Newspaper Page Text
How Science
Is Making
MAD DOGS
Less Dangerous
T HKyCefetit di -covcry of ttie microbe of hydropho
bia ty professor ilideyo Noguchi, of the Rocke
fet!$r Institute. Is rapidly clearing up the mys
tery of this fllsea.-R and putting an end once and for
all to the resistant denials of its existence.
London, Berlin and other large cities have virtually
rid themselves of rabies or hydrophobia by the sim
ple expedient of muzzling all dogs. Well meaning but
misguided individuals and societies in America have,
prevented the boards of health in American cities from
following suit, and the result is that more people are
said to die from hydrophobia in America than in all
Europe.
The American physicians have been told over and
over again to prove there is a microbe of rabies before
they may bope to have dogs muzzled, and this is exactly
what Professor Noguchi has been able to do after eigh
teen months of unceasing study.
The microbe Is o tmy that the ordinary miscroscope
caunot possibly reveal it. It passes through filters and
avoids all the common traps of bacteriologists. But
the Japanese scientist called to his aid the ultra-
microscope. This instrument differs from the common
high-power microscope chiefly in the way Pie objects
are illuminated.
The great difficulty in seeing the infinitely small
microbe is the fact that high-power lenses are ‘‘near
sighted." In other words, a powerful microscope must
push its fens so close to the germ it examines that it
ALL
ii OVER.
Hydrophobia Easier to Detect and Cure Now That We Know the Germ Which Causes It
I i : 1. n/1 LinlAoriot CK Si H TT1111.11 rl. lfift
shuts oil the light. Of course, light can bt flashed up
from below, but this shines in the observer's eye and
blinds bint
Tile ultra-microscope concentrate; a light of great
power and preads it out in a plane many times thinner
than a hair. These rays senf across the field of a micro
scope are able to squeeze in between the lens and the
slide, illuminating the objeci without blinding the ob
server. In this blade of concentrated light Professor
Noguchi brought to a finish 1 lie search which lias been
pursued for twenty-seven years by Pasteur and hi*
disciples.
Most germi belong to ilie vegetable kingdom and are
therefore really a form ol plant. They live by destroying
animals and eating them, just as the animal kingdom
lives by consuming the vegetable kingdom. The rallies
microbe is of the lowest form of animal life and there
fore prey. ui>on its own kind. It is seen as a tiny
double or triple drop of jelly-like substance. A thin
envelope surrounds the drop, and it contains a lev
grains of some harder substance which can be seen with
the aid of Mains. This little drop, called a plasmodhmi.
is able to kill the healthiest human being.
Tlie great Pasteur reasoned that a rabies microbe must
exist, and though he never found it, lie prepared a serum
which is the only remedy known to-day. If taken in
time the I’asteur treatment usually prevents the dis
ease from appearing in the victim of a mad dog bite.
Unfortunately, there has always been a small per
centage of cases in which the Pasteur treatment, even
.when given under ideal circumstances, has been of no
avail. With the discovery of the microbe a new serum
will soon be made which is expected to be a certain
cure when taken in time.
Man catches the disease mostly from dogs, but cats
•convey it, and even skunks, horses, oxen, pigs and foxes,
and, above all, wolves produce a more virulent form
than that from the dog’s bite. It is not necessary for
the animal to bite in order to transmit the infection.
A bit of ills saliva upon any scratch or wound in the
skin is sufficient.
The prevalent idea that dogs in hot weather go mad
son for this is the inflamed and irritated condition of
the nerves and muscles of the throat.
Water or anything which suggests swallowing throw s
the throat mnscles into convulsions. The patient,
whether he be man or dog. dreads to swallow, and as
a result saliva collects and runs out of the lips, causing
Hie well-known “frothing at the mouth.”
Dogs with hydrophobia do not always act "mad.”
The so-called "dumb'’ hydrophobia is perhaps Hie more
common, especially in dogs with gentle natures. The
animal is nervous, uncomfortable, seeks quiet and dark
ness and refuses food and drink. In this stage Ills saliva
is as likely to cause rabies in a human being as if he
were running mad.
