EDITORIALS 801

famous Harley Street. For 120 pounds a year he obtained a front consulting room and part use of a waiting room. He humorously remarked that he was soon to find them both waiting rooms.

Not a single patient crossed his threshold. However, the quiet hours in the consulting room were ideal for reflection and literary effort and resulted in some of his best Sher­lock Holmes' adventures. Between the middle of April, a month after his return to London, and August, 1891, he finished six short stor­ies. Between the , time the first adventure, Scandal in Bohemia, appeared in the July, 1891, number of the Strand, arid the sixth, The Man with the Twisted Lip in the De­cember, 1891, issue, Sherlock Holmes and his creator rose to the eminence of unfading literary renown.

He kept his professional office open for five months, until August, 1891. Following a severe attack of influenza, he decided to cast aside his medical career and live en­tirely by his writing.

Francis H. McGovern.

T H E NUMBERED INTERNATIONAL CONGRESSES O F ,

OPHTHALMOLOGY The International Council of Ophthalmol­

ogy was formed on July 14, 1927. Not less than 43 delegates from 24 different nations met in Schveningen and drafted the statutes for the future international congresses. To strengthen the basis of international inter­course and to secure its continuity, inde­pendently of political vicissitudes, Gonin had proposed the formation of an Interna­tional Association of Ophthalmologists with the individual ophthalmologists of different countries as members. Treacher Collins, on the other hand, seconded by von der Hoeve, had suggesteed a Federation of Ophthalmo-logical Societies with the national societies as members. The latter suggestion was accepted and, at the XIV Congress in Madrid in 1933,

the federation· was formed and its statutes accepted. By these statutes the International Council was made the administrative organ of the federation, retaining at the same time the final responsibility for the congresses. Provision was also made for an electing body of delegates from the member societies and an executive committee to operate for the council.

At its session in Cairo in 1937, the Asso­ciation for Prevention of Blindness was af­filiated with the International Congress of Ophthalmology. The International Organ­ization Against Trachoma, founded at that meeting, was also affiliated and these two organizations became auxiliaries of the con­gress. The presidents of these two organiza­tions were made members ex officio of the council. These organizations have since then co-operated with the federation, synchroniz­ing the sessions of their council and delega­tion with those of the latter.

While endeavors were made to hold con­gresses every four years, there were gaps from cancellation because of international political strife. Here is a list of planned con­gresses as held:

I 1857 Brussels TT I860) D ·. 11 1862} P a n s

III 1867 Paris IV 1871 London V 1876 New York

VI 1880 Milan VII 1880 Heidelberg

VIII 1894 Edinburgh IX 1900 Utrecht X 1904 Lucerne

XI 1909 Naples XII 1914 St. Petersburg

XIII 1929 Amsterdam XIV 1933 Madrid XV 1937 Cairo

XVI 1950 London Since its foundation in 1927, the Interna­

tional Council has met at least once a year. Together with the local committees, it has had four congresses and selected Montreal

802 OBITUARY

and New York for the XVII Congress in 1954.

For several years the congresses were de­ferred because of strained international dip­lomatic relations in Europe. Following the Cairo meeting in 1937, a movement was in­augurated by Harry S. Gradle, Moacyr E. Alvaro, and Conrad Berens to organize a Pan-American Congress of Ophthalmology and, sponsored and abetted by the American Academy of Ophthalmology and Otolaryn-gology, a full-blown scientific meeting was held in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1940, and a per­manent organization established. The Inter­national Council at once recognized the Pan-American Association and concluded an agreement about synchronizing the Interna­tional and Pan-American Congresses so that a congress of either kind would take place every other year.

The Pan-American Congresses have been held according to plan:

I Cleveland, Ohio October, 1940 II Montevideo, Uruguay November, 1945

III Havana, Cuba January, 1948 IV Mexico City January, 1952

The V Pan-American Congress will be held in Santiago, Chile, January, 1956. The time and place of the XVIII International Con­gress of Ophthalmology will be determined by the council at their next plenary session in Montreal in September.

William L. Benedict.

O B I T U A R Y

EUGENE W O L F F (1896-1954)

Eugene Wolff, F.R.C.S., ophthalmic sur­geon to the Royal Northern Hospital and surgeon to Moorfields, Westminster, and the Central Eye Hospital, died in London on February 25th. He was born at Oudtshoorn, Cape Province, South Africa, but came as a boy to University College School, Hamp-stead, from whicr he went on to University

College, London, and then to University College Hospital, where he was awarded the Lister Medal for clinical surgery in 1918. In the same year he was graduated from Lon­don University with the degrees M.B., B.S.

Following a year's service as captain in the South African Medical Corps, Mr. Wolff returned to University College in 1919 and, for the next eight years, pursued studies which enabled him to make valuable contri­butions to the anatomy and pathology of the eye. Meanwhile, clinical work was not neg­lected and he became house surgeon and af­terward ophthalmic registrar to the late Percy Flemming and Sir John Parsons at University College Hospital, as well as chief clinical assistant at Moorfields Eye Hospital. In 1927 he became a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons, England.

During most of his years as demonstrator of anatomy at University College, Mr. Wolff found time to lecture on this subject in the Slade School of Art and to write his first book, Anatomy for Artists (1925), which is now in its third edition. There followed, in addition to a number of excellent papers, three fine books, Anatomy of the Eye and Orbit (1933), Pathology of the Eye (1934), and Diseases of the Eye (1937). All of these books are beautifully illustrated with his own drawings. The popularity and value of these books are shown by each going into several editions.

Many American ophthalmologists serving in the European Theater during World War II remember Eugene Wolff with much grati­tude and affection for his many kindnesses to them during this trying period.

In 1945, Mr. Wolff was elected a vice president of the Ophthalmological Society of the United Kingdom. He was also an hon­orary member of the Ophthalmological So­cieties of Belgium and of Greece, and a mem­ber of the Section of Ophthalmology of the Royal Society of Medicine and the Section of Ophthalmology of the British Medical As­sociation.