REVIEWS. 209 



the spider-storing ones are parasitic of course. On page 58 he mentions the 

 Sawfiy larva, figuring an ordinary moth -larva in the margin ; on the next page, 

 by misplacement of a comma, he has made the difference of the number of 

 legs possessed by a moth larva and that of a sawfly somewhat difficult to 

 understand. When talking of '• a silky little black beggar vividly picked out 

 with orange and red and white spots and little stripes" on page 65, he 

 describes it as being " pretty well omnivorous " which is another misstatement. 

 The moth larva alluded to is that of Polytela, probably gloriosce and it feeds 

 only upon lilies. Mantis egg-masses on page 113 are said to be "easily 

 crumbled between the fingers ". As a matter of fact they are exceptionally 

 tough except when very old and weathered. The little holes are made by 

 parasites and not by the young emerging Mantis brood ; these slip out 

 between little edges, proceeding from the successive layers by which the mass 

 is built up, overlying each other generally down one side. 



TEANSACTIONS OF THE BOMBAY MEDICAL CONGRESS, 1909. 



It is a matter of every day knowledge that within the past half-century the 

 Science of Medicine and the Art of Surgery have been well-nigh revolu- 

 tionised by the study of one branch of Natural History, to wit, Bacteriology. 



A glance at these Transactions will convince the reader of a much less 

 known fact. Medicine, especially in the Tropics, owes most of its advances 

 during the past quarter of a century to the Science of Zoology. 



Year by year one disease after another has been found due to some minute 

 animal parasite, and others, though perhaps caused by vegetable organisms, like 

 the bacteria, owe their transmission to some specific animal host or carrier. 



Medical research in the tropics has therefore become largely the study of 

 Biology or the Life History of particular parasites, or particular animals con- 

 cerned in the transmission of disease. Omitting such obvious diseases as those 

 due to snake poison, intestinal worms, to vermin, such as lice, " jiggers " itch 

 mites, guinea-worm, etc. we find malaria, chyluria, sleeping-sickness, " kala- 

 azar," the black fever of Assam, hematuria of Egypt, relapsing fever, tick 

 fever, syphilis, yaws, Delhi boil or Aleppo . evil, miner's anaemia, the " anaemia 

 of coolies ", which causes such havoc in Ceylon and Assam, the enlarged 

 liver of Japan are all now proved and universally admitted by pathologists to be 

 directly due to animal parasites. 



Most pathologists believe that Elephantiasis is caused by a minute worm 

 transmitted by the common Culex mosquito, that most cases of liver abscess 

 and one form of dysentery are due to a specific animal parasite, an amoeba. 

 They are most certainly associated with it. 



Of late most protozoologists and cytologists have come to the conclusion 

 that certain minute bodies found in the skin and throat during scarlet fever 

 those found in the vesicles of small-pox and cow-pox, others found in the 

 nerve cells during rabies and hydrophobia are minute animals, the living 

 contagium, the exciting cause of those diseases. 

 27 



