612 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. II. No. 45. 



have the great revolution in surgery brought 

 about by Sir Joseph Lister, which has en- 

 larged the whole scope of the science, and 

 is daily saving hundreds of lives. 



Besides the vast increase in our knowl- 

 edge of the mode of spead of infective dis- 

 ease, successful experiments have been car- 

 ried on bj' Pasteur on the attenuation of 

 virus and the conversion of virulent micro- 

 organisms into useful vaccines. 



And perhaps one could not choose a more 

 readily understood illustration of the wealth 

 conferred on his whole nation by a man of 

 science than is furnished by a recapitula- 

 tion of some of the things accomplished by 

 Pastern*. Having discovered exactly what 

 fermentation is, he was able, by a few simple 

 directions, to almost entirelj^ put an end to 

 the spoiling of beer by secondary fermenta- 

 tion and the souring of wines bj^ the trans- 

 formation of alcohol into acid. 



This sounds rather unimportant, but some 

 idea of its commercial value may be ob- 

 tained when it is remembered that there are 

 about 45 departments of France that make 

 wine, and there was a known loss yearly of 

 wine to the extent of one million seven 

 hundred thousand francs in four depart- 

 ments. Since Pasteur's method has been 

 applied, there has been saved of this loss at 

 least one million five hundred thousand 

 francs annually. This is for four depart- 

 ments. As there are in France about 45 

 departments that make wine, you may 

 approximately estimate the stupendous sav- 

 ing. 



Again the farmers and stockmen of France 

 were visited by a terrible and increasing- 

 cattle plague, the malignant pustule, or black 

 quarter of cattle and sheep, which killed 

 annually thousands of horses and oxen and 

 hundreds of thousands of sheep. There 

 seemed no hope for them. But Pasteur 

 found by a series of researches not only that 

 this disease was caused by a specific minute 

 organism, but that he could save the ani- 



mals from contagion by inoculating them 

 with attenuated germs obtained by artificial 

 cultivations made in special liquids. 



The figures from the official statement 

 indicating the ravages made by this disease 

 in France alone for the years 1882 and 1883 

 are 2,196 horses, 62,107 oxen, 538,245 sheep. 



When we learn that the average mortality 

 was reduced \>y Pasteur's inoculations in 

 the proportion of 10 to 1 for sheep, and 15 

 to 1 for oxen, cows and horses, some idea may 

 be grasped of his vast and continuous gift 

 of wealth to his country in actual solid 

 meat — beef and mutton. 



Again, another disease has reduced the 

 sUk-worm industry to a most deplorable 

 condition. In three departments in the 

 center of France, after the silk-worm dis- 

 ease had attacked the factories, the product 

 yielded a value of less than one million 

 five hundred thousand francs. 



But Pasteur came to the rescue, discov- 

 ered the micro-organism, conquered it, and 

 since the regulations laid down by him have 

 been applied, the average value per annum, 

 calculated on five years, in those depart- 

 ments has risen to more than twenty-two 

 million francs. 



After such facts as that, who can wonder 

 at those sentences from Huxley : " I weigh 

 my words when I say that if the nation 

 could purchase a potential Watt, or Davy, 

 or Farraday, at the cost of a hundred thou- 

 sand pounds down, he would be dirt cheap 

 at the money. It is a mere commonplace 

 and everyday piece of knowledge, that 

 what these thi-ee men did has produced un- 

 told millions of wealth, in the narrowest 

 economical sense of the word." 



But let no one suppose that these men or 

 any other of the immortal scientists would 

 have been satisfied even by producing un- 

 told millions of wealth. They all had 

 higher aims and made higher achieve- 

 ments. 



From such men and from science comes 



