1895.] MICROSCOPICAL JOURNAL. 11 



white rats, however were entirely unaffected by the 

 treatment, indicating' plainly that the pathogenic germs 

 of a typhoid nature could not have been present. More- 

 over, a little inquiry soon showed that the wells could 

 not have been the cause of the trouble. In the first place 

 several of the students who were sick had certainly not 

 drank from either of the wells. Secondly, the wells 

 were used almost as much by certain young people from 

 the town as by the students themselves and there was no 

 corresponding outbreak of typhoid in the city. In fact 

 Middletown at that time proved exceptionally free from 

 all kinds of fevers. These facts taken together made it 

 necessary to exclude the well from the possible sources 

 of infection. 



It was noticed at the outset that the ladies of the col- 

 lege, about fifty in number, were exempted from the dis- 

 ease. This, of course, indicated that the cause of the in- 

 fection could not have been in any unsanitary condition 

 connected with the public college buildings in general, 

 but must have been some source of infection to which 

 the young men were exposed and not the young ladies. 

 After carefully looking- over the facts it was further 

 found that all of the cases of sickness with three excep- 

 tions occurred in three of the college fraternities. The 

 men did not all room in the fraternity buildings, though 

 most of them did board at the fraternity club houses. 

 This localizing of the disease to three fraternities proved 

 the first usable point of departure in the investigation. 



In the college there are seven fraternities and most of 

 the college students board at the fraternity clubs. In 

 the three fraternities afflicted there were about 100 stu- 

 dents, and of the 100 students as above stated about 

 twenty-five cases of typhoid developed. This is seen at 

 once to be an extremely large proportion. It is usually 

 supposed that some 10-15 per cent of those exposed to 

 typhoid take the disease and here was a percentage at 



