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R A D I U M 135
In the autobiographical notes, Mme. Curie tells of her parents and
family, her ambitions, her coming to Paris, and the meeting of Pierre
Curie, their common tastes and sympathies, which led in July, 1895, to
their marriage. In a later part she tells of her work in the training of
X-ray workers during the war, and the re-establishing of her teaching
and research work in Paris after the close of the war. In the last two
chapters Mme. Curie tells of her American trip and the concluding
sentence of her notes is one of appreciation: "I got back to France with
a feeling of gratitude for the precious gift of the American women.
and with a feeling of appreciation for their great country tied with ours
by a mutual sympathy which gives confidence in a peaceful future for
humanity."
The writer of this review cannot refrain from noting a correction
to a statement made on p. 235, where Mme. Curie, in speaking of the
presentation of the radium made at the White House, says: "The radium
itself was not brought to the ceremony. The President presented me
with the symbol of the gift, a small golden key opening the casket devised
for the transportation of the radium." As one who assisted Mr.
James C. Gray, the President of the Standard Chemical Company of
Pittsburgh, by whom the radium was refined and prepared, in the carrying
of the precious burden from Pittsburgh to the White House, and
after the presentation ceremony, to the United States Bureau of Standards.
I know the actual radium was enclosed in the metal container
which, housed in a mahogany chest whose golden key Mme. Curie received
from the President, stood on a pedestal in the space between the
audience and the chairs reserved for the President. Mme. Curie, and
the other speakers and immediate members of Mme. Curie's party.
REVIEWS AND
ABSTRACTS
John G. Clark, M. D„ and Frank B. Block, M. D., (Philadelphia,
Pa.) Relative Values of Irradiation and Radical Hysterectomy for Cancer
of the Cervix. Am. J. of Obstet. and Gynec, vii, 543-550, May.
1924.
"Surgical statistics the world over demonstrate the fact that there
is scarcely an anatomic situation which offers a more discouraging outlook
for operative intervention than cancer of the cervix. It is not, therefore,
surprising that many excellent surgeons have largely side-tracked
the radical abdominal operation in favor of irradiation, since the low
percentage of operability and the high rate of mortality have not proved
a very alluring fieldfor such a strenuous endeavor. In our own hands.
in the Gynecologic Department of the University Hospital, notwithstanding
the most assiduous endeavor, we were never able to achieve a salvage
of more than 33 per cent of five-yearcures, in a relatively small number
of operable cases, which had been culled from a much larger group of
hopeless cases. Several reports from other sources have demonstrated
a higher percentage of curability, while some have dropped below this
point. It was not difficult, therefore, to 'swap horses' when the surgical
race had been so poorly run by the first nag, and the second offered a
hope for at least as good if not a better issue."
"In our initial employment of radium, we proceeded with great cau-