Bacteria / Especially as they are related to the economy of nature, to industrial processes, and to the public health

BACTERIA
ESPECIALLY AS THEY ARE RELATED TO THE ECONOMY OF NATURE TO INDUSTRIAL PROCESSES AND TO THE PUBLIC HEALTH BY GEORGE NEWMAN M.D., F.R.S. (Edin.), D.P.H. (Camb.), etc. DEMONSTRATOR OF BACTERIOLOGY IN KING'S COLLEGE, LONDON ILLUSTRATED NEW YORK G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS LONDON JOHN MURRAY 1899
Copyright, 1899 BY G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS The Knickerbocker Press, New York
The present volume is not a record of original work, nor is it a text-book for the laboratory. Theoretical and practical text-books of Bacteriology plentifully exist both in England and America. There are two large works widely used, one by Professor Crookshank, entitled Bacteriology and Infective Diseases , the other by Dr. Sternberg, A Manual of Bacteriology . There are also, in English, a number of smaller works by Abbott, Ball, Hewlett, Klein, Macfarland, Muir and Ritchie, and Sims Woodhead. This book is of a less technical nature. It is an attempt, in response to the editor of the series, to set forth a popular scientific statement of our present knowledge of bacteria. Popular science is a somewhat dangerous quantity with which to deal. On the one hand it may become too popular, on the other too technical. It is difficult to escape the Scylla and Charybdis in such a voyage.
I am much indebted to Professor Crookshank, who, in reading the manuscript, has helped me by many valuable criticisms. My thanks are also due to Sir C. T. D. Acland, Bart., for many kind suggestions, and to Mr. E. J. Spitta, M.R.C.S., who has been good enough to take a number of excellent photo-micrographs for me. Some other illustrations have been derived from the Atlas of Bacteriology , brought out jointly by Messrs. Slater and Spitta. For these also I am glad to have an opportunity of expressing my thanks. It should be understood that the outline drawings are only of a diagrammatic nature.
GEORGE NEWMAN.
London, 1899.



We live in a world that is teeming with life. From the earliest times of man that life has been studied and the observations recorded. Thus there has slowly come to be a considerable accumulation of knowledge concerning the various forms (morphology) and functions (physiology) of organised life. This we call the science of biology. It has for its object the study of organic beings, and for its end the knowledge of the laws of their organisation and activity. Slowly, too, in the midst of this gradual accumulation of facts, we begin to see incoherence becoming coherent, chaos becoming cosmos, chance and accident becoming law. Further, the contemplation and comprehension which built up the edifice of modern biology is assuming a new relationship to practical life. Biology can no longer be considered only as an academic occupation or as a theoretical pabulum upon which the leisured mind may ruminate. With rapid strides and determined face this giant of knowledge has marched into the arena of practical politics. The world is opening its eyes to a reality which it had mistaken for a vision.