1030 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION I. 
(c) The examination of the tissues, secretions, and excretions 
in diseases such as diphtheria, typhoid fever, tuberculosis 
and many others for etiological purposes. 
(d) Examinations for the purposes of determining the cessation 
of the disease. 
(e) Examinations for the purpose of determining the best 
means of counteracting the effects of the discaee on the 
body, and of employing disinfectants for the destruction 
of microbic life ames the body. 
The value of work of this character lies in its accuracy. To be 
able to exclude every source of error in its results, ample appliances 
of the best construction, with personal skill and extended experience 
in their use, are indispensable. The strictly scientific nature of the 
work done, the ramifications of the investigations made, and their 
broad relations to the whole community, point without doubt to 
the central or State authority as the one solely fitted to establish 
and maintain so prime an auxiliary to public health administration. 
5. A few words more on this point. It is always, at least it 
ought always to be, a consideration with legislators how far the laws 
they wish to frame will meet with an intelligent response in those 
to whom the State proposes to entrust its powers. As a matter 
of fact, the amplest powers may be vested in a local authority, 
but unless there is a rational congruity between the function 
demanded by law and the intelligence that is to exercise the 
powers under it, a hiatus will arise, and the law will be found 
to be practically a dead letter. Whether this intelligent sympathy 
with the scientific services which modern hygiene is prepared to 
render exists sufficiently strong among local authorities to induce 
legislators to place the whole matter of public health in the hands 
of sub-divided authorities will best be decided by inquiry. But 
this may safely be predicted of the position, that where the action 
of local authorities shows that no such sympathy exists, and by 
persistent evidence is not likely to exist, then the authority by 
whom these investigations should be conducted, and with whom 
their practical application should rest, will not be difficult to 
determine. 
These are a few of the reasons arising out of the nature of 
communicable diseases which indicate the lines on which future 
legislature should run. It will now be of advantage to learn how 
far existing legislation in Australia, in its methods and practical 
results, contributes to prove similar conclusions. Acts of Parlia- 
ment, not being automatic, must be given effect to by some 
authority in whom the State vests powers for that purpose. The 
attitude of that authority towards the exercise of these powers 
will necessarily indicate its capacity and fitness for the function 
entrusted to it. If the administration is lax, indifferent, or 
