NATURE'S INSURGENT SON 



37 



children, so that it has been justly said that this malady 

 and the use of alcohol as a beverage are together 

 responsible for more than half the disease and early 

 death of the mature population of Europe. For more 

 than thirty years, a few workers, here and there, have 

 been searching for this parasite, and the means of sup- 

 pressing the awful curse of which it is the instrument. 



FIG. 6. 



The minute vibratile organism discovered by Fritz Schaudinn in 1905 

 in the eruptive formations and other diseased growths of syphilis and 

 called by him Spirochoeta pallida (since altered to Spironema pallidum) : a, 

 common phase ; b, shortened and thickened form leading on to e the 

 Try panosoma- like form ; c, d, stages of division by fission ; /, elongated 

 multi-nuclear form; g, segments into which it breaks up; h, supposed 

 conjugation of male and female units (after Krystallovitch and Siedlevski). 



This organism, though resembling the spirillar forms of Bacteria, is 

 probably not one of that group of vegetable parasites, but allied to the 

 minute animal parasites known as Trypanosomes (see pp. 145 and 181 

 and figures.) It is regarded as the ' germ ' or active cause of the terrible 

 disease known as Syphilis. 



It would have been discovered many years ago had 

 greater value been set on the inquiries which lead to 

 such discoveries by those who direct the public ex- 

 penditure of civilized States. And now the complete 

 suppression of this dire enemy of humanity is as plain 



