The Banner-Democrat. [volume] (Lake Providence, East Carroll Parish, La.) 1892-current, 1896-09-19
MEN ATTACKED BY MICE.
RISE AND FALL OF AN ANIMAL
PLAGUE IN RUSSIA

Fearful Ravages OF the Rodents the
Past Three Years-Scientists Find
|. q Remedy for the Pests.
~ OUTHERN RUSSIA and Si-
~ IBERIA in the last three years
y have been the scene of the rise
and fall of q pest of mice. In
some places the destruction of prop
erty by rodents was serious item in
the total of the general misery of the
peasant class. Great swarms of these
mice would suddenly appear in gran
aries, -four mills and storehouses, and
in few days little would be left ex-
cept the barrels or sacks. The mice
seemed to have lost their ordinary fear
of cats and would even rush at them,
relying on their force of numbers to
make up for the loss of few of their
fellow mice.
All kinds of traps were tried, but
seemed to make no diminution OF the
numbers. Some made their rendez.
vous in churches, and fed off the can
dies and prayer books. In the fields
they were so numerous that the women,
who do the most of the farming in
Russia, positively refused to go to
work, or, if they did, wore mems top
boots, with trousers bourd tightly
around the knees or ankles.
{ The government of the province
most infested finally offered large
reward for some means of extermina-
ting the mice, and the meteorological
laboratories undertook the task OF dis
covering some infectious disease that
could be started among the mice that
would make them die rapidly. There
are number of diseases which the
lower animals at times develop which
they alone are liable to. There are q
number of human diseases which are
fatal to animals also.
Thus, tetanus, or lockiaw, affects
most animals as we'll as man, and mice
are especially susceptible to it. Pas
teur discovered microbe, called the
bacillus of malignant oedema, which
can always be obtained by introducing
under the skin of rabbit or mouse q
small quantity of ordinary garden
earth. Mice, guinea pigs and rabbits,
and many large animals are promptly
killed by it. There is Q special bacil-
lus causing cholera and blood poison
ing in chickens, rabbits and small
animals, which rapidly proves fatal to
mice. There is q bacillus of hog
cholera, which also affects mice. There
is bacillus which is especially likely
to cause erysipelas and blood poison.
ing in mice. It kills rabbits, white
mice and house mice, but does not
affect field mice.
One Of the laboratories obtained q
microbe from q guinea pig who died .
natural death, which proved to be
especially deadly to mice, who died at
the end of two or three days after
being inoculated. The trouble with
these microbes was that the mice had
to be caught first and inoculated with
hypodermic syringe.
After much Investigation the Russian
psychologists discovered microbe
which not only killed mice when in
jected into them, but proved fatal if
placed IN their food. The name is the
bacillus typhi murium. It resembles
somewhat the bacillus of typhoid fever.
Though deadly to mice it did not seem
to affect rabbits, guinea pigs pigeons
or chickens.
To produce the new mice poison the
poisonous germs are cultivated In test
tubes of gelatine. Then they are
mixed with bread and water and dis
tributed kwhere the mice abound.
The mice die rapidly, and the dead
mice seem to kill of more than the
poisoned food.
The people in the province were
overwhelmed with gratitude at the
success of the scientists.
I As an illustration of the abundance
of mice before this method was tried,
the United States Consul at Odessa
writes that when the army of mice.
swarmed over houses and huts through
the country, not only the dogs and
cats refused to modest them, but the
mice attacked men. While he himself
was waiting for train on branch
line of the Southwestern Railway, .
clergyman with long hair, who was
walking up and down the platforn,
stopped for q moment and raised the
end of canvas which served as a:cov-
er for large quantity of wheat, which
was awaiting shipment. In an instant
an army of mice ran over HIM, and his
beard, hair and cloak were literally
alive with them. To brush them of
took some time, and when he finally
thought himself free, he was dismaYed
to find mouse in each of his trouss
ers' pockets.