TYPHOID FEVER IN MIIJTAKV LAMPS 233 



recently been sprinkled over the contents of the pits, flies with 

 their feet whitened with lime were seen walking over the i'mn]. 



" (b) Officeis whose mess-tents were protected by screens 

 suffered proportionately less from typhoid fever than did those 

 whose tents were not so protected. 



"(c) Typhoid fever gradually disa])peared in the fall of 1898 

 with the approach of cold weather and the consequent disabling of 

 the fly. 



" It is po.ssible for the fly to carry the typhoid bacillus in two 

 ways. In the first place faecal matter containing the typhoid 

 germs may adhere to the fly and be mechanically transported. In 

 the second place, it is possible that the typhoid bacillus may be 

 carried in the digestive organs of the fly and may be deposited 

 with its excrement." 



One of his conclusions was that infected water was not an 

 important factor in the dissemination of typhoid in the national 

 encampments of 1898, since only about one-fifth of the soldiers 

 in the national encampments during the summer of that year 

 developed typhoid fever, whereas about 80 per cent, of the total 

 deaths were due to this disease. In the latter connection Sternberg 

 (1899) refers to a report of Reed upon an epidemic in the Cuban 

 War, in which it was stated that the epidemic was clearly not due 

 to water infection but was transferred from the infected stools of 

 the patients to the food by means of flies, the conditions being 

 especially favourable for this means of dissemination. 



Sternberg, as Surgeon-General of the U.S. Army, issued the 

 following instructions 1 : " Sinks should be dug before a camp is 

 occupied or as soon as practicable. The surface of the faecal 

 matter should be covered with fresh earth or quicklime or ashes 

 three times a day." 



I think that the instructions of that ancient leader of men, 

 Moses, who probably had experienced the effects of flies, were even 

 better than these. He said (Deut., ch. xxiii, tiv. 12, 13): "Thou 

 shalt have a place also without the camp whither thou shalt go 

 forth abroad ; and thou shalt have a paddle (or shovel) among thy 

 weapons; and it shall be, when thou sittest down abroad, thou 



^ Circular No. 1 of tlie Surgeon-General of the U.S. Annj/, April, 1898. 



