the earth is like flint; the wind howls like a wild beast at the windows. How deliciously the fire burns! how the coals crackle, and the flame glows, as if in mockery of the blast and darkness without! A woman sings in the street: between December gusts you hear a sharp, tremulous human voice-wailing! No-it is the Christmas Carol; the homely burden sung two centuries ago: the self-same words, too, that Shakspere in his childhood may have lain and listened to that in his later years may have rapt his spirit, bearing it away to Bethlehem! The present, with all its monotonous common-place, for a time is gone from us, and we live in the past. The wild melancholy strain, strengthened by old association, charms away almost two thousand years; and we seem for a space as of those who had an instant interest in the tidings told,—seem almost contemporary with the wondrous Advent. And this sweet, though brief emotion, we owe to the ballad singer. The peevishness, the selfishness of earth, are hushed, forgotten in the rich melodious thoughts born of this antique lay-begotten by the Christmas Carol." [To be continued.] NATURE. Nature never did betray The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege, With lofty thoughts,—that neither evil tongues, -WORDS WORTH. PREVENTIBLE DISEASE. BY MR. WM. J. COX, M.R. C. S., Corresponding Member of the Epidemiological and Medical Societies, &c. I PROPOSE on the present occasion to bring before your notice some of the deleterious agents which prevail among the people, as bearing on the development and diffusion of disease. The influence of the various seasons of the year,-of atmospheric and terrestrial electricity,-upon the human organism, and the production or prevention of disease; the geographical condition of various maladies, and the meteorological states which are generally found associated with the outbreak of pestilences;-all these are subjects the importance of which it would be difficult to over-estimate; and which unquestionably merit a most diligent and patient investigation. But they are up to the present moment shrouded in mist and obscurity. They are too much in nubibus to be available for practical application. It is not so with the matters to which I now draw your attention. For if chemical and physiological science has proved anything; if it has succeeded in placing any fact in an unassailable position, it is the following:-that animal and vegetable emanations are a fruitful source of disease; that these noxious agents operate as causes in regard to the whole range of epidemics; that what will in one place develope the existing cause of typhus fever, will in another produce scarlet fever, influenza, measles, or cholera. In fact, medical men who practise much among the poor, can generally, when an epidemic is impending, predict with tolerable accuracy, the localities where it will appear; where its type will assume the greatest malignity; where its victims will be most numerous, and its mortality most deplorable. If this be true, and we find on inquiry that these noxious agents exist and flourish unchecked and unheeded in too many places amongst us; that in such spots the materies morbi is never absent, but that there is kept up a perpetual hotbed, so to speak, ready at all times for the reception and growth of the fatal germs of disease;- we must be prepared to admit that these predisposing and developing causes are far more important to us than the proximate* cause; and that it would be far more expedient to direct our attention to remediable influences, than to bewilder ourselves with abstruse speculations concerning the absolute essence of zymotic poison, or the laws of its aërial passage from clime to clime :-things which, even if comprehended, must from their very nature remain evermore as far removed from the sphere of our control as the law of the whirlwind, or the velocity of the tidal wave. If you are inclined to ask, before I proceed farther-Do these hurtful agents yet exist in number and force to justify a crusade against them? statistics from a hundred sources, medical and even parliamentary, cry out a loud affirmative. They show that in numerous localities the poor are crowded into stifling dens, wherein the rich would not consent to keep their domestic animals; that in numberless places they are compelled to drink poisonous water, instead of the pure element which God gave for the use of men and beasts; that dirt, ignorance, misery, and depravity reign supreme in scores of densely * The proximate cause means the essence of the malady itself. populated towns; and that the baneful gases, which constitute the food of zymotic poison, are constantly being generated and concentrated in the homes of thousands in our favoured isle. The prayers and supplications which rose to the Throne of Grace, during the ruthless course of the destroying angel in 1849 and 1854, bore on their very breath a testimony against the awful and culpable negligence of man. Let this be so no more. May the people learn and apply the true safeguards of health. May those who have wealth, or talent, or industry, bring of these their possessions to the altar of the common weal. Then we may hope that the savour of the sacrifice shall in future stay the avenging hand, and resist successfully the foe in the battle which the councils of Heaven may have decreed is yet to be fought. Statistics further show us, that epidemic diseases ravage only those districts wherein there are endemic influences at work. Happily, it is within the scope of human power to lessen or remove these endemic agents. If you ask-where do epidemics first break out, and where do they make most havoc? The answer, in accordance with an overwhelming amount of statistical evidence, is-" Almost always in dens of filth, and in low, dark, ill-ventilated places." Where did the cholera first break out in St. Petersburgh? In the low parts adjacent to the river. At Dantzic? in mud barges. In London? on the banks of the Thames, and near the outlets of sewers. I now proceed, separately, to consider these causes, and I divide them into two classes:-1. Those of a physical; and, 2. Those of a social origin. Under the first head, we have 1. Overcrowding. 2. Defective drainage and ventilation. 3. The use of foul water. 4. Privation of Solar light. The vitiated atmosphere produced by the aggregation in close rooms of an excessive number of human beings, is one of the most influential agents in developing disease. Its pernicious qualities are not due alone, or even chiefly (as is commonly supposed), to the increased amount of carbonic acid gas. They are attributable to a still more formidable agent, namely, the presence of waste organic matter thrown off from the lungs and skin. This effete body is an animal compound in a state of rapid decomposition; whence results the liberation of sulphuretted hydrogen and other noxious gases. My own experiments on this head justify me in this assertion, and are, moreover, entirely confirmatory of the more important ones of Dr. Angus Smith. Do not be deluded with the idea that the miseries and evil results of over-crowding are confined to cities and large towns. I have frequently encountered them in obscure and petty country villages, where are to be found ill-built and stifling cottages, and low lodging-houses, crammed to excess each night with human beings. The consequences are not less fatal to the physical and moral health of the inhabitants, than to those of denselypopulated towns. Evil assuredly is evil, find it wherever we may. As regards the moral enormities which result from such an abominable system (and which re-act, in their turn, on the physical constitution), who can wonder at these? Where human beings are shut up at night in the same fold, like beasts of the field, we cannot be surprised at the revolting revelations which sometimes come to light. It will be impossible for me within the limits of this lecture to give illustrations from my own experience of the development of various diseases arising from over-crowding, or any other of the causes of which I shall speak. I can only ask you to credit me when say, that I could easily occupy your attention for hours in the relation of cases in my note-book, of fever, of cholera, of scarletina, directly traceable to I |