302 
NATURE 
[| Aug. 17, 1871 

refuge at great expense, in instituting a series of astro- 
nomical observations, and issuing an elaborate series of 
charts for the protection of mariners against the unavoid- 
able risks and dangers of a seafaring life. The extent to 
which pure Science should beassisted by the State is still one 
ofthe grave questions for discussion of the day. But when 
we come to purely domestic, and especially to agricultural 
matters, few people seem to think that the State has any 
rightful authority here. Except the mariner, the farmer’s 
welfare is more dependent on his knowledge of natural 
phenomena than that of any other class of the commu- 
nity. Who can calculate the enormously increased mate- 
rial gain to the country, were we able, from any series 
of meteorological observations, to predict with moderate 
certainty the weather for a week? Since the first dawn of 
agriculture, crops have been ravaged by insect enemies : 
“the palmer-worm, the canker-worm, and the caterpillar,” 
have been the farmer’s foes for the past three thousand 
years ; and at the present day very little more is known of 
the causes of, or the remedies for, these plagues than in 
the days of Israelin Egypt. Our apples, our turnips, our 
hops, our vines, our potatoes, to say nothing of our goose- 
berries and our roses, are subject every few years to all 
but absolute destruction, and we are content to sit by idle, 
and to trust that next year will be a good year because 
this year has been a bad year. The continued existence 
among the farmers of some parts of England, of sparrow 
clubs, notwithstanding what has been written about the 
benefit conferred on the crops by these birds, is a standing 
evidence of the dense impenetrable ignorance in which 
the mass of our population is steeped. 
In other countries they manage matters differently. 
Few can doubt that a laborious series of investigations as 
to the causes of and the best means of preventing the 
potato blight or the turnip-fly, aided by the light of the most 
recent discoveries in biology, such as M. Pasteur has 
conducted in the case of the silkworm disease in France, 
would be productive of most important results. We have 
before us the “ Third Annual Report on the noxious, 
beneficial, and other Insects of the State of Missouri, 
made to the State Board of Agriculture, pursuant to an 
appropriation for this purpose from the Legislature of the 
State, by Charles V. Riley, State Entomologist.” The 
report contains descriptions, with woodcuts, of the most 
pestilent insects of the State, of their mode of propaga- 
tion, and of the result of experiments in different methods 
for their destruction ; and others of the American States 
have annually granted sums of money for similar purposes, 
money which we cannot doubt has fructified hundredfold 
for the benefit of the thrifty western farmers. The 
Central Government of the United States publishes 
“Monthly Reports of the Department of Agriculture,” 
containing an immense mass of information as to the 
progress of agriculture at home and abroad, the rearing 
of cattle, market prices, meteorological observations for 
the month, scientific notes, and innumerable subjects of 
interest and practical value to the farmer, Is it not worth 
consideration whether we might not spend a little of the 
public money that is now wasted in perfectly useless non- 
scientific experiments, to forward practical researches 
which have for their chief object the benefit of large 
classes of our fellow subjects, and the increase of the 
prosperity of the couniry at large ? 

MACNAMARA ON CHOLERA 
A Treatise on Asiatic Cholera. 
geon to the Calcutta Ophthalmic Hospital. 
(London: Churchill, 1870.) 
By C. Macnamara, Sur- 
Pp. 557 
ae literature of Cholera progresses with far greater 
strides than the scientific knowledge of Cholera. 
Here we have another large book devoted to the history 
of one disease, containing a digest of past information re- 
garding the history, theories, and treatment of Cholera, 
and leaving us at the end with another theory of the 
disease, which is supposed to include the main practical 
facts in a useful form. 
Discussions on professional matters are beyond our 
sphere, but as the subject of Mr. Macnamara’s book is 
one of great public interest, especially at the present time, 
it may not be out of place to glance at it very briefly, 
from the scientific aspect of some of the questions dealt 
with by the author. The historical part of the work con- 
sists of statements and opinions of different writers of the 
most opposite kind. It is scarcely too much to say that 
these describe Cholera to be unquestionably contagious 
and as unquestionably non-contagious; that it is import- 
able by ships and not importable ; that its progress can be 
arrested by quarantine and that quarantine is a useless 
precaution ; that it is communicable by clothing and 
that it is not so communicable ; that it doesand does not 
attack people living under the same unhealthy conditions ; 
and that it can be cured by certain methods of treatment 
and that it can’t be so cured. And then to crown the 
whole, we have theories of the disease which are as con- 
tradictory to each other as the facts. It appears to us 
that when we are confronted with evidence such as this, 
we can only arrive at one of two conclusions, either that 
the observations were one-sided and the logic wofully de- 
fective, or that there were reasons for the apparent con- 
tradictions requiring careful scientific study. Mr. Mac- 
namara’s own views about Cholera may be briefly sum- 
marised as follows :— 
1, That the cause of Asiatic Cholera “is invariably a 
portion of the fomes of a person suffering from the 
disease.” 2. That this must be in what is called the 
“vibrionic stage” of decomposition. 3. That it must be 
swallowed. 4. That it causes changes in the intestinal 
epithelium similar to its own, and that the epithelium is 
as it were washed off by the efflux of serous matter and 
passes away in the discharges. 5. That the organic 
cause of Cholera may be preserved dry for years. 6. That 
water is the most common medium of its diffusion, but 
that it may be carried and may act in foul air; and, 
lastly, the author says, “with the exception of the 
specific Cholera-infecting matter, I entirely ignore all 
other causes or combination of causes as capable of 
producing this disease.” This last position, which is left 
unproved, is, indeed, the foundation of the theory. The 
theory is much the same as that put forward by Dr. 
Snow, Dr. Budd, Dr. Farr, and others, with a theoretical 
addition from another quarter as to the manner in which 
the poison acts. 
The first remark which we would make is, that it 
there exists a Cholera germ, matter, Cho/ertne, or what- 
ever else it may be called, its existence can be proved. 

