8 THE CONTAGIOUS TYPHUS 



fied; he is able, without much degenerating, 

 to inhabit any latitude, to go with a sort of 

 impunity, if his calling require him to do 

 so, amidst the most pestilential emanations, 

 and to continue for hours inhaling their 

 baneful fumes. We could quote many striking 

 examples of this resisting power in man. But 

 there is one which we have recently witnessed, 

 and which all can appreciate. We refer to 

 the slaughter-house of the great Metropolitan 

 Market. Here we saw, in lumps and fragments, 

 every variety of corrupt detritus of animals 

 which had been seized with the contagious 

 typhus ; we saw the animals, too, being felled 

 and slaughtered and dissected, in a high tem- 

 perature which rendered the air so poisonous 

 that we could hardly breathe it ; yet amidst 

 all this infection the workmen employed to 

 move and handle these revolting wrecks ap- 

 peared indifferent to the scene, and quite in 

 their usual health. No living animal besides 

 man could stand such a trial ; no other could 

 breathe for hours, and day after day, like these 

 workmen, an atmosphere so charged with de- 

 composing impurities. 



We say, therefore, that man may expose 



