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Finally ungagged, those who had been holding off gave the story the works. The effects of the pest plane, of the pest bombs, were the most vicious that could be developed in the laboratories of bacterial war and they put to shame the naturally-occurring epidemics that have scourged mankind throughout his history. And the effects were spreading with the speed of a prairie fire before a high wind.
This whole process of decay of organic life is one in which bacteria play the most important part. In the case of the decomposition of the woody matter of the tree trunk, the process is begun by the agency of moulds, for this group of organisms alone appears to be capable of attacking such hard woody structure. The later part of the decay, however, is largely carried on by bacterial life.
The fine flavor is lost, the casein, which is the principal protein of milk, is toughened, the milk, which is normally a living liquid, is killed, the chemical balance is lost, the organic salts being rendered partly inorganic. Milk that is unfit to eat without being boiled is not fit to eat afterwards, for the poisonous end products of bacterial life remain.
The milk in the udder of a healthy cow is almost surely free from bacteria, but the moment it is exposed to the air these little beings start to drop into the fluid. The bacterial standards given by various city health departments vary. Those who are mathematically inclined may find the following figures interesting: In some great cities they allow 500,000 bacteria to the cubic centimeter of milk.
You will remember that to it some millions of dollars have been assigned, for the purpose of discovering the cause and cure of bacterial diseases. In one department of the Institute a Japanese professor showed under the rays of the ultra-microscope specimens of a remarkable bacillus, the existence of which he had been the first to detect.
Yet these unprotected, undoctored, unvaccinated peoples did not suffer and die from bacterial infections; and the women did not have to give birth to 13 children to get 2.4 to survive to breeding age almost all the children made it through the gauntlet of childhood diseases.
These sulphates appear to be formed, in part, at least, by bacterial agency. This gas, which is of common occurrence in the atmosphere, is oxidized by bacterial growth into sulphuric acid, and this is the basis of part of the soil sulphates. The deposition of iron phosphates and iron silicates is probably also in a measure aided by bacterial action.
In this way it will be seen that while plants, by building up compounds, form the connecting link between the soil and animal life, bacteria in the other half of the cycle, by reducing them again, give us the connecting link between animal life and the soil. The food cycle would be as incomplete without the agency of bacterial life as it would be without the agency of plant life.
A close blending of fat with nitrogenous matter appears to give a fabric which is hard to digest. The same principle is illustrated by fat-soaked fried foods. Under the cover of the fat, thorough-going bacterial decomposition of the proteins may be accomplished with the final release of highly poisonous products.
Food, its variety, adaptability, and preparation; clothing for the different seasons; work, recreation, and play; care of the eyes and teeth; bathing; the ventilation of the home, and especially of sleeping-rooms; the effects of tobacco and cigarettes in checking growth and reducing efficiency; the more simple and obvious facts bearing on the relation of bacteria to the growth, preparation, and spoiling of foods; the means to be taken to prevent bacterial contagion of diseases, these are some of the practical matters that every child should know as a result of his study of physiology and hygiene.
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