100 Disinfectants. 
effectual ; and, it is really a matter of careful chemical mani- 
pulation to disinfect, or what is practically the same thing 
to prevent, contamination. 
Volatile poisonous material obviously can be combated 
only by a volatile disinfectant, mounted police would be of 
little service in catching thieves on the house tops; to 
sprinkle the floor of a sick room with a fixed or non- 
volatile disinfectant such as chloride of Zinc is a sanitary 
stupidity. Chlorine is the aérial disinfectant par excellence ; 
there are abundant means contrived to generate chlorine 
for this purpose. Iodine answers the same end but has dis- 
advantages. Carbolic acid is also a volatile disinfectant and 
is superior to iodine in being cheaper and requiring less 
technical skill in its use. Above all things it is necessary 
that the disinfectant should be simple in its mode of 
application, otherwise the persons in whose hands the ap- 
plication too often falls, will in a sanitary point of view, 
make the same kind of blunder that the Irish footman made 
when, on being ordered to ice the champagne, poured the 
Wine into the ice tub. Dvry heat is a most powerful disin- 
fectant, it rarifies the poison and promotes its destruction 
by the oxygen of the atmospheric air, in other words, its 
oxidation 
If there were not practical difficulties in the application, 
doubtless, the recently invented spray producer so familiar 
to all, might be used to disperse throughout the atmosphere 
of a room non-volatile fluids which would destroy mephitic 
vapours existing therein. 
Decomposing animal substances carry off the palm for 
offensiveness. Animal stinks are derived chiefly from the | 
decomposition of albuminous matters. Gelatin, which is a 
characteristic constituent of bones and hides may be con- 
sidered as an albuminous substance; fatty matters of 
itself is much less prone to change, but ever. such a little 
albuminous matter mixed with it will give rise to a striking 
result. As an example—-Suet is really solid oil encased 
in albuminous cells, it will quickly become horribly nasty 
from the decay of the albumen ; but separate the albumen 
from the oil or fat, and the fat will remain unchanged 
for a much longer time. 
Now, Chloride of Zinc has a remarkable property of com- 
bining with albumen and of forming thus a double chloride 
of Zinc and albumen, it has, by the way, an equally curious 
property of combining with woody fibre. Chloride of Zinc — 
disinfects by seizing on all albuminous stuff, preventing its _ 
