The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-12-20

neutralizing the danger, at last Mr.
Wright's establishment is in a lofty
building near Fifth avenue. New York
He uses very heavy machinery, which
renders the building topheavy in the
| extreme. During a wind there wa:
always fear of the machinery being
driven through the somewhat thir
walls, or windows, thereby wrecking
the building and menacing passers-by
Mr.. Wright was equal TO the emer-
! gency. He simply caused his floor &c
| be partially zinc lined and converted
| into gigantic tank This ne flooded
with water. Then huge pontoons. oil
RATS, were constructed and set afioai
upon the surface of this strange
twelfth story lake. The pontoons were
anchored to the walls on all sides by
heavy chains and rivets. When these
preparations were completed, Wright
! had his heavy machinery embarked
upon the pontoons. Thus the building
may rock as it Will, but the dreaded
masses of steel are safely afioat, anc
all danger from them is neutralized.
The NOxiOus Mosquito in Death
Dealing Role-They Are the Dis
seminators of Malaria Germs.
In the romantic and even widening
Htlu VI IeSGdTCu. THERE
is nothing of interest comparable with
the advance in knowledge as to the
part played by mosqL itoes in the pro-
pagation of infectious disease. By far
the most definite information is that
which has been collected regarding
malaria, one of the most widely spread
of contagious. In this work, DIR. Pat
rick Manson of England and DR.. Am
leo Bignami of Italy stand first. It
10 l.
ingly minute organism, comparable in
size to the larger microbes as a mouse
to a man. and known as the malarial
Dlasmodium, is associated with all
forms of malaria, and may therefore
be regarded as the disease-producing
microbe. This tiny parasite apparently
grows in stupendous hordes in swamps
and marshy places, but seems to have
little desire, as so many other disease
germs have, to travel. There seems
good reason to believe that when the
wind blows they hide themselves I'M
der the trees or in the grass. Further,
in still air, they never seem to rise
more than a few feet above the
ground. They are, in the face of Or
binary belief, surprising facts, for it
follows from this that residence by n
marsh is not, in itself, dangerous to
health. How then does man become
infected by doing just this thing?
The present reply of science is
through the mosquito. In short, we
are now to regard this diabolical insect
as deadly as well. The process is be-
lieved to be as follows: The mosquito
as is well known, deposits its eggs in
water or in damp places. From the
eggs are Matched larvae, which, very
voracious, devour everything within
reach, among other things the bodies
of their dead parents, and the envel-
opes from which they themselves have
emerged. They then pass into the
state of nymphae, from which come
young mosquitoes. During this long
period of life in damp soil or water it
is believed that they load themselves
with the malarial microbes, which
probably inhabit the mosquito as para
sites, the mosquito being immune to
the microbe, just as a man is
to many bacteria which are dead
~ TO other animals. In some
way, then, it is not known
how, the malarial microbes escape
into the human system, when the mos
quito attacks man. That here, as else
where, science is. merely organized
that he natives of the Pontine marshes
nave learned to sleep at night, during |
the fever season, on platforms eight or !
ten feet high and. despite the heat, |
tightly protected from the marauding |
It seems almost conclusive; |
no Sectorial insects, no malaria. But |
the romantic story does not stop here. |
Once inside the human organism, the |
malarial germ promptly takes up its |
abode in the red corpuscles OF the |
blood, and there begins to multiply |
and manufacture the virulent poison
which produces the disease. 1t seems,
however, as if the microbe cannot es-
cape from the BODY by any ordinary
process, nor attain the full cycle of its
DEVELOPMENT therein. Hence it is that
malaria is rot contagious as most |
germ diseases are. But how then does
he microbe escape from its prison? /
rhe reply again is. by the mosquito.
When the latter has made successful
oray into the body of malarial vic
i'm, she (for the males are not given
o blood sucking) flies away to a
pool, deposits her eggs,
md expires beside them. Being lib
rated by their short-lived host, the
nalarial plasmodium may complete its
growth, reproduce, and its offspring
,e then ready for the same round of
Infectious pleasure as the parent en-
Dyed. The history as traced affords
curious Illustration of the way in
Which one organism may depend (
pom another, seemingly utter
Y, unrelated, for its very exist
nee, and OF the intricate linkings OF
ause and effect in nature. The ro- {
lantic story, however, is not yet COM {
lete. Manson has made some beau
ful studies in the life of the plas-
lodium within the human body. When
producing germs gain access to '
he human blood. they are Immediately
fered battle by the white corpuscles
18th the result that if the attacking
ost is not too powerful, the devouring ]
Ills engulf the microbes and chew '
lem uD. To all intents and purposes
lere is just the same antipathy as be-
veen a cat and mouse. To escape
lese monsters. the malarial microbes
Ike refuge within the red corpuscles, t
neither they are literally pursued by s
lie devouring cells. II have seer - 1
lys, Manson, a phagocyte (devouring {
I'D move up to one of the red corpus G
es. where a Dlasmodium lay embed &
I'd. touch it with pseudopia "a kind
an elephants trunk first at one
pint, then at another, move round it, I
cling as it were, if all were right
thin, suspicion apparently that
ings We're not just as they should
:. But the corpuscular sheaf seemed n
deceive the nhagOcyte for after a