142 INFECTION AND IMMUNITY 



tinal flux (chronic diarrhoea) caused a large share of 

 the mortality among the troops, on both sides, in 

 that momentous struggle. Deposits of infected 

 excreta upon the surface of the ground or in shal- 

 low pits ; neglect of camp sanitation ; the mischievous 

 activity of flies, which often constitute a veritable 

 pest under such conditions ; contamination of the 

 water supply ; and the deposit of dust from the in- 

 fected camp site upon the moist mucous membrane 

 of the air passages, are the chief factors in the pro- 

 pagation of all the infectious filth diseases that is, in 

 those diseases in which the disease-producing germ is 

 present in the excreta. We might include here cer- 

 tain diseases due to the presence of parasitic worms 

 in the intestine, the ova of which are discharged with 

 the excreta. Recent researches show that a disease 

 characterised by persistent anaemia and debility and 

 often ascribed to " malaria," which is very common in 

 many of the Southern States, is due to a minute intes- 

 tinal worm ( Uncinaria americand). Dr. Stiles, of the 

 Public Health and Marine Hospital Service, to whom 

 we owe this discovery, says : " I have now examined 

 specimens of this new parasite from Virginia, Texas, 

 Cuba, and Porto Rico. The clinical picture of the 

 disease does not differ from that of the malady caused 

 by the Old World parasite Uncinaria duodenalis" 

 The vast importance of the measures recommended 



