38 MICROBES AND THE MICROBE-KILLER. 



In experimentiDg on plants there is no such risk, and 

 when we shall have found something which will destroy 

 microbes without injury to the plant we may safely test 

 it on the human body. I have mentioned the proposal 

 that was made to win the one thousand dollars that I 

 offered as a reward for something that would kill the 

 cabbage bugs ; and it ruined the cabbage. If that same 

 experiment had been tried with a child it would most- 

 certain ly have killed the child. The product obtained by 

 burning sulphur in air is sulphurous acid. This has 

 bleaching properties and disinfecting power, and no ani- 

 mal life can exist in it. Its use as a disinfectant depends 

 on that property. It is, in truth, a deadly poison when 

 taken in full strength into the lungs. To use it, there- 

 fore, on mankind in that way would be simply criminal, 

 whereas an experiment with a plant is justifiable and 

 useful. It may be inferred with tolerable certainty that 

 if any agent that is offered to us has no deleterious ef- 

 fects on vegetable life, it will not be very hazardous to 

 test it on the human body. 



All my early life was passed amid flowers. I was en- 

 gaged in their cultivation ; 1 learned their habits and 

 their needs ; I watched their lives ; I studied them in 

 health and noted careful observations about their dis- 

 eases ; I experimented, and it will be well if I give some 

 of my experiences and how I went to work to try and 

 cure plants. 



If plants are kept as nearly as possible in their native 

 condition, with good soil from which to obtain their 

 nourishment, and in a pure atmosphere and an equable 

 and proper temperature ; if, too, they are raised from 

 healthy stock, they are not subject to disease, fungi 

 cannot readily get a foothold on them. So a child, the 

 offspring of healthy parents and a sturdy ancestry, 

 properly fed, kept in wholesome surroundings, sheltered 

 from extremes of heat and cold, and protected from con- 

 tact with disease of others, is not very likely to grow up 

 unhealthy or to be subject to any serious illness. But 

 if plants are chilled or kept too warm ; if the soil be 



