| Show THE geran GERM PROFESSOR tyndall Ty malm dalk of london announces a theory with regard to the causes of epidemic disease nud aud and aud supports i it with twit the results of scientific e experiments which is likely to over overthrow long established ideas and produce a new era in medical treatment it may be called the germ theory and holds that theair the air nin of large cities is loaded with organic dust while the country air M i not free from it and this organic dust in the atmosphere and is inhaled into the system where the germs of iffe lifo which it contains develop into par pari arites that rapidly produce disease this is claimed to be more es especially p the case with epidemics and the atmos phere of the apartments where persons suffering from such diseases aro are aro eon eon don confined is particularly vitiated by this organic matter it is asserted that the current belief bellef to ts incorrect which was held bome some time tim ago agg that epidemic diseases were gen geni i orally propagated by a kind of mala maia malaria risi which consisted of organic matter in a state of motor decay and that when sueh such matter was taken into the body through through the lungs or skin it had the power of spreading there the destroying process which had attacked itself a power visibly exerted in the case of yeast la in which a mere speck of matter to in this supposed state of decomposition is apparently able to indefinitely prorogate apropo aad its own decay rut but eliut discoveries have prove proved din dif that ier ien fermentation is not a process of decay as supposed but a product of oc life the yeas jeaa plant by these discoveries is shown to be a living organism which feeds gions grows and reproduces tices cices itself when placed in a proper medium and thus the process of fermentation is carried on this makes what are called fer ments simply organized being beings sly which find in the reputed rella relia ted ferments their necessary food by this discovery it was found that meats could be preserved from putrefaction by being placed in a high temperature of air and then being hermetically sealed so that ordinary air could not reach them professor tyndall said that the germ theory of epidemic disease had run aide by side with these discoveries and the researches that led to theland the them mand and had bad been strengthened by them A power powerful fuit fult electric the air in chieh dust is suspended to appear as a semisolid semi solid although ordinary lri iri day light no such condition would be observable in the lecture delivered on the subject at the royal roy boy al institution ondon london Ii he be said speaking of the atmospheric condition which the electric beam disclosed nobody could in tho first instance without repugnance placa the mouth a locus of the electric beam in and ana inhale the he uirt dirt revealed there nor is the disgust abolished by th the reflection that although we do not see the tiie nastiness wo we aro are churning it in our lungs every hour and minute mi nute of our lives floora is respite to this contact with dirt ani aal ta the wonder is not that wo we should from time duie to timo time suffer buffer from its presence but that eo small a portion of it would appear to be deadly to man A and this portion is declared ro to bo be the active organic matter with ath which the dust of the air is and which taken into the system produces produce a epidemic diseases on this thia thenny theory if it be true infection is not caused BO much by inhaling an atmosphere loaded with noxious and poisonous gaso gase galesas sas by breathing thad that in which these or faa iamb iams of the kind peculiar to the disease are found in great numbers and in the custom pf af a physician physic iau lau in applying a silk handkerchief tol yta the noboa entering a rodni room where infectious disease is he does by habit the airy very best beat thing that could bo be done to being taken with wilh the contagion yet a cotton respirator is better than a silk one and the air filtered through it is purer and freer from all or ganic matter pro professor fessor dalls description of this filtering process and the results obtained in experiments on it is so good that we cannot do better than produce it but by far the most interesting and important illustration of this filtering process is furnished by the human breath I 1 fill m my lungs with ordinary air and breathe thy through bogh a glass tube across the electric beam the con dension of the aqueous vapor of the breath is shown by the formation of a luminous white cloud of delicate texture it is necessary to abolish this cloud and this may be done by drying the breath previous to its entering the beam or still more simply by warming the glass tuge tube tube tubo when this is done the luminous track of the beamis beam is for a time uninterrupted t or rupt bupt the breath impresses upon th the floating matter matten a transverse motion but the dust from the lungs makes good the particles displaced but after some time an obscure disk appears ip pears nears upon the beam the darkness of which increases until finally I 1 L t towards the end of the expiration tho the beam is as it were pierced by an intensely black hole in which no particles whatever can be discerned the air in fact has so lodged its dirt within the lungs as to render tho the last portions of the expired breath absolute absolutely 17 free from suspended matter this experiment ma may L be repeated an any number of times wl with t the same result t it renders the distribution of the dust within the lun iun lungs gs as manifest as if the chest was transparent I 1 now empty my lungs as perfectly a as 1 9 possible and placing a handful of cotton wool against my mouth and nostrils inhale lahale through it there is no difficulty in thus filling the lungs with air on 0 expiring Z p ir this air through the glass tube its freedom from floating matter is at once oneo manifest brom prom the very beginning of the act of expiration the beam is pierced by a ablack black a aperture the first puff from tho lungs aperture ture ater aier abolishes oil h khe fhe he illuminated dust and puts a patch of darkness in its place and the darkness continues throughout the tho entire course of the expiration the subject is one which cannot fail fall to command the attention of scientific men and may be found to have hava cloae close connection with the diseases that prevail here s sometimes ome times late in summer when the atmosphere la Is more likely to be charged with this organic matter which would make itself manifest quicker in the tender constitutions of children than in tho the those se of adults |