Until proper laws are passed, every dog showing signs
of mysterious illness should be muZ&led and confined
until his ailment is definitely diagnosed. In case there
is good reason lo suspect hydrophobia-exposure in a
human being, the patient should lose no time in pre
senting himself for the Pasteur treatment.
Professor Noguchi, who has made the important dis
covery of the -allies microbe, was born in the little town
of WakamaUu, in the north of Japan, of an old and
noble family of Samurai, on November 24. 1876. The
favorite amusement of Noguchi as a child was to play
with gun powder. One day, when lie was not ten years
old, some powder exploded in his left hand. To-day
this distinguished biologist has a mutilated left hand
with parts of all five fingers amputated, but he is ex
tremely skillful in using the remainder.
Scientists believe that Hie public will soon obtain val
uable results from his discovery. These results will
lie an improvement in diagnosis and the preparation
of a new vaccine.
At present the diagnostic examination of unihials sup
posed to be rabid is long and uncertain. The method
of Pasteur, which Is lo inoculate « portion of the brain
of the animal suspected of rabies into rabbits and
guinea pigs, is very slow. It is necessary to wait for
ihc disease to show itself after a period of incubation
varying from sixteen to twenty-five days. Another
method, which is to search for the "corpuscles of
Negri" that are often found in the brain of rabid ani
mals is uncertain in its results.
Vnti-rables treatment now consists of a series of
punctures, of which the number varies from eighteen to
("-enty-flve, according to the gravity and situation of
the bite. J. Viala, who now gives anti-rabies vaccina
tion at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, states that the
vims given to patients to-day is the same as that first
by Pasteur in 1886. The Pasteur virus has never
', 0 ., t prom its first use it has served in the prep
aration of all°'anti-rabies vaccine, and 10.200 rabbits
have been sacrificed in this work.
How Rabies Affects
Human Victim.
if tliqj can’t find water is a mistake.
A dog may die of thirst, but he can
not contract hydrophobia except from
another animal. The disease is call-
How FISH Display COMMON SENSE
R'
ECENT studies of the habits of fish show that
most of them are possessed of considerable com
mon sense and display, in many particulars, as
good judgment as human beings could.
Take, for instance, the common catfish. They have
sufficient sense to build a nest for their eggs and care
fully watch their young when they are hatched out.
ed hydro-phobia, which means fear 4 During August you will see the male taking care of a
, i ~ ~ / ... .... ...
of water, because of the behavior of
its victims. The sight or sound of wa
ter will throw a rabid dog or human
being into convulsions. The rea-
Why Ifs a MISFORTUNE to Be an ONLY CHILD
A MASS of evidence has lately been collected
to prove that it is a serious misfortune
for a boy or girl to be an only child.
Tlie chances which such children have of grow
ing up to he normal, healthy, useful members of
society are, it seems, far loss than they would
be if they had even one brother or sister. The
fact that a boy or a girl is an only child auto
matically surrounds their early years with con
ditions which make them nervous, high-strung
individuals with abnormal mentalities; and
later in life these tendencies lead to drunken
ness and other evil habits, to hysteria anc^ in
sanity. and not infrequently to crime.
There are many sound physiological reasons
s\ by this is so. One is that the only child is
brought up under the special care of his parents
and is often uever allowed to see or play with
nWier children This unnatural existence makes
him precocious and a parrot-like imitator of his
ciders.
Soon he begins to care only for persons who
art 1 older than lie is, tr.e- to ’alk and act like
lliem. and finds the society of children of iiis
Otfrn age distasteful, lie ,iev«-i gains the inde
pendence which other boys and girls acquire by
association with their equals, hut instead grows
dependent, credulous and utterly lacking in
strength of character and initiative. .
ill
The only child, too, is apt to be spoiled by iiis
parents who, having no one else to lavish their
affection on, coddle him, gratify all his‘whims
and never punish or oppose him. This super
fluity of attention develops an abnormal egoism
in liini, and lie becomes the ruler of his parents.
