22 THE AMERICAN MONTHLY [January, 



EDITORIAL. 



Explanatory. — The managing editor has returned from the Pacific 

 Coast, where he has devoted the past four months to Census Office busi- 

 ness. During his absence, the Journal has suffered temporarily and 

 hundreds of letters have accumulated. All will be answered as soon as 

 possible. The delayed numbers, which could not be edited and pub- 

 lished at so great a distance, are now being put in type, and will follow 

 this issue as fast practicable. The annoyances which subscribers will 

 necessarily feel by reason of this delay are very much to be regretted. 



All must be awai^e that periodicals of a scientific or technical nature 

 are usually published, not for profi^t, but often at a loss, purely from 

 interest in the cause. This is why they do not always maintain a cleri- 

 cal force, agents, etc., and explains the delay in such emergencies as the 

 present. This incident may help our friends to appreciate some of the 

 difficulties encountered by the missionaries of science. — C. W. S. 



Steady Progress. — Here isan enthusiastic biologist, a hunterof path- 

 ogenic microbes, with his 1-15 immersion. He understands cultures 

 and differential staining. He says that he can diagnosticate tuberculosis, 

 cholera, and typhoid fever by means of his microscope and cultures, 

 and he confidently expects that the cure of these and other microbic dis- 

 eases will be found in some substance that either destroys the causative 

 microbe, or antidotes its alkaloidal product. 



There is a man who has spent forty years at the bedside of the sick. 

 He understands the remedial effects of calomel, morphia, quinia. He 

 never saw nor looked for a bacillus. Not long ago he said that he could 

 see no objection to public funerals for children dead with diphtheria, 

 and he asks patients sick with sore throat to breathe forcibly in his face 

 to see if he can scent diphtheria. 



Between these two men there is a wide gulf. Between the two ex- 

 tremes there are, in professional circles, men representing every degree 

 of faith and unfaith. Outside of scientific circles prevails the grossest 

 ignorance concerning the whole matter. The newspaper is about the 

 only medium of communication between the savant and the millions, 

 and the latest news is often presented in so sensational a form as to be 

 practically worse than valueless. A simple tonic becomes in headlines, 

 " The Elixir of life." A bit of lymph is expected to restore broken-down 

 lungs. These sensational reports should and do breed distrust. It is 

 not to be supposed that a bacillus may be discovered, described, its 

 rank, habitat, and variations determined, and its by-products thoroughly 

 studied in the space of six months. 



The attitude of the philosophic mind towards the bacteriologist should 

 be that of eager, expectant caution. Knowing that ambition and pre- 

 tence are abroad, we should not with undue haste accept every new 

 " lymph," but, on the other hand, we should throw aside old traditions 

 as soon as the man with the microscope shall have shown them to be 

 false. Compared with what the bacterologist knew ten years ago, the 

 sum of to-day's knowledge is marvelous after all due allowances have 

 been made. — F. B. 



