3IO 



SCIENCE 



[Vol. XX. No. 513 



the most intimate terms. But then, nnder these circumstances, 

 they catch the disease. As there is no danger here of such iden- 

 tification of the two races, we need no protection from a board of 

 health for our own persons; but if some restraint is not put upon 

 the intercourse of the races future generations, even here, may 

 have to pay for the imprudence of their fathers. It seems to me 

 that it is the duty of our National Board of Health to send back 

 to theu- osvn country the lepers who have it now in their power 

 to poison several generations and to establish a horrible disease, 

 to be exempted from which we have considered hitherto a pre- 

 cious privilege, and thanked God for it.'' 



It follows from all that I have said that the danger from leprosy 

 does not arise from any contagious action, but from the continual 

 redintegration of the disease, which results from the intercourse 

 of lepers with healthy individuals. Contrary- wise to what would 

 happen in syphilis, this intercourse strengthens and perpetuates 

 the evil. As a matter of fact, no greater difference can be imag- 

 ined in the etiology of two diseases than that which exists 

 between leprosy and syphilis. I may here call the attention of all 

 dermatologists to the well-known Colles law. According to that 

 law, a woman who bears a child to a syphilitic man acquires per- 

 fect immunity from syphilis. Now, nobody doubts, either in 

 China or Japan, that a leprous woman bearing a child to a healthy 

 father acquires some measure of immunity; while the child re- 

 ceives and transmits the susceptibility. This is a fact diametri- 

 cally opposed to those which are included in Colles law. 



An assimilation, in whatever degree of leprosy and syphilis, 

 has been made by many otherwise acute observers. Yet, what 

 a difference in regard to contagiousness; for instance, there is in 

 the fact that one disease, breaking out at the age of puberty, 

 spares the race, while the other congenital, appearing with the 

 appearance of the individual himself (both parents being supposed 

 to be syphilitic) would destroy the race. In leprosy the interven- 

 tion of pure blood acts as a nourishment to the disease; in syphi- 

 lis, it attenuates the virus. The attenuation of germs, when they 

 are allowed their regular course, seems to me to be of more gen- 

 eral application. It is believed in Japan, that a child of parents 

 who enjoy immunity from small-pox, by having had the disease, 

 possesses itself a natural immunity (not a perfect immunity) 

 transmitted to it. This was the greatest obstacle to the introduc- 

 tion of vaccination into Japan: artificial immunity of the parents, 

 they said, would interfere with the natural power of resistance of 

 the child. Variolization (if I may coin the word) and syphiliza- 

 tion were always popular in Japan, in consequence of these same 

 traditions. The complete devitalization of our introduced vaccine 

 virus, after a certain series of inoculations, when a new virus 

 had to be imported, proves that these Orientals were right. The 

 devitalization of the germ of syphilis, which has occurred in 

 Japan, after thirteen centuries of syphilitic inoculation, proves 

 also that a natural immunity is acquired by the very transmission 

 of the disease. 



Let me say now what I believe must be rationally deduced 

 from all I have said: What is generally called contagiousness does 

 not essentially belong to the disease itself, it is entirely in the in- 

 dividual who contracts it. Its measure is that of the resistance 

 of the individual or of the race. In four generations of lepers, 

 regulated as I have said, the power of resistance becomes com- 

 plete. In an unconscious, blundering, medigeval way, the resist- 

 ance has been acquired by Europe. There is no place for the 

 idea of contagion in these facts. 



liable to be influenced by the moon's changes as other elements. 

 A series of observations, suitable in all respects for such discus- 

 sion, is indeed difficult to find. The mean daily rainfall for a 

 locality of wide area is not adapted to this purpose, for the moon's 

 influence cannot be supposed to be the same under different topo- 

 graphical conditions. Even the daily records of rainfall at a single 

 station may not be good ones if changes occur from time to time 

 in surrounding buildings and trees, or if the gauge is placed at 

 different positions in different years. 



The observations of rainfall, taken at Bethlehem, Pa., by Mr. 

 F. E. Luckenbach, during 1881-1890, are selected as the basis of 

 a brief discussion, and they are believed to be free from the ob- 

 jections above noted. The amount of rainfall in each year was 

 obtained for the day of new moon and for each of the three days 

 preceding and follosving, and also for the _other quarters. For 

 each year a curve of rainfall throughout a lunar month of 28 days 

 could then be drawn, and these curves were combined in various 

 ways to endeavor to ascertain the features common to all of them. 

 The following conclusions were derived : First, the new moon is 

 liable to be followed by an increase in rainfall ; second, the full 

 moon is liable to be followed by a decrease in rainfall; third, the 

 wettest period is generally at and preceding the full moon; and, 

 fourth, the driest period is generally at and preceding the first 

 quarter. These conclusions are, in general, most plainly marked 

 in the years of least rainfall. 



The first conclusion, that the rainfall is liable to increase after 

 new moon, is perhaps the one most prominently observed in the 

 curves for all the years. The frequency of rain, as shown by the 

 number of days on which rainfall occurred, was also found to 

 follow the same law. In the following table are given for each 

 of the years the amount of rainfall on the two days before and on 

 the two days after the day of new moon, as also the number of 

 rainy days for each period. The number of new moons embraced 

 in the table is 12i, and in the last two columns are shown the num- 

 ber of times that this first conclusion was verified and the number 

 of times that the opposite fact occurred. It is seen that every 

 year except 1889 agrees with the conclusion as exhibited in the 



Rainfall for Two Days before and Two Days after New Moon. 



THE INFLUENCE OF THE MOON ON RAINFALL— A. 

 SYMPOSIUM. 



I. BY MANSFIELD MERRIMAN, PH.D., LEHIGH UNIVERSITY, SOUTH 



BETHLEHEM, PA. 



The widespread notion regarding the influence of the moon on 

 the weather has probably some slight validity. The dispersion of 

 clouds in mountainous regions under the influence of a full moon 

 has been noted by several observers, as also the peculiar move- 

 ment of thunder-storms. Yet little evidence, except of a nega- 

 tive character, has been derived by a discussion of rainfall 

 statistics, although the rainfall is an element probably quite as 



totals. The year 1889 was the one of heaviest rainfall, 57 68 

 inches, while 1881 had the least rainfall, 34.99 inches, the mean 

 for the ten years being 45.68 inches. The probabilities of the re- 

 spective occurrences, if based upon the totals for the ten yeais. 

 are, hence, yV? that rainfall will increase after the new moon, 

 3^^ that it will decrease, and y'st that rain will not occur either in 

 the two days before or in the two days after. 