And all this so weakens him that when he
finally has to face life alone he is powerless to
ehoose.a proper course of conduct.
Dr. A. A. Brill, tlie well-known American neu
roiogist, has recently completed a study of 400
men and women, each of whom was an only
child. Of these no less than 28 per cent W'ere
abnormal, some of them develpping the grossest
kind of perversions. Another 18 per cent suf
fered from various types of insanity. Drink and
Hie drug habits and all sorts of irregularities
claimed the remainder. Not one of the four
hundred was in any way successful, allhough
many of them had been reared in wealthy homes
and had the advantage of a good education.
Physicians who have made a special study of
sufferers from the drink and drug habits say
that (heir own experience confirms Dr. Brill’s.
A surprisingly large number of the victims of
these habits are found to be only sons, who
were so idolized by their parents that they never
learned how to face life’s problems for them
selves. When finally overwhelmed by the merer
less shocks and disappointments of existence
they sought relief in alcohol and morphine.
According to Freud, the great German au
thority, a large percentage of the weaklings who
figure in divorce trials and in dissolute circles
owe their abnormality to the fact that each
was an only child. The care with which they
were shielded from contact with anybody less
favored and the wav their normal impulses
were suppressed gave them the perverse con
ception of love, marriage and other relations
which makes them the pitiable figures they are
to-day.
“The only child,” says Dr.
Brill, in summing up the re
sults of his investigations, “Is
a morbid product of our pre
sent social economic system.
He is usually the offspring of
wealthy parents, who, having
been brought up in luxury,
are anxious that their chil
dren have the same fate. By
their extraordinary attention
and love, the child is over
developed and unfitted for
battle. His normal manhood
is perverted, and he becomes
a neurotic and a w'eakling.”
swarm of small fry, while the mother fish floats around
and takes things easy. The male catfish is more
thoughtful of his mate than are a great many men.
Should an intruder come near the little catfishes there
will be trouble, for the daddy fish is always ready to
do battle for them.
The catfish in their native ponds and brooks always
find a quiet place in the water near the bank to lay
their eggs, building a nest in the sand and covering
with a thick spawn. The inale fish will hover around
the nest and force fresh water through the mass by
rapid vibrations of its fins. This continues for a week
or ten days—when the eggs hatch and the father fish
at once assumes his duties as caretaker of tlie young.
In the sea a species of catfish is found which takes
the eggs in his mouth as soon as they are laid by the
female, and there he will keep them until they hatch.
After this they are looked after by the mother fish,
the daddy fish feeling that he has finished his part of
raising the family.
A fisli very much resembling our common sunfisli
raises its young in the same manner as the sea cat
fish. Sometimes their jaws fairly bulge out with the
eggs. These fish are called cichlids, ami are plentiful
in Palestine and in Texas. They are so plentiful in
the Sea of Galilee that the miraculous catch at the time
when Saint Peter fished there might be repeated any day
now. It is the habit of these fish to move to the top
of th6 water in aJniost a solid mass, covering at times
many square yards and making a noise like that of
pouring rain. "...
in the earlv Spring a pair of these fish will clear
away near the shore a circular spot a foot or two in
diameter, removing all the weeds and stones, in this
clearing the female lays her eggs. This done, the male
immediately takes charge, hovering over the nest and
driving away all intruders.
The pipe fish take care of their young in a manner
that is entirely peculiar. The newly-laid eggs are taken
care of by the male, he having a sort of fold on either
side of his body. Beneath these “flaps” he secretes the
eggs, and when the young are hatched he continues to
carry them in this pouch until they are old enough to
look out for themselves.
In the case of all fish which take care of their young,
a curious adaptation of natural law to circumstances
is found. Those which take the greatest pains and
care in sheltering their offspring have the fewest eggs,
perhaps less than one hundred at a lay, while on
the other hand, species o'f fish which pay not the slight-,
est attention to their young produce hundreds of thous
ands, and even millions of eggs, at a single lay.
