466 
F. S. BILLINGS 
more particularly on the National Board. Onee having properly 
drafted laws and regulations, the next thing is their execution; 
this will be the regulative work of the National Board, but this 
word covers an immense deal of territory. To regulation the first 
essential is properly educated regulators—by that we mean sub¬ 
boards and sub-officers. In this regard we have yet to form in our 
country an entirely new, yes, two new police organizations, both 
in connection with hygiene, the one medical, the other veterinary. 
The latter we will not at present discuss. One of the best sug¬ 
gestions in the memorial in question, is that the health officers 
shall be subjected to an appropriate examination. In this regard 
there must be a very sharp distinction Between the technical 
health officer, an M.D., and the executive police. It will mark 
a grand day in the progress of American medicine when in each 
State we have the requisite number of competently educated 
“ Kreis-physici,” who shall be men, as in Germany, passing es¬ 
pecial examinations in forensic medicine, and especially with refer¬ 
ence to the invasionVdiseases. Such positions should be the 
point of ambition towards which our rising men should look. 
These positions should be worth, according to locality and respon¬ 
sibility, the sum of $1,000 to $3,000 each, said sum to be paid in 
part, to be fixed by law, by the State, and in part by the locality 
in question. Such men, as in Germany, should also be allowed to 
practice, but if in given cases the duties were so arduous that no 
time could be given to practice, except at the neglect of more im¬ 
portant public work, then, in such cases, the official M.D. should 
receive pay from the State and local treasury combined, equal to 
an income derived by the best average practitioners in same lo¬ 
cality. One absolute qualification which all such men must have, 
or they are useless, is, that they be at home in foreign medical 
literature, and still more absolutely “ au fait ” in all methods of 
pathological and setiological experiment. It should be positively 
demanded, and introduced in an examination, that such officers be 
“ gervaudt ” in the various methods of fungi-culture, and able to 
diagnosticate the various microscopic fungi now playing such a 
hypothetic role in the genetic theories with reference to the “In¬ 
vasion’s lvraukheiten.” Another very essential qualification such 
