On  this  account  I  look  on  local  treatment  as  essential
to  the  i-apid  cure  of  these  affections.  If  these  ulcers
occur  in  the  early  period  of  secondary  syphilis,  or  if
they  occur  in  persons  who  have  not  been  treated
sufficiently  with  mercury  (in  fact,  in  the  large  majority
of  cases),  I  am  in  the  habit  of  ordering  three  grains  of
hydrargyrum-cum-creta  to  be  taken  twice  a  day,  and
the  sore  places  on  the  tongue  to  be  painted  at  least
three  or  four  times  a  day  with  a  camel-hair  brush
dipped  in  a  solution  of  ten  grains  of  chromic  acid  to
one  ounce  of  water.  The  effect  of  this  treatment  on
the  ulcers  is  marvellous  :  they  cease  almost  at  once  to
be  painful,  and  in  the  course  of  a  few  days  most  of
them  are  well.  Some  of  them  are  kept  up  by  the
rubbing  of  carious  teeth  or  stumps  ;  and  when  that
is  the  case,  the  offending  teeth  must  be  removed.  It
is  seldom  necessary  to  insist  on  special  forms  of  food  ;
but  it  is  well  that  the  patient  should  desist  from
smoking  and  should  be  very  sparing  in  the  use  of
alcohol.  There  is,  T  think,  no  special  virtue  in  the
hydrargyrum-cum-creta  that  it  should  be  prefen-ed  to
every  other  preparation  of  mercury  ;  but  I  have  been
in  the  habit  of  using  it  for  many  years  in  the  treat-
ment of  the  earlier  affections  of  syphilis,  and  I  hold
fast  to  it,  on  the  principle  that  it  is  a  good  rule  in
practice  to  use  the  same  preparation  of  such  a  drug  as
mercury  (if  one  is  satisfied  with  it)  in  all  cases  which


I20  Diseases  of  the  Tongue.      [Chap.  viii.