The gigantic devil fish of southern waters, which
will grow to twenty feet in width, bears but
a single young one at a birth, the mother re
taining it inside her body until it has grown to be
four feet broad. The youthful devil fish coming into
the world so big is in but little danger of an enemy.
Why AMERICANS Are the BEST LOOMING Men
A
How SUICIDES Show That TIMES ARE GOOD
T HE suicide statistics are nearly as
reliable an index of tlie country's
prosperity as the hank statements.
Business troubles seem to be tlie chief
reason why Americans kill themselves,
and it has been repeatedly shown that tlie
number of men and women who take their
lives varies in direct ratio to tlie uumber
of failures. When times are bad the sui
cide rate increases; and when times are
good it fails off.
According to 1lie suicide statistics just
completed for the hundred largest cities in
the United States, business conditions dur
ing 1912 showed a marked improvement
over the preceding tour years. The mini
■ .
1010 and 1011 and considerably less than
5n 1008 and 1900. when, as a result of the
panic of 1007. it was much larger than
usual
But although the yearly rate shows a
decrease, the live-year rate as compared
with each five years for the last twenty
years shows an increase of nearly one
third. Everybody would be greatly alarmed
if the mortality from any of the contagious
diseases were increasing as rapidly as
suicide.
Surprisingly enough, suicides arc not
uios4 frequent ia those parts of the coun
try wlv're one would expect them to he.
Suffering is usually considered an im
portant factor in leading people to kill
themselves, and it would therefore lie.
natural to expect that cities subject to the
greatest extremes of heat and cold would
show tlie highest suicide rate. But almost
exactly the opposite is true.
Three California cities head tlie list
San Francisco, with a rate of 50 per
100,000; San Diego, with more than 40, and
Sacramento, with 27. Then comes Ho
boken, N. .1., with ;!4, followed liy Eos An
geles, w ith 32, and Oakland, Cal., with 31,
Si. Louis coming in between the last-
lutned two. Thus five cities of Califor
nia, where Hie climate is delightful, have a
high suicide rate.
The cities of tlie country having the low
est suicide rate are in the oldest settled
portions, especially in the South and in
New England. In the last twenty of the
hundred cities Massachusetts has eleven
towns with a suicide rate of 10 or less per
100,000. Augusta. Ga.. has the lowest rate,
:’,.7, and the fourth from the end of the list
is Charleston. S. C. Williamsport, Pa„ has
the unique distinction of having had no
suk'ide during 1912, and during the pre
ceding decade Hie rate was only about 9
per 100,000, or less than one-half the aver
age for the hundred American cities at
large.
The cities of the West and Middle West
have as a rule a much higher suicide rate
ilian those of the East and South. Spring-
field, Ill., is seventh on the list, while the
first Eastern city is McKeesport, Pa.,
which, with its large foreign population, is
sixteenth on the list. Chicago is twenty-
first, with a suicide rate of 22.2 for the
decade, while New York, with its very
mixed population, has the same average as
ihe whole country for the decade, 20.2.
Atlantic City, N. .1., is in the same class.
It has been shown over and over again
by the comparison of suicide records of
cities with reports of their weather bu
reaus that suicides are considerably more
frequent on bright, sunny Mays than in
dark, cloudy weather. Decemner has the
lowest suicide rate of the year and June
the highest. It is psychic, not, physical, de
pression that tempts to suicide. The mo
ment at which there is a deep feeling of the
contrast between their own unhappiness
and what they imagine, at least, to be the
happiness of others, is the time chosen by
the discouraged to end it all and get away
from what to them is unbearable.
The highest suicide {ate is not found
among the very poor, but among the well-
to-do. Very lew suicides are absolutely
vitliout resources. Even those who have
failed in business are often not absolutely
ruined, but still have enough money to
continue life on a more moderate scale.
