SCIENCE 



FRIDAY, JULY 29, H 



Will the reader please cast his eye upon the following ques- 

 tions : I . How can it be proved that nicotine is a poison ? 2. Why 

 are cigarettes especially harmful ? 3. Is alcohol a food ? 4. What 

 is the effect of disuse upon a muscle ? 5. Under what names is 

 opium sold ? 6. Under what names is alcohol drunk ? 7. What is 

 the difference between a food and a poison ? 8. Is any thing 

 gained by changing from one narcotic to another ? 9. What is the 

 effect of beer as a drink? 10. How does cheerfulness help the 

 muscle ? These are the questions given as a test in physiology in 

 the public schools of a prominent Eastern city. They are not ad- 

 dressed to young men about to leave school. No, they are asked 

 of little boys and girls of from eight to ten years of age. This is 

 the examination-paper at the end of the first year's elementary in- 

 struction in physiology. Of ten questions, eight relate to drinking 

 and smoking : the physiology is a mere side issue. These children, 

 who ought to have about as much knowledge of such matters as 

 they should of the methods in vogue at the stock exchange, are 

 actually forced to learn by rote the details of human vice ; and that, 

 too, under the name of ' physiology,' the only science which they 

 learn. Unconsciousness, nai've/e, is the symbol of childhood. The 

 fact that physiology, even if well taught, tends to destroy this trait, 

 is the chief objection to its early study. Instruction such as the 

 above implies crushes the most valuable trait in the child, directs its 

 curiosity to what is morbid, and forces into precocious development 

 all its dangerous elements. Not enough that the newspaper and 

 the dime novel proclaim in glaring colors the story of crime and 

 sin : some notion of the perversity of human nature must be mi.xed 

 with the food of babes. That the result of this teaching is to excite 

 in the children a morbid curiosity to experiment for themselves in 

 such matters ; or (with the boys) to regard the whole thing as a 

 lesson in ' goody-goodyness,' to which they forthwith decide to show 

 themselves superior ; or to regard their father, who takes his glass 

 of wine at dinner, as an incipient criminal, — this could easily have 

 been foreseen, and goes without saying. If there is one method 

 better than all others to produce a race of drunkards, this has good 

 claims to that distinction. If there is a degree of wrong in such 

 superlatively perverse methods, then it is still worse that the 

 fair name of science should be outraged in this cause. Not only 

 that this kind of teaching necessarily depends upon catechism 

 methods (that the answer to the second question, for example, is to 

 read that the especial pemiciousness of cigarettes is due to the fact 

 that they are usually made of decayed cigar-stumps), but that the 

 entire idea of science thus implanted is as wrong as it well can be. 

 Better far revert to the old days when there was no science on the 

 curriculum than have science thus taught. The crowning educa- 

 tional virtue of science is that it leads to the use of scientific 

 methods of teaching : this usurper chokes up all possibility of an 

 interest in the scientific. The ' temperance ' question is doubtless 

 one of the most important with which our age has to deal ; suffi- 

 ciently important, perhaps, to make some consideration of it in the 

 public schools a legitimate proceeding, but it must be done at the 

 right time and in the proper way. Nothing can excuse the conver- 

 sion of a text-book on physiology into a ' temperance ' tract : noth- 

 ing can excuse the sacrilege of presenting this story of disgusting 

 vice under the name of ' science.' 



are of greater interest in view of the report of Professor Carnelley, 

 D.Sc, and Mr. Haldane, of University College, Dundee, referred to 

 in Etigineermg lately. These gentlemen have been investigating 

 the impurities of sewer-air, and find that the organic acid in the 

 sewers examined was about twice, and the organic matter three 

 times, that of the outside air, whereas the number of micro-organ- 

 isms was less. As regards the quantity of these three impurities, 

 the air of the sewers was better than the air of naturally ventilated 

 schools, while even mechanically ventilated schools were more pol- 

 luted with organic matter. The sewer-air contained a much 

 smaller number of micro-organisms than the air of any class of 

 house, and the carbonic acid was rather greater than the air of 

 houses of four rooms and upwards, but less than in two and one 

 roomed houses. As regards organic matter, however, the sewer- 

 air was only slightly better than the air of one-roomed houses, and 

 much worse than that of other classes of houses. The amount of 

 carbonic acid found by the observers shows that the sewers ob- 

 served were better ventilated than those investigated by previous 

 observers. They attribute the excess of carbonic acid over that of 

 the outside air chiefly to oxidation of organic matter in the sewage 

 and the air of the sewer. The excess of organic matter is probably 

 chiefly gaseous, and derived from the sewage itself. The micro- 

 organisms in sewer-air come entirely, or nearly so, from outside, 

 and are not derived, or only so in relatively small numbers, from 

 the sewer itself. This important conclusion is proved by the facts 

 that the average number of micro-organisms in sewer-air was less 

 than in the outside air, namely, as 9 to 16 ; that the number in- 

 creased with the efficacy of the ventilation ; that the average pro- 

 portion of moulds to bacteria in sewer-air was almost exactly the 

 same as in outside air at the same time, whereas one would expect 

 the proportion to be very different were the outside air not the 

 source from which they were derived, seeing that such a difference 

 has been proved to exist in the air of houses and schools. Another 

 consideration is that the filthiness of a sewer seems to have no in- 

 fluence on the number of micro-organisms. Further experiments 

 in the laboratory showed that the number of micro-organisms in 

 sewer-air is diminished nearly a half in passing along a moist tube 

 5 feet long and i| inches in diameter, at a rate of nearly i foot per 

 second. There was, however, distinct evidence of the occasional 

 dissemination of micro-organisms from the sewage itself ; espe- 

 cially in splashing, owing to drains entering the sewers at points 

 high up in the roofs. It is therefore important that drains should 

 be arranged to avoid splashing. 



The statements by Mr. W. Glenn in Science of July 15, as to 

 the freedom from disease of men employed in the Baltimore sewers, 



TOPOGRAPHICAL SURVEY OF THE UNITED STATES. 



It is some eight years since the passage of the law creating the 

 U. S. Geological Survey. This survey is charged, among other 

 things, with making a geological map of the United States. For 

 this purpose, it is desirable to have good maps for the use of the 

 geologist in the field, and for the exhibition of results. No map 

 of the whole country, suitable for the purpose, exists, and, of many 

 and extensive portions, rude and imperfect diagrams constitute the 

 only maps. The Geological Survey, therefore, first sought to have 

 inaugurated a general topographical survey of the whole country. 



The superintendent of the Coast and Geodetic Survey was con- 

 ferred with and solicited to undertake the work, and a little work 

 was actually undertaken, but none upon a general or comprehensive 

 plan. The Geological Survey, therefore, finding that no satis - 

 factory progress in geological work was possible without suitable 

 maps, set about organizing topographic work on a systematic and 

 comprehensive plan. 



