Omaha daily bee., 1896-09-20

microscope will reveal is still quite Won
derfu! enough.
The lancet of a flea is yet a more fan
tastic affair. There is a pair of them, with
teeth like a saw, and ii is with these that
the flea literally makes a cutting into the
skin of his victim. Not less wonderful
are the muscles of a fea's leg. You know
how he is able to jump. If you and |
were endowed with II e san e muscular power
a leap over Trinity spire or. for that matter.
Washington's monument would not be a
difficult matter.
Yet inner than the surgical instruments
of the flea Is the sting of the bee. Com
pared with the point of a No. ~ needle, the
latter looks blunt and heavy, more like the
stick of carbon in an electric light. Sim
ilarly, If man were endowed with teeth or
nails of anything like the relative strength
and power of a mosquitoes lance with which
1t cuts its way under your skin, we should
be able to saw rock.
But when a microscopic wants to really
astonish you he goes a step farther and
shows you the infinitely tiny parasite that
infests the bodies of even such small in
scots as the house fly or the flea. 1t Is
something of a relief, something of a sat
%isfaction to know that these diabolical nui-
sances are themselves preyed upon by para
sites of far greater size relatively than the
insects are to us. The idea helps alone
Emerson's Law of Compensation.
Again, If you were to take a hair OF
your head and make a cross section of the
tip it would have something of the beauti-
full granting of a pomegrante cut in two.
If you looked at a highly magniied por-
ton of your scalp you would think you
were gazing at some steep and jagged
cliff. 1t would remind you Of the walls of
a Rocky mountain canyon. Similarly a
portion of a leaf of a tree looks as thin and
gossamer like almost as does a spiders
web to the naked eye. You come to under
stand then what a naturalist means when
he tells you the leaves of a tree are its
lungs. This gossamer like structure enables
1t to breathe.
A look at the human skin again gives you
the impression of a cross section OF a Won
derful geological formation. You see what
looks like a loose layer on top, and then
beneath, superimposed one over the other,
are a series of different strata that re-
mind you OF anything but the warm, soft
substance which covers your body. II you
were to look at the palate OF a little whelk
you would think you had run across the
drawings and specifications OF a new fire
escape. The strings of a nettle can be
made under a microscope to look as large
as a rifles bayonet. The page Of a book
tina. to your naked eye looks as clean as a
polished knob OF brass will reveal a horde
OF insccts-real book worms" that are
never found anywhere else outside OF books,
MICROSCOPE AS A MEDICAL AGENT.
After this, perhaps, you will hardly be so
skeptical as to the value OF the expert tes-
hN'''FffE h''h 80 S'fNA 80 - 'iA' tAht
der trials as to microscopic examinations
OF the blood. Provided that the blood be
reasonably fresh, it Is not at all difficult
to determine from what kind of an animal
1t came. Then again, blood shows very
differently under varying conditions of
health and disease, II is regarded by some
az possible to anticipate a number Of differ
ent diseases simply from an examination
of a drop OF venous blood that the prick OF
a pin on your hand viii draw. In the
condition OF health the corpuscles will be
free, separated and clear: in disease they
will be stringy, run together and clotted.
Just what will be the final estimate as to the
value of this micrOscopical examination to
medicine the physicians are as yet at wide
variance.
But there is no question, on the other
hand, as to the value OF a microscope in
the study and detection OF bacteria, although
just at the moment probably more ado has
been made over this than actual results Will
warrant, AS almost everyone knows. there
are hundreds OF different forms OF bacteria,
and only a small proportion OF these, so far
as is known, are pathogenic, that Is 10 say,
disease breeders. And OF these disease
breeding germs only about a dozen or ff-
teen have been caught red handed, that is,
detected definitely as responsible for a given
disease. Conservative bacteriOlogists would
even reduce this number. Nevertheless
steady progress is being made and there
is little doubt In the minds OF the more
sanguine at least that one day we shall know
the cause OF every Infectious or contagious
disease and be equipped to do battle with
the bacteria invader who is responsible
for II. IL. Il. JOKOSA, Ph. u.