RELATIONS TO OTHER SCIENCES 59 



connection therewith devised an elaborate system of water analysis; 

 we think also of Schutzenberger devising a method for the deter- 

 mination of oxygen dissolved in water (not, to be sure, simply for 

 sanitary purposes), Mallet studying the various methods of water 

 analysis, Remsen studying the organic matter in the air, and Leeds 

 the practical effect of charging with oxygen (or rather with air) 

 water used for purposes of domestic supply." * 



I dwell intentionally upon the service of sanitary chemistry to 

 public health science previous to the rise of bacteriology, because 

 I believe that, dazzled as we have been and still are by the blaz- 

 ing achievements of bacteriology, beginning, let us say, with the 

 discovery of the microbe of tuberculosis by Koch in 1882, students 

 of public health science have been too much inclined to underrate 

 the past services and present relative importance of sanitary chem- 

 istry. I know of few more important contributions to public health 

 science, even since 1882, than the chemical work of the State Board 

 of Health of Massachusetts under the able direction of my friend, 

 Professor, afterwards President, Drown (the successor of Nichols) 

 and his associates and successors; or that of another friend, the late 

 Professor Palmer, of the University of Illinois, whose chemical 

 studies of the rivers of Illinois will long remain a monument to a 

 life full of promise and too soon cut short; or that of still another 

 friend, Professor Kinnicutt, who fortunately is still engaged in fruit- 

 ful work. 



I have perhaps said enough, though it would be difficult to say 

 too much, of the magnificent contributions to public health science 

 of Pettenkofer and his disciples in sanitary chemistry; but the 

 work of these investigators in sanitary physics and especially the 

 physics of the soil, of the atmosphere, of the walls of buildings, and 

 of heating and ventilation, in their relations to the public health 

 are quite as important, and perhaps to-day even more neglected. 

 In view of the increased facilities of transportation and the grow- 

 ing habit of traveling, together with the tendency to outdoor life, 

 which seem to be characteristic to-day of all civilized nations, 

 the next twenty-five years will probably see a return to the patient 

 and exact studies of the environment, such as the chemists and phys- 

 icists began, and have in some measure continued, since the middle 

 of the nineteenth century. These studies will be directed largely 

 to further knowledge and control of the environment, but they 

 will not end there, for personal hygiene, owing to recent advances 

 in physiology, is to-day one of the most inviting fields for work and 

 education, and I hardly need to point out to a company of experts 



1 William Ripley Nichols, address before American Association for the Advance- 

 ment of Science, Proceedings, American Association for the Advancement of Sci- 

 ence, vol. xxxiv, 1885. 



