The Sacred Beetle and Others 



crobes, near neighbours of must and mould, 

 on the extreme confines of the vegetable king- 

 dom. At times of epidemic, the terrible 

 germs multiply by countless myriads in the 

 intestinal discharges. They contaminate 

 those primary necessities of life, the air and 

 water; they spread over our linen, our 

 clothes, our food and thus diffuse contagion. 

 We have to destroy by fire, to sterilize with 

 corrosives or to bury underground such 

 things as are infected with them. 



Prudence even demands that we should 

 never allow ordure to linger on the surface 

 of the ground. It may be harmless or it 

 may be dangerous: when in doubt, the best 

 thing is to put it out of sight. That is how 

 ancient wisdom seems to have understood 

 the thing, long before the microbe explained 

 to us the need for vigilance. The nations of 

 the east, more liable than we to epidemics, 

 had formal laws in these matters. Moses, 

 apparently echoing Egyptian knowledge in 

 this case, tabulated the rules of conduct for 

 his people wandering in the Arabian desert: 



*' Thou shalt have a place without the 

 camp," he says, " to which thou mayst go for 

 the necessities of nature, carrying a paddle at 

 thy girdle. And, when thou sittest down, 



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