ASCAEIS MYSTAX. 323 



milk. The child very rarely drank water by itself; if lie ever did, 

 it was filtered water, as used by the rest of the family. During 

 the last two months or more he occasionally sucked a piece of 

 meat, but it was always taken from the cooked joint eaten by the 

 family ; he never had raw meat or uncooked ham. During the 

 last two or three months, or more, the nurse had frequently given 

 him a piece of celery to chew ; of this he was very fond. He had 



not been fi'om home for some months The child's 



general health had been good ; no worms had been seen in the 

 evacuations previously. After the worms were shown to me, I 

 gave a dose of castor oil, and examined the fseces. I found in 

 them several white filaments, which proved to be bundles of 

 vegetable vascular tissue and spiral vessels — evidently from the 

 stalks of celery. After this the diarrhoea ceased, and though the 

 evacuations have been fi'equently examined since, no other entozoa 

 have been found." 



Nothing could be more exphcit or better to the point than this 

 information ; but having observed the extreme incredulity of foreign 

 parasitologists (especially Dr. Kiichenmeister) in regard to other 

 equally well-ascertained facts, I resolved, at the risk of proving 

 troublesome, to make certainty doubly certain, by suggesting to 

 Mr. Scattergood the possibility of deception having been practised 

 upon him. His reply to my second letter is equally satisfactory, 

 and runs as follows : — 



" The possibility of fi^aud or of mistake was not overlooked in 

 my inquiries. The proof of the presence of the parasites in the 

 child's evacuations depends, not on the evidence of the nurse, but 

 of the mother, who is an intelligent person, and the daughter of a 



medical man The celery was probably the means of 



introducing the entozoa. The market gardens about large towns 

 are often watered from ponds or streams which may contain all 

 manner of abomination." 



The opinion here enunciated by Mr. Scattergood is one with 

 which I am faUy disposed to agree, seeing that it accords in the 



