Loudon free press. (Loudon, Tenn.) 1852-1855, 1853-04-09


have endeavored to account for the manner in
which diseases undermine the vital powers by a
theory not unentitled to attention. As the air is
ever more or less filled with the emanations of
purifying animal and vegetable matter, they
have assmilated the action of these particles
upon the blood, to that of yeast on wort By
the fermentation produced by the yeast, the su-
gar is turned into alcohol. 1t is apparently,
predisposed for the changes and the slightest
assistance 1T receives enables it 10 unloOse the
former union of its particles, and to enter into
a wholly new state or chemical combinations
Just so, animal matter, floating in the air in the
chemical state of change called putresence, if
not sufficiently diluted, is capable of throwing
the blood, with which it comes in contact, into
an analogous state of fermentation. Thus, of
course, it Totally alters lis nature, and renders
it incapable Offulflling its proper functions.-
Other writers have supposed that the air when
rendered impure, becomes overloaded with null
titudes Of microscopic insects, who attack the
human body, as smut attacks corn. Conceiye4a
minute fungus, whose spores, floating IN th7 air,
from the gems of epidemic disease. But all the
various theories brought forward proceed, from
the assumption of vitilated state of the atmos-
phere.
To understand the full force of these theories,
we must remember that the human body is a
wonderful combination of innumerable particles,
all placed in different degrees of chemical afhn-
ity or antagonism to each other, and only held
separate and in their proper relations, by the
inscrutable powers of vitality. Port wine will
tan and convert into species of leather the stom-
ach of dead person; and the gastric juices,
that possess the power of diSsOlving not only an
imal substances, but even metals, fail to injure
in the least degree, the tender vessels with which
they in constant contact as long as life holds
full dominion. How wonderfully does one sin
gle fuid-the blood-in its passage through
each organ of the body, veild to it the different
secretion required 20 enable it to fulfill its proper
functions-supporting, at the same time, that
very vitality which it at once sustans and serves
Life has no sooner departed, and let loose all
the different atoms of which our earthly taber-
nacle is formed, than they engage in the great
strife that eventuateS in its total dissolution
AS in moral sense, the spirit is ever at war
with the iuclinations of the flesh; so too, in a
physical sense the different clements of the
body are only preserved in their integrity by the
despotic control of vitality.
These considerations derive some title to no
tice, from the undoubted fact that epidemics are
almost invaribly accompanied bv an extraordi-
nary development of insect life; and seldom fail
also to produce most remarkable effects upon
the lower animals.
We have often heard of the Showers of blood"
that are said to have preceded pestilence, strik-
ing terror into the minds of the vulgar The
showers of colOred rain are almost invaribly
caused either BY infinite multitudes of microsco-
pic insects, or sometimes hv growth of fnnrus.
The cliffs between Cape York and Cape Dudley
Digges. in the Arctic REGIONS, are some times
covered with snow of a bright crimson color
Whether these crimson globulus belong to the
animal or vegetable kinrdom, has been much
disputed; but Sir John Ross the discoverer, in
sists that they are a vegetable production, and
has called them the JredG ndrdfis. He has
so STYLED them because, he maintains, they be-
long to the genus UTedG. vulgarlv k own as the
smut in wheat. IT is evident that the phenome
non of colOred rain cannot occur, particularly
in our latitudes, without some extraordinary at
mosphere changes, of which, philosophy has fail
ed to discover the causes; but it frequently takes
place on the eve Of pestlenoe. DIR. Barker
has recorded the fall of an ink black fietid rain
doubtless animalcular). near Carlow. on the
18th of April, lS49, Mt period coincident with
the ont break of the cholera in that town. This
belief in n connection between both circumstan-
ces also prevails extensively in India; and though
perhaps it receives an undue amount of evidence,
the popularit- of the theory vouchPs for the Ire
uuencv of the coincidence. An immense de-
velopment Of insect life also preceded the pes
thence at West Barbarv, in 1893. and the same
circumstance elsewhere has heen frequently wit
messed and recorled.-Dublin University Nag
aziae.