500 



HYGIENT: IN THE AEMY. 



the surgeon before deciding to accept a volun- 

 teer. The diseases, defects, or deformities which 

 afford cause for rejection of recruits have been 

 fully laid down in the books of instruction .for 

 the examining surgeons, and do not come prop- 

 erly within the range of our inquiries. It is, 

 however, to carelessness and neglect in the in- 

 spection of those who have offered to enter the 

 service that a large portion of the sickness of 

 the new troops is due, and from this cause 

 more than any other has*it happened, more 

 than once, that with very large numbers on 

 the rolls, the effective force of our armies has 

 often been very small. 



But the soldier once received into the army, 

 there are many causes which tend to impair 

 his health, and prevent that sound hygienic 

 condition necessary to make him effective and 

 serviceable. These causes may be classed 

 under one or the other of two heads those 

 inherent in the organism of the soldier, and 

 those external to that organism and acting up- 

 on it only from without. In the first class may 

 be enumerated Race, which exerts a powerful 

 influence ; the men of one race being far more 

 subject to some diseases, and enjoying a great- 

 er immunity from others, than those of another. 

 To a limited extent this is true even of nation- 

 alities, the Celt, the Teuton or the Scandinavian 

 having a constitutional predisposition to some 

 forms of disease from which the Anglo-Sax- 

 on is free, and vice versa. In the different races 

 of men this difference becomes strongly mark- 

 ed. The volunteer army of the United States 

 is principally composed of the European or Cau- 

 casian race, some regiments being largely Teu- 

 tonic, others mainly Celtic, and others, the great 

 majority, of that conglomerate of different na- 

 tionalities, the native-born American. Within a 

 year past, however, another element has been 

 added to the army, in the numerous regiments 

 of African descent. The experiment has not yet 

 progressed quite far enough to enable us to com- 

 pare the hygienic characteristics of the two races 

 very fully, but these facts have been ascertained : 

 the negro troops are more subject to phthisis, 

 scrofulous affections, and tetanus, and their 

 wounds do not heal so readily as those of the 

 whites, but they are far less liable to malarious 

 diseases, nervous affections, or the influence of 

 the syphilitic poison than the white troops. The 

 mortality from disease among them has been 

 thus far proportionally much below that in the 

 white regiments in the departments of Ten- 

 nessee, the Gulf, and the South. There are 

 three or four regiments of Indians and half- 

 breeds on the western frontier, but they are 

 not sufficiently numerous to offer the oppor- 

 tunity of a fair comparison. Age, temperament, 

 hereditary tendenciet, habit in the mode of life, 

 morbid and rsitiout habitt, and the natural con- 

 ttitution are also among the agencies inhe- 

 rent to the organism which influence the hy- 

 gienic condition of the soldier, all of which 

 must be taken into account by the regimental 

 surgeon who would keep the body of soldiers 



under his charge in the highest effective con- 

 dition. To the watchfulness of some surgeons 

 over these agencies, as well as those presently 

 to be mentioned, is due the superior condition 

 in which their regiments are always found. 



But, aside from these inherent tendencies 

 to impair the health of an army, come another 

 class equally formidable, to assail vigor and ef- 

 fectiveness from without. 



Of these external agencies the most import- 

 ant are the atmospheric condition, tempera- 

 ture, light, heat, electricity, water, soil, and lo- 

 cality of camp, bivouac, or barracks, the cli- 

 mate, and. the necessary acclimation where 

 that climate is essentially different from the 

 one in which the soldier has previously resided, 

 the habitation, in its plan, space, ventilation, 

 etc., whether that habitation be a camp, bar- 

 rack, or hospital ; the food of the soldier in all 

 its relations, quantity and varieties, accessary 

 food, including condiments, spirits, tea, coffee, 

 and tobacco, and the clothing of the army in 

 its relations to health. 



On some of these agencies a few words o: ? 

 explanation may be desirable. The atmosphere 

 is an agency for the promotion or transmission 

 of disease when loaded with moisture, es- 

 pecially when the temperature is low, produc- 

 ing at such times rheumatism, neuralgia, and 

 often pulmonary disease. A hot and moist or 

 a hot and dry condition of the atmosphere is 

 also unfavorable to health. The atmosphere is 

 also a medium of imparting disease, when it is 

 corrupted by noxious gases, when it is satur- 

 ated with the effluvia thrown off by perspira- 

 tion, as in over-crowded rooms, tents, etc.; 

 when it is impregnated with the spores of fun- 

 gi, or whatever it may be, which we denomin- 

 ate malaria ; and, perhaps, when it contains 

 an excess or deficiency of ozone. The promo- 

 tion of health in these various atmospheric 

 conditions in the army requires the use of the 

 rubber blanket, the protection of tents where 

 possible, a sufficiency of good clothing, the 

 strict avoidance and prohibition of over-crowd- 

 ing, whether in tent, barrack, or hospital, the 

 careful selection of camping ground on high 

 and dry locations, to windward of marshes or 

 malarious positions, and, if possible, with 

 water between the camp and the marsh ; the 

 building of fires, wherever there are not mili- 

 tary reasons to prevent ; the flooring of tents, 

 and the raising of the floors of barracks some 

 distance above the ground. The administra- 

 tion of quinine or cinchonine in small doses 

 daily to the men when exposed to malaria, is 

 also an important prophylactic against the inti r- 

 mittent and remittent fevers which would 

 otherwise prostrate so many of them. 



The temperature exerts a powerful influence 

 upon the health of the army. When provid id 

 with proper clothing and food, the tempera- 

 ture has rarely been so low as to effect serious 

 injury upon persons in health. In a few in- 

 stances, however, men in cavalry expeditions, 

 or in transit from one point to another, where 



