain with which this treatise is concerned.Case 1.—W. F. S., a man about 35 years of age, was injured on May 4, 1925, by a piece of 1 by 1 inch (2.5 by 2.5 cm.) lumber driven

During the development of the embryo certain anlages tend to carry with them to maturity some of the more important collateral systems which are destined to provide the mature parts with some of their most important physiologic functions. This tendency is noted particularly in the nerve supply of the muscles derived from the branchial arches. The trigeminal nerve supplies the muscles derived from the first branchial arch, the facial nerve supplies the muscles derived from the second branchial arch, while the glossopharyngeal and the vagus nerves innervate those derived from the third and fourth branchial arches. A good example of this is the derivation of the tensor tympani muscle from the first branchial arch and its innervation by the trigeminal, while the nearby stapedius muscle is derived from the second arch and is innervated by the facial nerve.1The best example of this developmental principle found in the lymphatic system

In spite of some recent publications, the value of the agglutination test as a check on the efficiency of meningococcus serum has not been given the proper clinical appreciation. Regarding this, our experience with some forty-five cases of epidemic meningitis may be of interest.When the Army of Occupation entered Coblenz, sporadic cases of meningitis appeared, never two in the same company or neighborhood. All patients, whether brought in late or early in the disease, were at once put on the usual treatment, which consisted of intraspinal and at times intravenous injections of serum. This product, that of an American commercial firm, was five months old and dated good for another month.At this time Captain Leon Unger of Chicago, who in France had had considerable experience with this disease, urged that in clinical value the American serum was vastly inferior to that of the Pasteur laboratories.In spite of