Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1890-11-08

!. :" =: !:
Il there is at present a bottled
stock most admirably COM
plete of nearly all the dis
~ ~ eases which are apt to be
| 4 on fatal to human life. If one
| A~ to indulge in any Of
| ~ these luxuries there are on
y hand in quantities to suit
~ consumption, pneumonia, ty-
="
| " ~ phoid fever, diphtheria,
w WAsatic cholera blood poison
I ~ ing, erysipelas, carbuncle
q and numerous other similarly
z cheerful complaints. The
= - Army Medical Museum keeps
n, these morbid affections in
| MT y tubes so constantly ready for
| N I'D immediate communication to
| n, healthy individuals that the
rs curator in charge Of the lab
oratory was kind enough to say yesterday that
| ii desired he could give them all to The STAR
| writer within few moments.
! OF course it was a temptation. 1t is luxury
! to be sympathized with when one is q sufferer,
but only think of the amount Of delightful
| COMMUNICATION one would receive If one were a
! galloping consumptiye. in the last stages of
| pneumonia, afflicted with typhoid, taken down
| with diphtEeria, complicated with blood poison
ing, inoculated with carbuncle and attacked
| by Asiatic cholera, with blood poisoning set
in to discourage the physician.
BREATHING GERMS.
| The curator added that he really would DO
able to do this at no serious loss or expense, in
asmuch az there was enough consumption in
| the consumption bottle to communicate the
| complaint to many thousands of people. and it
was the same way with all the other diseases he
| had on hand. In administering pneumonia to
patient. so he said, he would select by prefer
| ence the method of putting solution of the
| germs IN water IN spraying vessel and having
| the victim breathe the spray. The subject
| operated upon would contract the affection with
| absolute certainty every time. Pneumonia by
the way. is contracted not from a cold or in
| nammatIon of the lungs, as people ordinarily
| suppose, but from the breathing in OF pneu-
| monia germs. which are given encouragement
III growing and multiplying by an unhealthy
| condition such as n cold may give rise to. The
mouths of altogether healthy people very COM
monty have lots of pneumonia bacteria in
| them. The disease signifies simply that the
air cells in the lungs are ruptured and blood
| flows into them, thus rendering them useless
for breathing,
CATCHING CARBUyCLE.
As for that interesting and commonly fatal
| complaint. carbuncle, the curator said that he
could produce it any time in the most healthy
| individual by simple incubation with q solu-
| ton of the germs. Once so inoculated You
| have about an even chance with death. This
| Is very commonly called 'wool-sorters' disease,
| because men who sort wool are very apt to con-
| tract 1t. Sheep are frequently afflicted with
| carbuncle and the slightest abrasion on the
! hand of one who touches the fleece OF an ami
| NAL SO diseased Is likely to communicate it.
Spraying the throat with a solution OF the proper
| germs Is the proper method also for conveying
diphtheria. which can be given in this way with
| absolute certainty. Then IL is question of
| preventing the patient by artificial means from
| being strangled by the false membrane that
| rapidly grows and tries to ill up the breathing
passage.
AsIATIC CHOLERA.
There Is no great difficulty in contracting
Asiatic cholera if you want it. Take a few OF
the germs from the appropriate bottle at the
| museum and drink them in water or beef tea
Ii your stomach is in a particularly healthy
| condition you may not take the disease, but
| otherwise You are pretty sure to have it An
| assistant in the laboratory of the famous Prof,
| Koch once swallowed by accident a lot of
germs of Asatic cholera, with which expert
ments were being made, and developed what the
| professor dellghtedly called a typical case.
| He recovered by narrow scrape. Tubercu-
losls and blood poisoning. by the way, can be
given every time artificially by hypodermic in
| jectons OF the germs in beef tea. Erysipelas
Is easy enough to communicate by rubbing the
germs upon the skin, and all sorts Of other
complaints, such as relapsing fever, like
wise IN various simple ways. Even
| consumption Of the lungs. which kills one out
OF seven OF ali the people in the world who
dle, can be propagated readily enough by arti-
| hce, supposlnS favorable conditions to be pres
| ent III the patient We all breathe consump-
ton germs frequently-perhaps every day
but healthy tissue resists them. When these
| microscopic rod-shaped bacteria find a congen-
| lal spot to plant themselves in they grow and
multiply, forming about themselves accumula-
| tons of dead flesh, which are called .tuber-
cles." When the air cells of the lungs have
become sufficiently filled up with these accu-
mutations the victim dies. The germs of lep-
| rosy and yellow fever have not yet been sue
cessfully isolated.
| HOW GERMS ARE OBTAINED,
The diseases which the government keeps
thus bottled in convenient form are all OBJ
tained-the germs, that is to say-from actual
diseased tissues OF. patientsl afflicted with the
complaints. To propagate the germs in any
quantity from these tissues is easy enough.
Vegetable gelatne, from a Japanese plant
called "agsr-agar," is boiled and mixed with
| beef tea, to form soft, transparent solid.
A small quantity of this is put into tube that
| is tightly corked with cotton at the open end
| The tube is then placed in an oven and heated
until all the germs in it, of whatever sort, are
killed. Next the tube is briefly uncorked and
| u long steel wire, that has been heated also to
| sterlliZe it, is dipped III the germs OF the dis
ease which it is desired to cultivate and
scraped across the surface of the gelatine
| 4HC tuDo 10 uOW IGCOThcu anu permitted
| to stand for q few hours, at the end of which
the bacteria of the disease, having found the
gelatine to their taste for feeding upon, will
have multiplied enormously, so as to fairly
cover the surface OF the gelatine. Each kind
OF bacteria or germs has its own form of grow
ing In colonies, so that one disase can be
readily distinguished from another in the
tubes without microscope. All diseases, you
see. are caused by poisonous bacteria, but
most bacteria ar of the most important use
fulness in the world, performing an essential
part in the operations whereby human tissues
are renewed and kept healthy. The mouth
and throat are always full of bacteria and the
skin is covered with them; they are in
the air and everywhere When you see q
stale fish appear luminous in the dark
it is because multiudes of bacteria are feeding
upon 1t as scavengers In old times the couse-
Grated waters placed over night by the priests
In churches were occasionally found in the
morning covered with bright red drops or clots
of what looked like blood. Very naturally this
was taken for a miracle and . portent The
number of lives sacrificed and homes destroyed
in consequence Of this supposed prodigy Of the
bleeding host history can tell. Today the
chemists cultivate in tubes at will the tiny bac-
terra which, growing in masses on bread or
other food substances, made the drops Of blood.
This bacterium has been suitably named the
bacillus prodigiosus."
The knowledge gained by the experiments oil
the psychologists has already been of meal.
cuiable usefulness in the saving Of life. To
them is due the adoption of antiseptic methods
| in surgical Whan IL