6 PREFACE. 



As stated in the text of the bulletin 



The treatment of water supplies for the destruction of pathogenic bacteria, or any 

 application of the copper sulphate method, which has to do with the public health 

 is not contemplated or indeed possible by this Department. The requests of pri- 

 vate individuals or of unauthorized bodies for information or assistance can not be 

 granted. When State or local boards of health consider that the disinfection of a 

 water supply is desirable and wish information upon the subject, it will be supplied 

 as fully and freely as possible. All experiments of this kind, however, must be 

 conducted by boards of health, and the Department can serve only in the capacity 

 of an adviser. 



We are under obligation to Dr. H. P. Wolcott and Mr. X. H. Good- 

 nough, of the Massachusetts State Board of Health, for facilities in 

 securing material and a temporary laboratory in the Boston State 

 House; to the United States Bureau of Fisheries for fish used in 

 experiments; to Dr. J. J. Kinyoun for typhoid cultures; to Dr. M. J. 

 Rosenau for Asiatic cholera cultures, and to the Bureau of Animal 

 Industry for cultures of typhoid and facilities for carrying on pre- 

 liminary experiments. 



ALBERT F. WOODS, 

 Pathologist and Physiologist. 

 OFFICE OF VEGETABLE PATHOLOGICAL 



AND PHYSIOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS, 



Washington, D. C., April 30, 1904. 



