DUST AND DISEASE. 17 



' Since the commencement,' he says, ' of these researches, 

 I have been constantly exposed to the most obstinate 

 and unjust contradictions ; but I have made it a duty 

 to leave no trace of these conflicts in this book.' And in 

 reference to parasitic diseases, generally, he uses the 

 following weighty words : ' II est au pouvoir de I'homme 

 de faire disparaitre de la surface du globe les maladies 

 parasitaires, si, comme c'est ma conviction, la doctrine 

 des generations spontanees est une chimSre.' 



Pasteur dwells upon the ease with which an island 

 like Corsica might be absolutely isolated from the silk- 

 worm epidemic. And with regard to other epidemics, 

 Mr. John Simon describes an extraordinary case of in- 

 sular exemption, for the ten years extending from 1851 

 to 1860. Of the 627 registration districts of England, 

 one only had an entire escape from diseases which, in 

 whole or in part, were prevalent in all the others : ' In 

 all tlie ten years it had not a single death by measles, 

 nor a single death by small-pox, nor a single death by 

 scarlet-fever. And why ? Not because of its general 

 sanitary merits, for it had an average amount of other 

 evidence of unhealthiness. Doubtless, the reason of its 

 escape was that it was insular. It was the district of 

 the Scilly Isles ; to which it was most improbable that 

 any febrile contagion should come from without. And 

 its escape is an approximative proof that, at least for 

 those ten years, no contagium of measles, nor any 

 contagium of scarlet-fever, nor any contagium of small- 

 pox had arisen spontaneously within its limits.' It 

 may be added that there were only seven districts in 

 England in which no death from diphtheria occurred, 

 and that, of those seven, the district of the Scilly Isles 

 was one. 



A second parasitic disease of silkworms, called in 

 France laflacherie, co- existent with pebrine, but quite 



