APPENDIX E. cxxxiii 



says, on this subject : ' It is also very generally admitted 

 that glanders is a generable as well as a propagable disease ; 

 and that it is extremely apt, especially in some seasons, to 

 develop itself in foul, unventilated stables, or (as was often 

 the case during the continental war) in the filthy between- 

 decks of crowded transports ^' 



Here too may be mentioned such affections as purulent 

 ophthalmia, gonorrhoea, croup, and diphtheria — the two 

 former at least yielding local secretions which are virulently 

 contagious, although assuredly they are not necessarily pro- 

 duced by specific infecting agents. The secretions of croup 

 are only slightly contagious, though those of diphtheria often 

 exhibit this quality to a more marked degree. Yet, even this 

 last is generally regarded as an aggravated form of angina, 

 which is apt to prevail occasionally as an epidemic affec- 

 tion ^. 



Turning now to the infective diseases of a more general 



^ 'Transactions of the Epidemiological Society,' vol. i. p. 175. The 

 same author adds, however : ' The converse of the proposition is hap- 

 pily no less true ; experience having abundantly shown that its de- 

 velopment may be controlled even to absolute prevention by the 

 same simple sanitary rules, the observance of which has banished 

 from our jails and workhouses the disease to which I shall next refer, 

 viz. typhus.' 



^ After referring to the exaggerated notions which were at one time 

 entertained Avith regard to the contagiousness of diphtheria, Mr. J. 

 Netten Radcliffe ('Trans, of the Epidem. Soc.,' vol. i. p. 332) says: — 

 ' Subsequent observation has shown, moreover, that contagion plays 

 but' a very limited part in the epidemic extension of diphtheria. . . . 

 The times of occurrence of the forerunners of the epidemic, the scattered 

 and disconnected centres of manifestation, and the slow growth, ex- 

 tending over a period of several years, would seem to point to de- 

 veloping causes, slowly originating over ^ the whole or the greater 

 portion of the surface of the kingdom, and culminating more rapidly 

 in the southern than in the northern districts.' Mr Radcliffe adds, 

 ' If we would successfully study the etiology of the epidemic, we cannot 

 disconnect that study from the observation of allied affections prevailing 

 contemporaneously.' An examination of the statistics relating to the 

 prevalence, during the same period of scarlet fever, croup, thrush, 

 quinsey, and laryngitis lead to the conclusion that ' all the affections 

 allied to diphtheria prevailed epide?nicaUy contemporaneously with diphtheria.' 



