AND PREVENTION OF PHTHISIS. 403 



A glance at the state of things existing some years ago 

 will enable us to realise more fully the ameliorations of 

 to-day. I once had occasion to ask Professor Klebs, of 

 Prague, for his opinion of the antiseptic system of 

 surgery. He replied, " You in England are not in a 

 position to appreciate the magnitude of the advance 

 made by Lister. English surgeons were long ago led 

 to recognise the connection between mortality and dirt, 

 and they spared no pains in rendering their wards as 

 clean as it was possible to make them. Wards thus 

 purified showed a mortality almost as low as other 

 wards in which the antiseptic system was employed. 

 The condition of things in our hospitals is totally 

 different; and it is only amongst us, on the Continent, 

 that the vast amelioration introduced by Lister can be 

 properly apprehended." I may say that Lister himself 

 once described hospitals in his own country which, in 

 regard to uncleanness and consequent mortality, might 

 have vied with those on the Continent. Klebs's letter 

 was written many years ago. Later on the authorities 

 in German hospitals bestirred themselves, with the splen- 

 did result disclosed by Cornet, that institutions which 

 were formerly the chief breeding-grounds of pathogenic 

 organisms are now raised to a pitch of salubrity sur- 

 passing that of the open street. 



Cornet thus grapples with the grave question which 

 here occupies us. How, he asks, does the tubercle 

 bacillus reach the lungs, and how is it transported 

 thence into the air ? Is it the sputum alone that carries 

 the organism, or do the bacilli mingle with the breath ? 

 This is the problem of problems, the answer to which 

 will show whether we are able to protect ourselves 

 against tuberculosis, whether we can impose limits on 

 the scourge, or whether, with hands tied, we have to 

 surrender ourselves to its malignant sway. If the 



