In regard to the soil, several circumstances are very worthy of attention. It is desirable, not only to lower as much as possible the level of the subterranean water (grunawassen) by pipes of deep drainage, the cleansing, and if there is reason, the enlargement (J. Ory) of the capacity of the water collectors, besides covering and keeping in perfect repair the principal ditches in all the secondary valleys to render the lands wholesome, but also to completely drain the ground, diverting the rain water and cultivating the land, in the cultivation of which those trees, shrubs, and plants should be selected which thrive the most on marshy grounds and on the shores and paludal coasts of the sea, and which have their roots most speading and most ramified. Some of the ordinary grasses are also quite appropriate, but crops of the cereals, which are obtained after a suitable reformation of marshy lands, yield a much better return. After the soil in the neighborhood of the dwellings has been drained and cultivated with care, and in a more systematic manner than at present, the bottoms of the cellars should be purified as well as the foundations of the walls and of the houses.
The water intended for drinking, which contains the Limnophysalis hyalina, should be freed from the fungus by a vigorous filtration. But, as it is known, the filtering beds of the basins in the water conduits are soon covered with a thick coating of confervæ, and the Limnophysalis hyalina then extends from the deepest portions of the filtering beds into the filtered water subjacent. It is for this reason that it is absolutely necessary to renew so often the filtering beds of the water conduits, and, at all events, before they have become coated with a thick layer of confervæ. The disappearance of intermittent fevers will testify to the utility of these measures. It is for a similar reason that wooden barrels are so injurious for equipages. When the wood has begun to decay by the contact of the impure water, the filaments of mycelium of the Limnophysalis hyalina penetrate into the decayed wood, which becomes a fertile soil for the intermittent fever fungi.
The employment for the preparation of mortar of water not filtered, or of foul, muddy sand which contains the Limnophysalis hyalina, explains how intermittent fevers may proceed from the walls of houses. This arises also from the pasting of wall-paper with flour paste prepared with water which contains an abundance of the fungi of intermittent fever.
The miasm in the latter case is therefore endoecic, or more exactly entoichic. With us the propagation of intermittent fever has been observed in persons occupying rooms scoured with unfiltered water containing the Limnophysalis hyalina in great quantity.
The following imperial ordinance was published on the 25th of March, 1877, by the chief of admiralty of the German marine. It has for its object the prevention and eradication of infectious diseases:
"In those places where infectious diseases, according to experience, are prevalent and unusually severe and frequent, it is necessary to abstain as much as possible from the employment of water taken from without the ship for cleansing said vessel, and also for washing out the hold when the water of the sea or of a river, in the judgment of the commander of a vessel, confirmed by the statement of the physician, is shown to be surcharged with organic matter liable to putrefaction. With this end in view, if you are unable to send elsewhere for suitable water, you must make use of good and fresh water, but with the greatest economy. In that event the purification of the hold must be accomplished by mechanical means or by disinfectants."
"As I have demonstrated by my investigations that in the distillation of paludal water, and that from the marshy shores of the sea, the Limnophysalis hyalina, which is impalpable, is carried away and may be detected again after the distillation, it must be insisted that the water intended to be used for drinking on shipboard shall be carefully filtered before and after its distillation."
The Klebs-Tommasi and Dr. Sternberg's report, as summarized in the Supplement No. 14, National Board of Health Bulletin, Washington, D.C., July 18, I would cordially recommend to all students of this subject.
I welcome these observers into the field. Nothing but good can come from such careful and accurate observations into the cause of disease. For myself I am ready to say that it may be that the Roman gentlemen have bit on the cause of the Roman fever, which is of such a pernicious type. I do not see how I can judge, as I never investigated the Roman fever; still, while giving them all due credit, and treating them with respect, in order to put myself right I may say that I have long ago ceased to regard all the bacilli, micrococci, and bacteria, etc., as ultimate forms of animal or vegetable life. I look upon them as simply the embryos of mature forms, which are capable of propagating themselves in this embryonal state. I have observed these forms in many diseased conditions; many of them in one disease are nothing but the vinegar yeast developing, away from the air, in the blood where the full development of the plant is not apt to be found. In diphtheria I developed the bacteria to the full form--the Mucor malignans. So in the study of ague, for the vegetation which seems to me to be connected with ague, I look to the fully developed sporangias as the true plant.
Again, I think that crucial experiments should be made on man for his diseases as far as it is possible. Rabbits, on which the experiments were made, for example, are of a different organization and food than man, and bear tests differently. While there are so many human beings subject to ague, it seems to me they should be the subjects on whom the crucial tests are to be made, as I did in my labors.