The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-05-29 00:00:00

UNSEEN ENEMIES.

The National I-Letlth Society renders great
service to v folb-ic. and justkfies its existence
..4y diffusing vaidate iiifor,...a.tion upon subjeets
intinwely bearing upon the health of the com-
munity and tLe causes which tend to interfere
with the rules that on.,;lit to govern sanitary
science. At its suggestion Professor _Ray
Lankester, of Exeter College, Oxford, ',lid
Fellow of the Royal Society, has limn lecturing
on our unseen enemies—that is to say, . upon
microscopic germs. In doing so the prefessor
has gone a great way towards popularising
knowledge which ordinarily requires for its
acquisition thought and restairch. Toe infor•
ination which he had to convey was full of inter-
est, and affected tile existence of a creature of
a I unpleasant natdre, aud with a singular name.
Professor kfay .Lisnkester tells us that the vibrie,
:n its most simple form resembles a cell in shape
a tail of grc.ater or less length attached to
it, and floating suspended in some organie fluid.
A vibrie of this kind, us seen under the micros-
cope, resembles a tadpole; and precisely as
• adpoles exist in stagnant pools, so almost
iovari.bly, wherever there is any organic sub-
stance in procets of change or decoinposiTioo,
vibries in greater or less abundance are to be
detected. There are creatures present of this
kioci whenever milk turns sour, or meat putre-
fies, or blue mould forms or any process of
ternvoitaciou or decomposition is set up. The
viurie, according to Professor Lankester, is the
accompanying condition of ahoost every morbid
state of the human body. Physiologists and
microscopists do not attempt to decide whether
under such circumstances, the vibrie is the
actual cause ot the disease, or only its invariable
concomitant. But accortiing to Profossor
Laankester himself, two very unpleasant and
almost invariably fatal unaludies—inalignant
„ustule and spienic fever—are each distinctly
due tn a specific vibrie by the inoculation ot
which the pestilence can be infused into the
system of a previously healthy patient. In
other maladies, wilether they be fevers or pro•
oesses of local degeneration and decay, the
specific vilnie can a:most always be detected
and iciaitified.

These -c-reetures surtouni us at every turn,
aim it ia i•ile to supp,so that we can fence our-
egaimit tuem. They float in thousands
ip the Liej4 atinohpre, dud are even more
ini..tve thin the tiny motes of dust to be veal
Athwart a ray of iig.t. If a bowl of milk he.
'Wed sour, it a bundle of cut do Tors droop and
if a speriow fells =Wad OIL U.t housetop, la
oaeh cala„ the 11,icrosoopc nit! Oisciese the vihrie
4t work in in:trials. These infinitesimal td.
polo, according to Professor Lenkester, are pre-
sent in every breath of air that we inhale, in
....very drop of water that we drink, in the dust
that seitles on our clo:hes, and in the very
breeze that, CODICS tO from the sea, bringing
with it a faint odour of dying ?ea-weed, Hod
decaying fish and =tine refuse. Futunately it
wroulti seem as if the vibrie, woeu of a inali.gnaut
kind, needs a congenial soil ; otherwise a COD-
'
agouti; or an infecious disease, when once it bad
made its appearance, would sweep away a whole
neighbourhood. These minute germs are
either not so powerful for mischief us imagine-
. tin would wake them or by long process of
custom our constitaduna have become proof
Itsainst their influence. Even the most malign-
tut specimens of the tribe can nave their power
for evil citcked by being once subjected to a
Limp. Liture cps& to that of boiling water. If
Left; be en if,i,:etious tnala,-4 in any household
s .;thiog ca:, he easier than to Wouge all the
.ineti r.nai, conies front the sick room into a

_
_,,Jpper of holing spAvis. Such a course will
Absuiutely check tht• po,sibiity ot contagion. It
.1,4 be prinature to suggcst the establishment
of a profcssorship with the especial view of
..iissetnivating useful knowledge with regard to
,he vibrie and its nature. At present science
oda tell as little more about these invisible
plagues than Professor Lunkester has been
enabled to itnpazt, but eveo that is useful in the
ilteresis of the preservation of the public
health.