N English writer—Rupert Brooke—is
positive that Americans are better
iooking than the men of other na
lions. As to the exact reason for this
) superiorit' he is not so certain. It may.
he thinks, he due to the free, swinging,
graceful walk which results from the
s national habit of wearing belts instead of
, suspenders; or it m»; be because the pad
ded shoulders and loosely cut trouser legs
J supplied by American tailors make a more
j presentable figure than other nations turn
f out.
> Whatever the reason for their good ap
pearance, Mr. Brooke Is much pleased with
? the looks of American men and particu-
i larly with their readiness to take their
\ coats off on all sorts of occasions. This
j custom he raises to the dignity of a symbol
j of the nation s greatness.
> 'Americans,” says Mr. Brooke, “take
) their coats off, which is sensible; and the.'
' can do it the more beautifully because
J they wear belts instead of braces or sus
penders. They take their coats oft an> -
where and any-when, and somehow it
strikes the visitor as the most symbolic
thing about them. They have not yet
thought of discarding collars; but they are
unashamedly shirt-sleeved.
Any sculptor seeking to figure the
American Republic in stone must carve
in future a young man in shirt-sleeves,
open-faced, pleasant and rather vulgar,
straw hat oil the back of his head, hi*
trousers full and sloppy, his coat over al
arm. The motto written beneath will be,
ot course; ‘This is some country.’ The
philosophic gazer on such a monument
might get some way toward understanding
the making of the Panama Canal—tijat
exploit that no European nation could have
carried out.
•nr. Brooke's observations lead him to
believe (hat America has developed only
two classes, the upper-middle and the
lower-middie, each of which has a distinct
face.
“The upper clas* head." Mr. Brooke
says, "is long, often fine about the ;ore-
head and eyes, and very cleanly outlined.
The eyes have an odd tired pathos in them
—mixed with the friendliness that is so
admirable—as if of a perpetual never quite
successful effort to understand something,
it is like the face ol' an only child who lias
been brought up in the company of adults.
But the mouth of such men is the most
typical feature. It is. small, tight and
closed downward at Hie corners, the lower
lip very slightly protruding. It has very
little expression in if. and no curves. There
• he Puritan conies out. But no other'
nation has a mouth like this. It is shared
to some extent by the lower classes; but
their mouths tend to h< wider and more ex
pressive.”
With American Women this English
critic was not so favorably impressed, as
he was with the men He found their
laces for the most pari inuetermmate and
not very feminine. Their habit of wearing
"invisible" eyeglasses gives them, he
thinks, a curious air of intelligence which,
often they do not deserve,
"Handsome people of both sexes are "very
common in the United States.” concludes
Mr. Brooke, "beautiful and pretty ones are
very vare.”
How You Can Find Out if Your BRAIN IS NORMAL
T has just occurred to some of Ger
many’s military experts that the value
of that nation's fleet of armed dirigible
balloons is serial sly lessened by the fact
that these huge craft, with their luminous
gas bags, make the most conspicuous pos
sible targets for both tlie eyes and the guns
of the enemy. To remedy this difficult'
it is suggested that the aerial war craft oe
disguised by means of a protective scheme
of coloring similar to that which nature
has supplied to various birds and beasts
to help conceal them from their enemies.
For a background of trees, earth and
snow, nature has evolved the deceptive
decoration of the zebra, the partridge and
the ermine. With these and the imaginat
ive performances of the chameleon as ex
amples, men have evolv
ed for their soldiers
khaki uniforms, and,
.... />«V- -. V
^ ^gince the introduction of
j 'The aeroplane’s inquir-
V V ;- ■ t. .i .Y -- U J' e-ff:» V/V‘• V-' ;'w J
if Your Brain Is Normal You Should Be Able to
Faces Have Their Eyes
V A RIO US ways of proving whether a person's brain
is normal or defective have been tried, hut tne
one that is giving the best results is the series
of tests devised by Dr. Howard A. Knox for use at
Kill's island to determine which immigrants are feebie
minded.
These tests are entirely pictorial, and involve no
• aiking, writing or reading on the part of the person
who is being examined. They are therefore available
for the most hopelessly uneducated, for the dumb and
for those who are unfamiliar with English.
