The Microscope.. T3 



and during the short and frequently dark winter days this is 

 quite an object. No especial skill is required for the work or 

 previous experience with the microscope. A week generally 

 suffices to break in a novice. Ladies prove best adapted for the 

 work. Patience and conscientious care are the qualities chieiiy 

 called in use. Trichinae are found but rarely here, but we are 

 prohibited from giving details in this regard. We work slowly, 

 each lady doing now from 12 to 15 an hour, and they work five 

 to six hours a day generallj'-, with an intermission at noon. 

 Generally the work does not seem to affect the eyesight, but 

 after a dark day they are indisposed to use their eyes much in 

 the evening, but no one so far seems seriously affected. The 

 work here is done at the abattoirs, only two here from which 

 meat is exported. This affords me opportunity to verifj' each 

 find of Trichinae by examining duplicate samples, which I in- 

 variably do, to make sure that there has been no error in tag- 

 ging. The Government began here August 26, and we are now 

 inspecting about 7000 animals a week at the two establishments, 

 with IT assistants. All hogs found trichinous are immediately 

 destroyed, rendered out for soap grease. 



As regards the character of the Trichinae found. They are 

 almost invariably encysted , and when found free it is generally 

 evident that they have become so by pressing and rolling the 

 slides on each other. On heating gently — as in direct sunlight, 

 they will move and generally burst their cysts. Dead Trichinae 

 are not infrequently found, some scarcely recognizable except 

 by the cysts. All such are condemned and the carcasses de- 

 stroyed, and it frequentl}^ happens that further search discovers 

 some live ones in the same animal. 



Early in the work 1 became convinced of the need of some ar- 

 rangement to insure the bringing of every portion of the prepar- 

 ation into view. The ordinary mechanical stage I found too 

 sIqw in operation and too costl}^, but I hit upon the following 

 simple device which answers the purpose admirably. Shallow 

 grooves are cut in the stage of the microscope at a distance 

 apart equal to the field of view for the power used, in our case 

 2 mm. Two ribs are attached to the lower side of the com- 

 pressor frame for sliding in these grooves. By carrying the 

 frame step by step across the stage, and moving it up and down 



