One fly lays 120 eggs in the season, and as each of these eggs takes but ten days to reach maturity, it has been computed that twelve flies surviving the winter will produce 40,000 the following summer. When to this estimate of numbers is added the experimentally proved fact that one fly carries upon his legs alone anywhere between one and six million bacteria, there seems little exaggeration in Dr. Beyer’s characterization.
Observation has shown that the fly is omnivorous and ubiquitous, and that, certain unsanitary conditions being fulfilled, where-ever the fly is, there also are certain diseases. In regard to these diseases the most startling evidence is given for typhoid, but careful experiments have shown that no less than ten others, among them tuberculosis, carbuncle, cholera, tapeworm and summer diarrhea, have been spread by flies, and there is good reason to believe that smallpox, leprosy and diphtheria might be added to the list.
It is the omnivorousness of the fly, together with his choice of breeding-places, that makes him a menace to health. A fruitful source of disease bacteria is damp, decaying organic matter, and it is just such matter, usually stable refuse, that is used for a breeding-place by flies. Experiments with young flies fresh from the breeding-ground showed them to have live bacteria either on the outside of their bodies or in the digestive tracts. This same decayed organic matter is also the food of the fly, but with true democracy of taste he is glad to share man’s food also, and it is this willingness to take his dessert out of the sugar-bowl after a dinner of decayed fish that constitutes his chief danger to man.
(2364)
Pests—See [Barriers]; [Piracy, Bird]; [Remedy for Pests].
Pests, Utilizing—See [Ingenuity].
PEW, IF I WERE IN THE
There are a great many things which can be done by those in the pew to assist the ministry, and to better the Church and her services. Here are a few of them. If I were in the pew:
I would acquire the habit of getting to church on time, for then I would get the full benefit of the service and would not disturb others by my late arrival.
I would have my regular seat, and see that it is occupied every Sunday.