MEDICAL EXPERIMENTALISTS.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3738, 9 July 1883, Page 4

MEDICAL EXPERIMENTALISTS.

AVhat may happen to a woman in Victoria was shown a day ort'.vo ago during the trial of Savillc ancl Avife v. Gilbee. The plaintiff, au actor, sued tlic doctor for damages caused to his better-half by placing a lump of lunar caustic in her mouth, incidentally accusing the medical gentleman of having been guilty of this act for tbo purpose of damaging the reputation of one of the resident surgeons at the Melbourne Hospital, fortunately for tbe medical profession the jury did not believe the story, and, by returning a verdict in the doctor's favor, exonerated him from the charge of gross malpractice, and the still more grave one of endeavoring surreptitiously to blast the prospects of a possible rival. But tbe evidence afforded the outside public a glimpse into the inner life of the Melbourne Hospital, which shows that the dictum in relation to the small amount of wisdom with which the tlic Avorld is governed applies Avith much force to the Melbourne Hospital. The young "saw-bones" who occupy the the position of resident surgeons appear to look on a patient brought into the hospital ward as a corpus rile on which to exercise their 'prentice hands. Even were a person brought into the institution suffering from the effects of drink, the application of the galvanic battery is a wanton piece of cruelty ; but to subject a Avoinan suffering from an epileptic fit to a series of galvanic shocks, and to repeat them because she expresses hor unwillingness to disclose her name and address, is in a way re-introducing the tortures of the Inquisition. No Avonder the learned Judge who tried tbe case stigmatised tbe treatment received by Mrs Savillc as "improper aud brutal." Mr ancl Mrs Savillc evidently sued the wrong doctor.— 1 Southland News' ' Melbourne correspondence.