(Scabies), is a contagious vesicular disease of the skin, attended with an intolerable itching, hence its name. The vesicles are minute and slightly acuminate, with a pearly transparency at their summit, and are most numerous at the flexures of the joints, and the soft skin between the fingers. It seems to be almost solely propagated by contagion, and a few days generally elapse between the infectious contact and the manifestation of the itching. This disease is now very generally ascribed to the presence of a minute insect resembling the cheese mite, and named acarus scabiei, which propagates with great rapidity, burrows in the skin, and is the cause of the intolerable itching; and numerous carefully conducted experiments have proved that this insect placed on the healthy skin soon burrows below the surface, and gives rise to the disease. A few, however, deny that the insect is the invariable cause of the disease, but assert that it is only generated in some cases of scabies. The disease in the dog termed the mange seems to be the same malady, and contact with a mangy dog will produce itch in the human subject as readily as contact with a person with that cutaneous disease. Sulphur is considered as the specific for the cure of itch. It is commonly applied in the form of ointment; the sulphur being simply mixed with lard or butter. It is much more efficacious, however, if combined with an alkali. The best proportion seems to be—sulphur two parts, subcarbonate of potash one part, and lard eight parts. Frequent washing of the parts affected with soap and water are essential to a speedy cure. Indeed, some practitioners assert that every case may thus be cured without using any specific ointment or lotion. Many other external applications may be used instead of sulphur ointment, such as ointment of white heliobole, solutions of the chloride of lime, or chloride of soda, solution of the muriate of mercury, &c. In inveterate cases sulphurous baths, or sulphureous fumigations, have been found efficacious.