ETIOLOGY OF TUBERCULOSIS. 
249 
estimated that two-sevenths of all mankind are overcome by 
its onslaughts, and, as it is originally a disease of horned cat¬ 
tle, no doubt thousands upon thousands of our bovine friends, 
from the same cause, come to an untimely end, or go pre¬ 
maturely to the shambles where their quarters are duly 
No. 4, sold at a reduction, and serve to spread the 
curse among the lower classes of society. 
The antiquity of this disorder is well established. The 
?reat Hippocrates, justly styled the “ Father of Medicine/’ 
was born on the small island of Cos, off the coast of the 
ancient province^of Caria, in Asia Minor, about 470 years be¬ 
fore Christ, and gave to the world the oldest account of medi¬ 
cine which it now possesses. He frequently discourses upon 
.t, in the first and third books of the Epidemics and in the im- 
noital Aphroisms, which the medical student of to-day would 
io well not only to consume, but also to ruminate, to digest 
md thoroughly to assimilate. He has both called it expressly 
ay name and given us such a minute and accurate symptoma¬ 
tology of phthisis, that not even the most cursory reader can 
ail to recognize his vivid picture. In another part of the 
Hippocratic collection of manuscripts, it is distinctly stated 
hat cattle, sheep and^wine are very subject to tuberculosis, 
out it is argued that man is still more liable to its attacks! 
P-nd from that remote date down to the present time, a large 
amount of the medical literature has been devoted to its con¬ 
sideration. Such is tuberculosis, to the etiology of which I 
iow invite your attention. 
In these most ancient writings no cause is assigned for the 
lisease but heredity. However, this is modified by stating 
hat changeable spring weather and certain slender conforma- 
ions were accountable for its more frequent appearance. 
Tom the death of the renowned Hippocrates till about the 
our hundredth year of the present era, the science of medi- 
j ine made little or no progress, its writers being content 
numbly to leiterate the opinions and sublime truths of their 
I oble ancestor. In reality it scarcely held its own. After 
/hich the dark ages hovered over and settled down on 
mi ope, like a pall, burying her in such thick darkness and 
