Bacteria and their Products. By G. Sims Woodhead. "The Contemporary
Science Series." (Walter Scott.)—Mr. Sims Wood- head has really made a most readable volume out of a subject which, if interesting, is perhaps somewhat repulsive to the majority of readers. The history of tuberculosis, cholera, anthrax, and other diseases in which bacteria play the most important part, becomes interesting surely when we discuss the area and origin of epidemics, their cure and prevention. Cholera, for instance, every one should understand. The most interesting chapter in the book is that devoted to " The History of Cholera," and next comes that on " Hydrophobia." It is remarkable that these two diseases, the most terrible scourges with which man- kind is afflicted, should have been the last and the hardest to determine. Cholera, alas ! was found to be endemic at certain places in the East,—that is to say, it is not a visitor, but a resi- dent. The Delta of the Ganges is apparently the home of cholera. It is also endemic at Shanghai, appearing and disappearing at regular seasons, not being continuous, as in the Ganges Delta. At the Nile Delta it breaks out at the same season as at Shanghai, but intermittently.
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