LITTRfi, DUMAS, PASTEUR, AND TAINE. 66 7 



some time ago recommended the projection of water, in the form of 

 rain, to bring the dust to the ground. Fecula and talc have been used 

 as inoffensive substitutes, in iron-founding, for charcoal, as the dusting 

 between the mold and the melted metal. 



Siliceous dusts are apt to arise especially in the making and re- 

 dressing and re-cutting of millstones. They accumulate in the bron- 

 chia?, which they scratch, and produce one of the most painful of 

 coughs, with decline and loss of strength. Sometimes an eliminatory 

 inflammation supervenes, with expectoration of masses of siliceous 

 dust, particles of steel, and bits of bronchial membrane, and gives a 

 temporary relief. But the disorders return, and the workmen have to 

 leave the shops, to continue in a condition of marasmus an existence 

 which is terminated by a premature death. The victims of this dis- 

 ease, called the St. Roch disease, are hardly ever able to endure more 

 than eight or ten years in their occupation. 



The dusts, moreover, which accumulate in the throat produce an 

 incessant thirst, and lead the workmen to habits of intoxication. M. 

 Mercier, of La Ferte-sous-Jouarre, a manufacturer of small mills, who 

 himself works at the stones, has contrived a very thin and inexpensive 

 silken veil, to which he has attached spectacles, for the protection of 

 the eyes. He has used it with great success since 1870, but has not 

 been able to induce more than twenty or twenty-five of his workmen 

 to adopt it. The others laugh at it, and die of the dust against which 

 they will not protect themselves. 



Among the siliceous dusts should be included those arising in the 

 manufacture of porcelain. At Charenton, St. Maurice, Montreuil near 

 Paris, and Sarreguemines, the workers in porcelain die very frequently 

 of pulmonary phthisis, hardly reaching more than the average age of 

 forty-four years and a half, and rarely passing fifty years. The pro- 

 tecting veil ought to be used here also. 



The dusts of gypsum, on the other hand, appear to be inoffensive, 

 and even hygienic, according to Dr. Burq, who is almost tempted to 

 attribute to them a salutary action in pulmonary phthisis. At any 

 rate, the workmen recognize them as pleasant. They have only the 

 single inconvenience, common to all dusts, of provoking thirst ; and 

 that thirst is not always quenched with pure water. 



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LITTRE, DUMAS, PASTEUR, AKD TAINE. 



THE names which we have placed at the head of this article are 

 those of four of the most illustrious representatives of the intel- 

 lect of France in t^he present age. M. Littre, whose recent death the 

 Academy and the world of letters have to deplore, takes rank among 



