Commonplace book belonging to Ross

Commonplace book belonging to Ross, containing manuscript notes, transcribed extracts from text books, journals and newspapers, diary entries, poems, culinary and medical recipes, and newspaper cuttings.

Entries begin at both ends of the volume, which has been added to in a haphazard and irregular fashion over a period of 20 years. [?] Ross's original page numbering is broken and inconsistent in places and manuscript entries/newspaper cuttings are not entirely concurrent or in chronological order. A wide variety of medical, public health, social, cultural, historical, military and economic topics, relating to Britain, America, India and other countries, are covered.

From the 'front', ff.1-125 contain notes and transcribed extracts mainly on medical and health matters including: amputation; dental caries; inflammation; lymph; repair and reproduction after injuries; detection of albumen in the urine; mental disorders in Britain; iodine linement in bowel complaints; treatment of prolapsed anus; snake bite cures; preventive medicine; poisoning by strychnine; suicide rates in England and London; crime; French schools for training officers; lithotomy; Dr Snow and cholera; travel in northern Europe; Afghan history; treatment of female diseases; diseases of children; diarrhoea; diseases of the brain and nervous system; digestion.

From the 'back', ff.247-132 contains notes, extracts and newspaper cuttings on a wide variety of topics including: the physical and moral effects of excessive tobacco smoking; prison systems in America and India; wine making and drinking in Australia; quarantine regulations; depopulation of France; poisoning by photography; the cholera epidemics in England; the American civil war; organisation of the French Army; smoke pollution in England; rifles; sanitary and sewage issues; medical officers under the Board of Health, 1855; history of British North America; poisoning by strychnine; history of the national debt in England; Italian schools of painting, Samuel Rogers obituary; the passage of the Kohat pass. ff.208-189 contain Ross's journal of his "journey home on sick furlough 1855" [apparently continued from and taken up again in another book called 'book V'], 30 Aug 1855-30 Oct 1855. Ross departs from Aden and his journey covers Egypt, Greece, Italy, Germany, France, England, Ireland, Canada - Newfoundland and Quebec, and the east coast of America. ff.142-134 contains his journal of "our wedding tour JTCR and S[arah]R", 26 May-1 Jun 1857, covering their stay in Paris and journey to Dijon [possibly continued in a separate volume, whereabouts unknown].