106 TUBERCULOSIS. 



as others and to hold free communication with them. Since 

 bacteriology has become a science, the necessity for keeping 

 them apart has been recognised. In advanced cases, when the 

 breaking-down of the tissue begins, the breath of phthisical 

 patients conveys into the air which is breathed by other persons 

 innumerable tubercle bacilli ; the saliva which they discharge 

 is loaded with the living seeds of disease ; and the bacilli are so 

 protected by the sputum of their host that they retain their 

 vitality when this has become perfectly dry, and may be con- 

 veyed with the dust in the air to the mouth and lungs of their 

 destined victim. So fully is this danger recognised by patholo- 

 gists of the present day that in continental hospitals, and I 

 believe also in those of Great Britain, not only are phthisical 

 patients kept apart from others, but vessels containing water are 

 set beside them for the reception of their saliva, and every care 

 is exercised to prevent the sputum from drying on handkerchiefs, 

 cloths, &c., which they make use of. Carl Fraenkel has as 

 much to say in his Textbook of Bacteriology as other pathologists 

 of the dangers of unboiled milk and insufficiently cooked meat, 

 and his warnings are no doubt wise ; but after all he relegates 

 these dangers to a very obscure back corner — " If it be remem- 

 bered," he says, "that the very expectoration of tubercular persons 

 usually furnishes the richest supply of rods, and if it be borne in 

 mind how carelessly and heedlessly this dangerous matter is 

 almost everywhere treated, how it is strewn and scattered about, 

 it will be found a source of infection flowing, unfortunately, so 

 copiously that other sources need hardly be looked for." Then, 

 referring to Cornet's " beautiful and significant investigations," 

 he says — " Cornet ascertained that the tubercle bacilli are by no 

 means scattered all about us without choice or difference (as was 

 formerly supposed) ; that they are not ubiquitous ; but that they 

 are only met with in definite narrowly-circumscribed regions, 

 the centre of which is regularly a tuberculous and phthisical 

 person." Then, in concluding his remarks on Tuberculosis, he 

 says — " If we may state our view of these in brief, we declare 

 that tuberculosis is an infectious disease, caused by a specific 

 bacillus, and transmitted to man mostly through inhalation of 

 dried sputum of the lungs of phthisical persons." 



Sims Woodhead, in " Bacteria and their products," also 



