52 Discussion on Sanitation. 



shown scientifically. The third class of disease embraces those 

 of which micro-organisms are not given as the exciting cause, 

 such as cancer and certain forms of rheumatism. What I may 

 term dirty damp is the cause of the latter disease. It is seldom 

 or never caused by clean damps, such as exposure to dry cold 

 or to snow. The question may be asked how these micro- 

 organisms cause disease, as they are so minute, and their 

 presence cannot explain their effects. Intoxication, or in its 

 worse form delirium tremens^ is the effect of the persistent use 

 of alcohol, and may be called the disease of the yeast plant. 

 The plant, however, does not grow in the blood ; it is outside 

 the body. Last year a medical man in Leicester examined the 

 micro-organisms that arose from the ground in autumn and 

 subsequently in winter, and in the other seasons of the year. 

 He found that in autumn, when English cholera and other like 

 diseases were extremely rampant, the microbes were exuberant 

 of growth, and of different character from those found in the 

 other seasons. This will explain the disease that may arise 

 from the foreshore of Holywood, and that which follows from 

 house to house where the buildings are erected on cast material. 

 Microbes, a great many of them, are extremely tenacious of life. 

 To destroy them we require strong chemicals or excessive heat — 

 heat which a human being is unable to bear. Another method 

 is the dilution of the poison. Dispensary doctors suffer more 

 from typhus fever than those engaged in fever hospitals, as 

 they have to invade unsanitary homes, while the others work 

 in well ventilated rooms. 



Mr. L. L. Macassey said : — In the course of a couple of 

 years Professor Letts, the Belfast public, and myself will be 

 one way of thinking, as the water of the city, both high and 

 low levels, will be filtered. The Water Commissioners, before 

 proceeding for their last Bill, sent a deputation to examine a 

 number of the most lately-constructed filters in the kingdom. 

 I, however, believe that even unfiltered the Belfast water is 

 a fairly wholesome water. Professor Tidy held that opinion 

 and said it was suitable for its purpose, although he believed 



