It will be noticed that during these three months of summer the thermometer kept constantly within the range we have before found the most favorable for the production of malaria. While the daily range of temperature was higher than the average it was not as great as in May (22.48°). A monograph by Dr. G. H. Wilson, of Meriden, Conn., member of the State Board of Health, published several years ago, gives an account of the progress in a definite direction from southwest to northeast, of intermittent fever. This seems to be strong evidence that the disease is due to a specific poison or germ. From clinical evidence and meteorological investigations therefore it appears: 1. That intermittent fever is due to a specific germ. *Grains of vapor in cubic foot of air. No report for January, February and March. Average for 9 months. 2. That the development of this germ, and hence the production of the fever is favored by a most atmosphere ranging in temperature between 60° and 85° F. 3. That the germ is taken into the body by inhalation or through drinking water. 4. That the fever is the result of irritation of 17 the heat producing centre of the cerebrum. This irritation is perhaps partially due to the direct effect of the specific germ, but it is also due to the retention in the circulation of effete matter. 5. That under favorable conditions the true malarial fever may assume the character of a genuine typhoid fever, without the agency of a typhoid germ. 6. Exposure to an average temperature below that to which the person is accustomed, may develop a latent malarial condition, but exposure to cold does not produce the disease, 7. There being no definite and constant relationship between intermittent fever and the daily range of atmospheric temperature, we must conclude that daily variations in atmospheric temperature are not essential for the production of the disease. Ozone is a potent germicide. It seems to the writer that its influence upon the disease is incidental and negative. When ozone is abundant it attacks the germs in the air and deprives them of their virulency.. There is less ozone over swamps than in the open fields; less in the winds filtered through the underbrush, than in the same winds before reaching the woods. There is more malaria on the windward than on the lee side of a swamp. Conditions favorable to the growth of malaria are therefore destructive of ozone. That the presence of ozone in the atmosphere does not greatly increase the power of the human organism to withstand the effects of the germ, I am led to think from the fact that a person going from a malarious region, where the amount of ozone is small, to a colder region, where the amount of ozone is greater, is almost sure to have strong signs of malarial poisoning soon after arrival. 10 The occurrence of the fever at high altitudes and in cold weather are sometimes mentioned as arguments against the paludal theory of the etiology of the disease. Let me simply hint at an explanation. One day after clambering up the crags on the coast north of Larne, Ireland, I was surprised to find myself in a bog while still close to the edge of the high cliff. Again: the upper plateau of Mackinac Island is 295 feet above the water's edge, and yet there one may find marshy ground. The heating of the house in winter draws air from the cellar. The air of the house is not so rich in oxygen as that out of doors. One may therefore find in the house in winter the necessary heat, moisture, and decaying vegetation -all the atmospheric conditions known to be essential. 10 Dr. Baker calls attention to the fact that persons exposed to night air over low lands are more liable to the disease than if they are exposed only through the day. It is suggestive that, according to Table 14, in Michigan, the months showing the most intermittent fever also show less night than day ozone, but generally there is more night than day ozone. Does light have any influence on the growth of the germ? THE PREVALENCE OF ALBUMINURIA IN PERSONS APPARENTLY HEALTHY. BY WILLIAM B. DAVIS, A.M, M.D., OF CINCINNATI, O. I read a paper before the American Medical Association at its Forty-first Annual Meeting, held in Nashville, Tenn., May 20th, 1890, on the subject of "Functional Albuminuria, or Albuminuria in Persons Apparently Healthy," in which I reported a case which had been under my observation for five years. On March 5th of this year, 1891, I made a careful urinalysis of this person's twenty-four-hours' urine, examining separ- ately each specimen as voided, and then mixing them together and again examining a sample of the whole quantity. The tests used were cold nitric acid,-contact method,—and boiling, then adding a drop or two of nitric acid and again boiling. The following are the results, viz.: |