The first test is to separate and pair ten clusters
Tell in Fourteen Seconds Just How Many of These
Turned Toward the Left.
of leaves. Five of the leaves are uumbered 1, 2, 3, 4
and 5, and four are lettered A, B, C. D and E. Dr.
Knox lias found that a normal minded person is able
to pair leaf 1 with leaf A. leaf 2 with leaf B, and so on,
in twenty-eight seconds.
There are six of these tests One-consists in tell
ing how many of a group of faces look sad and how
many happy. This should be done in twenty seconds.
Another is to select from a group the
are turned to the left. Still other tests
of envelopes of different styles, and ...* ,
simple geometrical figures.
faces whose eyes P-.I
ts are the sorting p
ul the pairing of [•'•.
tng eye into warfare, it
may be necessary for
them to devise some
protective colorings that will make tents,
fortifications and other military accesso
ries invisible or much less conspicuous
than tliev now are when viewad from
above.
The same principle ha* already been
tried with success oil the sea. It began
twelve years or more ago when, after
many experiments, some one hit upon a
more or less uniform gray as the safest
color for large warships. When painted
in this way the largest battleships melt
into their background in broad daylight
just as the jet black coats in which the
torpedo boats are dressed, melt into their-
at night.
What the German airmen suggest i*
some scheme by which dirigible balloons
and aeroplanes when seen against the
sky would melt into their background, so
that their approach would be invisible o»
distinguishable with difficulty until they
w'ere close at hand.
Any one who has looked at a gull fly
ing high on a sunny day will have noticed
how its white under body in shadow 'tone*
into the blue sky just as its gray upper
iiodv overcomes the lighting of the sun.
Even on gray days it is not too noticeable
an object. Many other birds and many
fish are colored on similar lines.
A dirigible balloon i* a conspicuous ob
ject under almost an.v weather condition.
Whether viewed in the graj dawn or tne
tull sunlight, it makes a magnificent mark,
even when a long distance away.
A semi-transparent object like a balloon
when surrounded by lighted atmosphere
does not take on so dark an under shadow
as a solid object, especially a solid object
on land, btn the darkness of the unde*
ride and the lightness of the upper pro
duce a. contrast which makes the object a
s ifficiently noticeable one. in addition to
this many of the dirigibles appear a bril
liant yellow as though covered with >ollen
Suppose an airship, like the gull, were
colored a bluish gray on top and a paler
gray or white below', so arranged that the
average effects of light and shadow "can
celled out, it might help her invisibility,
just as it might improve the invisibility of
warships if the color in such places as are
always in deep shadow were lightened.
What to Do with Your UMBRELLA
Ccoyright. 19lo. bv
the Star Company. Great Britain
T HE most expensive as well as the cheapest urn
brellas can be ruined beyond repair by the
common practice of opening them when wet and
leaving them in that shape to dry. After this has been
done a few times the fabric begins to crack and i* soon
full of holes.
The right way to dry an umbrella is first to shake it
well, open it briskly once or twice and then hang it
up where it is warm hut not hot. It should on no
account be left near a stove or radiator or in any
place wfiiere the temperature is very high. It will drv
better if hung up than if left standing.
The way an umbrella is rolled up makes all tlie dif
ference in the world with its appearance and the length
Rights Reserved
of time it w ill wear. The ribs of an umbrella are deli
cate tilings, and they cun easily be twisted out of shape,
broken or torn from the fabric by careless handling.
\v hen -ou start to roil your umbrella, pull out the
cover into nice smooth folds and lay them one on lop
of ihe other. When they are all arranged, with the
told wait the little fastening tag at the top, take the
tips of the ibs in one hand, clasp till other hand around
the stem a little lower down and turn the umbrella very
gently once or twice so that all the different layc
flattened down and brought close to the stick bj
pressure of your clasping hand. In this way the ««
are not twisted, and not only is the umbrella in hand.'
compact shape, but its life is lengthened.
•y are
the
ribs
Disguises to HIDE BALLOONS from the ENEMY
I
HMHi