OCR Text |
Show DANGEROUS TO HANDi-E HiCE.5. W araliij to Tba Who TV or It la Leather fHorw BKmxJ FoImjoIiij;. The death of Thomas Young some tune ago. a worn man in a Spruce ttrwt wtiuiesale leather nous, from poiaou received ui band-ling band-ling tudai, has oiuwJ talk auiouj Icutcrr duiers. WiLliuui Fa leu vid: "1 met) thai Young thought that oe nad beeu hitten by some UlieCt tiuit tiurruwni iu a Cide. i dlrtt-r from UiaL 1 nave knowu of poi:ouous insects, in-sects, such as me itcorpiuu. to be tound in the hldtj. Out never liucw of any men (ting bitten bit-ten by inem. Young protxioly rtusoJ a bundle bun-dle of bides to ma shoulder and it scratched his neck, causing an anrasion of thvskiu, through which tiio poison in the hide entered bis system. Iu my father's tamiery. over thirty-live years ago, I used to see men with thtsir arms frightfully swollen through having hav-ing been poisoned in handling bides. One man employed here in Spruce street lost an eye in this way. Physicians, in making an autcpey, may be poisoned similarly if any abrasion of their skin is exposed to the virus of any diseased organ of a subject they are examining. Most of the hi den likely to be diseased dis-eased come from tbe East Indies, the Argentine Argen-tine Confederation and other foreign ports. 1 have never known men to be poisoned in handling our own American hides, which are pretty sure to come from stock that has beea killed." G. B. Horton said: "There is no more dangerous dan-gerous illness that a man can suffer from than that of blood poisoning from coming in contact with the hide of an animal that has died of a virulent disease. If 1 should be poisoned in this way in the head or neck I should go home and make my wilL If a man is poisoned in the hnnd his chance of recovery is good; but let him be poisoned in the bead or neck, and it is two to one that he dies. 1 have known of half a dozen deaths in five years, two of them being of men in our own employ, from the same cause that kdled Young. Hides include those of animals ani-mals that have been killed and whose skins are healthy; those of fallen cattle, or thoso that have beeu frozen or died of starvation, whose minute blood vessels, in tbe fleshy part of the bide, coagulate and turn the skin black, and lastly, of those of diseased cattle, that also turn block and have patches of hair gone in places. Of course, tbe ordinary workman cannot make these distinctions, but they can protect themselves from danger if they would cover any abrasion of the skin at once with court plaster or wear gloves when at work. There is no danger in handling our native hides, because the men west don't remove the skin from on animal that has died of any disease. "The most dangerous hides come from coun-; coun-; tries where the workmen are very poor and i labor for a few cents a day. Particularly dangerous hides come from tbe East Indies, ! Central America and Mexico. When one of our own men, Bamuel Mc Williams, died some years ago from blood poisoning, resulting from handling hides, it was said that be died from arsenical poisoning. Tins was wrong, as the amount of arsenic used in curing a hide so that insects can't eat it is infinitesimal infinitesi-mal and could not barm any ona The first symptom of blood poisoning from a diseased bide that appears in the victim is a red spot with a bard white center, similar in appearance appear-ance to the sting mark of a boo. After a few hours the affected part begins to swell rapidly, rap-idly, and the disease speedily affects a considerable con-siderable portion of the body. Handling bides will continue to be a most dangerous business until the men learn to take proper precautions in their work." New York Sun. |