FOUL-BROOD 485 



the "woinaii, who did not have the disease, refused to use it. 

 In two weeks afterwards, the man came back for more ointment. 

 He was cured but his ^\-ife had the itch in her turn. The 

 doctor gave him some and told him that he should use it too 

 or he might catch the disease again; but he did not mind the 

 warning, and two weeks later he had to call for more. "Well," 

 said the old doctor, "I hope that these two experiments will 

 convince you of the necessity of a thorough treatment for both, 

 with a disease that is transmitted so readily, by contact." 



The case is exactly the same ^ith the bacillus. While we 

 are treating one colony, a few spores may be transmitted to 

 a neighboring hive, by the contact of a single bee, and the 

 disease is spread, unknown to us, while we are congratulating 

 ourselves, in the firm belief that we have eradicated it. 



The difference in the treatment between the two diseases is, 

 first, because in the one case the honey has proven to transmit 

 the germs of disease. Secondly, in the European foul-brood 

 the assumption is that the bees are able to clean out all the 

 dead brood. Should they fail to do so, or be unable to clean 

 it, the treatment would fail. 



All disinfectants and antiseptics are good, as preventives 

 and perhaps also as cure, but it must be borne in mind that 

 they cannot very readily reach to the bottom of cells containing 

 putrid or dried-up larvae. The irregularities in the reports of 

 cure, some failing where others succeeded, may be ascribed 

 to differences in the intensity of the disease. On this matter 

 Mr. Bertrand, in his work, "La loque et son traitement," says: 



"In countries that are rich in melliferous resources, where 

 bees have been kept for years, and where, in consequence, foul- 

 brood must have been in existence for a long time and exists 

 in an endemic state, the race has acquired a relative im^munity, 

 a force of resistance which diminishes considerably the effects 

 of the disease and permits of its being more easily overcome. 



