270 MICRO-ORGANISMS AND DISEASE [cit. xii 



for indications of any influenza-like disease affecting the 

 lower animals. We could not get evidence of horses being 

 affected with any complaint identical with influenza in 

 man, nor, as regards other animals which live amongst 

 human habitations, are we aware of any evidence proving 

 that amongst them influenza or any similar disease was rife 

 during the periods of the influenza epidemic. Under these 

 circumstances we have made inquiries at the Zoological 

 Gardens in London, and Mr. Beddard has kindly given us 

 the facts as to the condition of illness and deaths amongst 

 the mammals kept there. From his record we learn that 

 the incidence of disease and death at the Zoological 

 Gardens was not unusually heavy during the years of the 

 influenza epidemic in the metropolis. As regards the 

 monkeys in particular, kept at the Zoological Gardens, we 

 also understand from Mr. Beddard that no increased sick- 

 ness was observed amongst them during these periods. 

 The fact conforms with the results from our experimental 

 observations on monkeys above recorded. It can hardly 

 be supposed that if monkeys were, as a class, susceptible 

 to the infection of human influenza the creatures living 

 in the monkey-house in Regent's Park, frequented by 

 many thousands of people a month while influenza was 

 abundant in the London population, would have kept free 

 from the complaint. And from the general experience of 

 the Gardens of the Zoological Society it would appear 

 that few mammalia share with the human subject a 

 susceptibility to epidemic influenza. At all events, few of 

 them are liable to receive the infection by the method 

 which habitually obtains in man, through the respiratory 

 passages. 



