April 15, 1887.) 



SCIENCE. 



353 



study and conclusions may not be looked upon in 

 a sensational light, nor regarded as a polemic 

 against ice companies and dealers, or against the 

 free and wonted use of ice, the incalculable use- 

 fulness of which is beyond question. His re- 

 searches have been carried out at great expendi- 

 ture of time and money, in the hope, that, in the 

 light of its results, the rapidly developing disci- 

 pline of preventive medicine might find a plan of 

 curtailing, in some degree, the number of annual 

 victims to preventible disease. 



When the student is translating from a for- 

 eign language, especially from the classics, the 

 teacher is very apt to measure the quality of the 

 performance by the literalness of the translation. 

 Every preposition, every interjection, every case 

 or tense signification, must find verbal expression 

 in English, no matter at what sacrifice of sense 

 and spirit. But translation is not the same 

 thing as transliteration. The student's aim should 

 not be to get the Greek or Latin words into Eng- 

 lish, but to convey the sense and spirit of the 

 writer. We are convinced that this is one of the 

 most prominent faults in the classical instruction 

 of the present. And it does not end in the mere use 

 of language. It has a narrowing, cramping influ- 

 ence on the mind, instead of developing that 

 breadth of view and comprehension which ought 

 to come from classical study. It is surprising, too, 

 how great an influence for evil this ultra-literal 

 translation has on the student's English style. We 

 have known numerous instances where the pecul- 

 iarly Greek and Latin idioms have been quite as 

 numerous in a composition or essay as the English. 

 The result is, naturally enough, a forced, artificial, 

 and awkward style. Our classical teachers, es- 

 pecially those who have the supervision of the 

 younger pupils, cannot be too careful in demand- 

 ing a translation which shall not neglect the spirit 

 while it interprets the letter of the author. 



The report of the special committee of the 

 American public health association on the disin- 

 fection of rags contains a complete summary of all 

 the evidence which has thus far been accumulated, 

 in this country and Europe, in reference to this 

 article of commerce, and the dangers connected 

 with it. The greater part of the report was sub- 

 mitted at the Toronto meeting of the association. 

 A letter from Dr. Sternberg to one of the members 

 of the committee, giving the results of his inves- 



tigations abroad, has been appended to the report. 

 In it Dr. Sternberg says he made inspections at 

 Ghent, Brussels, Berlin, and Stettin, and obtained 

 reliable information as to the methods pursued 

 in Hamburg and other German ports from 

 which rags are shipped to this country. He 

 had previously supposed that rags from ports in 

 southern Europe, where cholera was prevalent, 

 were liable to be shipped from any of these ports ; 

 but he was assured that this could never occur, 

 on account of the low price of rags as compared 

 with the cost of land transportation. As a matter 

 of fact, rags sent to each shipping-port can only 

 be collected within a limited area, the boundaries 

 of which depend upon cheap transportation facili- 

 ties by canals, rivers, etc. He regards it as in- 

 cumbent upon all sanitarians to insist upon the 

 proper protection of all those who are brought by 

 their occupation in contact with old rags. If this is 

 done, the danger will be reduced to a minimum ; 

 and if the community is fully protected in the same 

 way as is the case in Germany, there wiU be no 

 good reason for disinfecting rags in the bale. He 

 considers it as desirable that all old rags should 

 be disinfected by steam, and dried, before being 

 baled. During the prevalence of cholera, all old 

 rags from ports known to be infected, or in direct 

 communication with infected places, should be ex- 

 cluded. He would require all rags shipped from a 

 healthy port during the prevalence of cholera in 

 Europe to be disinfected by steam before being 

 baled for shipment. In the absence of any pre- 

 vailing epidemic, baled rags should be treated as 

 other merchandise. If any merchandise is dan- 

 gerous, it should be disinfected, and this can be 

 done most effectually by steam. 



The epidemic of scarlet- fever attributed to 

 the milk of a sick cow, to which we referred in a 

 recent number of Science, has been still further 

 investigated by Dr. lOein, for the British govern- 

 ment. A micrococcus was obtained from the 

 ulcers of the sick cow, w^hich, when inoculated 

 into calves, produced the same lesions as existed 

 in the cow from which they were taken. Dr. 

 Klein has found in the blood of scarlet-fever 

 patients a micrococcus which appears to be identi- 

 cal with that obtained from the cow. He has 

 inoculated and fed mice with the micrococci from 

 these two sources, and the same results have been 

 produced. He has also obtained the same micro- 

 cocci from the blood of these mice, and cultivated 

 them. The same inoculations have been made 



