67 2 
J. LAW. 
even fifty years ago ? How recent is the acceptance by the 
profession of the doctrine of contagion in tuberculosis, in tetan¬ 
us, in pneumonia, in influenza, in glanders, etc ? Are we to sup¬ 
pose that our forefathers were surrounded by fewer evidences of 
contagion at a time when no precautions were taken to prevent 
infection than we are with all the antiseptic and antizymotic pro¬ 
visions of the present day? The facts of contagion were doubt¬ 
less more abundant in their days than in these, but their attention 
had never been drawn to them. So now let the attention of 
physicians and sanitarians be drawn to the morbid action of the 
soluble poisons of the tubercle, and evidences of their evil 
results will accumulate on all sides. It is the scrutiny and not 
the facts that are wanting. 
The economist will object to drastic measures for the sup¬ 
pression of tuberculosis on the ground of expense. Who is to 
pay for the municipal abattoirs, the inspectorships, the disinfec¬ 
tions and the indemnities for slaughtered animals ? In response 
let us ask who now pays for the constant losses of live stock 
which the proposed system would put a stop to ; for the fre¬ 
quent infection of sound herds by unfortunate purchases of 
animals that prove to be tuberculous; for the losses to the 
nation, the community and family of the tuberculous one eighth 
of all deaths ; for the loss of work—literary, scientific, manu¬ 
facturing, commercial, domestic and manual—of the great host 
of consumptives waiting all over land to fill the places of this 
fatal eighth in coming mortality statistics ; for the losses rep¬ 
resented by the bills of physicians, nurses and druggists for 
these invalids; and for the losses represented in the many 
migrations and exiles in search of health, and of the costly 
consumption hospitals and sanitaria ? And who is to pay in the 
future for the needless harvest of similar fruits, which the seeds 
now sown through our supineness, must inevitably produce in 
the coming generations ? 
Is it not truer economy to destroy the seed before it has germ¬ 
inated, or even before it has been sown, than to wait for multitu¬ 
dinous evils that must attend on its growth and fruitification ? 
