The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1900-05-31
BILL APPS LETTER
Barlow Man Writes Interesting
Chapter On Germs"
RE DIFFERS WITH THE DOCTORS,
Test Being Made by European Physicians
To Prove That Mosquitoes Pro-
duce Malaria.

but it seems to me that the modern
doctors attach too much Importance to
germ theory. They are trying to
cure all sorts of diseases by extermi-
mating germs, microbes, bacteria and
other invisible infusoria. Maybe they
were not intended to be exterminated
but are part of the economy of ma
ture. There are bolts in r horses
stomach and wolves in cows back,
and feas on a dog for some useful
purpose, and it may be that these in
visible germs are a necessary part Of
our organism. We eat them in food
and drink them in water and breathe
them in the air, but still l reckon
there are poisonous, infectious kind
that do produce disease and pesti-
lence,
[ was Eliminating about this from
having read in a London paper an ac-
count of the experiment now being
made by the British Medical Society
to discover the true cause OF malaria
in the Pontine marshes that for cen
turtles has proved a slow and certain
death to the poor peasantry who work
there and have to work there to make
living. These Campagnean marshes
lie adjacent to Rome and cover terri
tory twenty-five miles long and ten
miles wide, and are wonderfully pro-
ductiye, giving three crops year, but
the malaria soon pales and sickens the
strongest men. and they have to stop
their work and go to the hills to die.
To discover and remove the cause has
been the problem of the ages.
Three hundred years before Christ
these marshes were solid land and the
Appian way was built upon it. Slowly
and surely the water encroached upon
the land and submerged it, destroying
the Appian way, the aqueducts and
arches. Ju Jus Caesar and Augustus
Caesar spent immense sums to drain
them, but without avail. They were
finally given up to the labor of the
slaves, and Pliny tells US of one man,
Cecilius Claudius, who owned 4, 1l6 of
them, all males, who worked there
and were not allowed to marry. Their
cruel fate was to work out brief life
and die. About 125 years ago Pope
Plus VI made another effort to drain
the marshes but failed, and since then
all efforts and all hope has been sban-
doned.
But now a new theory comes up be-
fore the scientific school of medicine
and has agitated the medical savants
all over the world. 1t is claimed that
malarial climate does not produce
mosquitoes but that mosquitoes pro-
duce malaria, and it is their bites or
stings and suction of the blood of the
peasantry and thereby inoculating
them with poison and producing ma
laria that eventually wastes the life
away. This theory has found many
strong advocates in London and Paris
and Berlin, and now they are preparing
to prove it.
The English government is having
wire gauze house built, and it is to
be placed in the middle of the Pontine
marshes, and two English physicians
have volunteered to live in it for q
year or more and test the effect of the
climate secure from the mosquito. Just
think of that Living in q wire gauZe
house right in the midst of the most
no1ious mlesmatic climate of the world,
and all for the sake of science and
humanity. If they prove their theory
then they will cease to use quinine for
the malaria, but build wire houses and
wear wire cowls or hoods over their
heads and faces and fence ont the mos
quitoes and turn their next attention
to exterminating them. They say it is
big thing, financially, for there are
two million acres in those marshes
and will be worth if they succeed
thousand dollars an acre, and that
makes two thousand million dollars
for Rome and the pope.
But still | am dubious. l don't be-
lieve the mosquito introduces malaria
il 20 the human system. His probos-
els draws out blood, but puts precious
little in. The germ theory has become
scientifc fad and has not vet been
proven. The doctors all went mad
about Pasteur and his inoculating
virus, but that has subsidized and we
never hear of it now. Folks are too
ready to believe any new thing. APP
pendicitis raised a mighty rumpus Tor
a while and every sick man imagined
he had il, and it must be cut of, but
the disease is now doubted and the
use of the knife almost abandoned.
Just SO folks take up with new doc
trines of pc litics and religion.
DIR. Vance of Nashville said not long
ago that if shrewd, smart man with
a lively tongue was to declare that 1t
was necessary for salvation that a man
should Jump off the roof of house on
to the pavement he would find follow
ers who would be jumping all over the
country breaking their arms aud legs
and necks on this new road to heaven.
What upon earth these Mormon elders
and proselyters expect to accomplish
is a mystery to me, and am amazed
that any person with common sense
can be fooled by them. They ought