DR. THEODOR NEUMANN. 281 



one or the other of those millions of eggs which are 

 strewn out every year will reach a suitable place where 

 it finds all the conditions of development, and if only 

 one' single one of many millions should succeed in find- 

 ing such favorable conditions, the preservation of the 

 species is secured; the remaining millions may perish ! 



Nevertheless, the number of eggs produced and laid is 

 always in a certain and well settled proportion to the 

 probability of whether the embryos will get along easily 

 and develop properly. For we must remember that the 

 development of the brood is not so simple as often im- 

 agined by non-specialists. Many people think that the 

 egf^ must simply get into another host in one way or 

 other in order to grow up there; this is very rarely the 

 case. On the contrary, the wanderings and travels of 

 some of these creatures are sometimes truly marvelous, 

 and the investigation of the same have taxed the in- 

 genuity and sagacity of the shrewdest and most expe- 

 rienced observers. One example may suffice as an illus- 

 ration: Trichina spiralis — that famous round-worm which 

 has brought death upon hundreds of people. Discov- 

 ered by Hilton in London in 18^2 in a human corpse, 

 recognized as a worm by Owen in 1835, it was for a long 

 time a puzzle for scientists as well as medical men, until 

 Leuckart, in Leipzig, succeeded in 1860 in clearing up 

 the darkness concerning this worm, and in proving that 

 this little animal, far from being a harmless guest of 

 man, as people had believed until that time, belongs to 

 his most terrible foes. Hoav true this statement is has 

 been woefully and disastrously experienced many times 

 in nearly every country of the globe since high percent- 

 ages of people died from infecting themselves with 

 trichinas. This disease is known under the name of 

 trichinosis, which sometimes appears in really epidemic 

 form. 



The principal carrier of this worm from which men get 



169 



