THE Inangahua Times. FRIDAY, APRIL 21, 1911. MASTERS OF SCIENCE.

Inangahua Times, 21 April 1911, Page 2

THE Inangahua Times. FRIDAY, APRIL 21, 1911. MASTERS OF SCIENCE.

I To-Day is the day of outwrd and visible accomplishment. W t have done much. We have atempled the conquest o f the n i and are greatly proud becau-i our aeroplanes rival the bird n, its flight and can spy out t e lands of our enemies. Space ha-

practically been ann.hikted Lv our wireless that will greatly assist us in defence and attack. Our warships are huge— len years past no man even dreamt ot them. We, however, forget that in distant lands among savages and the most unwholesome conditions, in laboratory and schools of

chemistry, men are working year on year—not to destroy that life which God has given man, but to save it. The work they do—baring the arm to the sting of the ravenous poison bearer, the dissection of plagued rats, the handling of death dealing fluids—of ethers that may when experimented on disperse into mid-air or else hurl laboratory and ex psrimenter into limitless space—the work of testing plague cultures—of analysing poisons that allect nun—the discovery of antidotes, of those things that will assist man in living his life, I this is their woik which they do without t lie glow of limelight or | the sound of advertising. Wlut' work it is—one instance will j show. In the Chemotherapy ' Institute at Frankfort. Dr Ehrlich

with his assistants had tried 605 preparations. Six hundred and live times had the cultires been sot 60s times had they matured, (>OS times had all no;e< been j taken and 605 times each pre- ' paration was considered inefficacious. li was cas: aside as useless. But a young Japanese, a Doctor Haka, suggested a fresh preparation and it was regarded as successful. Preparation 676 is now in use for combating an evil, that for centuries, in fact! ever since the Crusaders has been , the attendant demon on the footsteps of the white From 1

the it came ai d it is well that an Eastern savant should

'nave invented something to curt a disease, that death itself c mlo not rn-e hut which effected generation on generation, thv 1 nn ' cent suffering for the guilt}, in the approved fusion of t'" world. But it is not only in regacu ' to an infectious disease that the] labour and pains multiplied 6.6 ! times have to be expended. It is !

l in regatd to o f her illnesses tha* j affect mankind—other fevers that fasten on his blood. To-day in 1 India—in Auckland even~= tomorrow it may be in Feefton—men stand dissecting plague stiicken rats—a scratch and the

mo?t horrible of deaths is theirs. But it is being done. And we take it quietly. We accept their devotion as a matter of course A young man ttops a runaway tram and he is feted* A woman gently nurses a plague patient a-d die?. It is her duty. What indeed have these savants, to me

the French word that sums up' 'hese masters of science, done ? In a late Spectator, is a list o! some-a little—of tjiat which they have accomplished and ii is

cot a tithe of what they have done for man. The Spectator's article deals with the prevention of malaria. It reminds us that' wherever the white man goes he I takes death and disease with him. I He introduced the disease which 606 is to minimise into the We*t l

- , j Indian and Islands.! Reintroduced tuberculosi&j amongst the North American ? s Indians. His railways are carry- j 1 ins the sleeping sickness o! j {Uganda through the length and i

breadt hof Africa. He has mot ..- J over had to contend with one i great enemy malaria. Fortu-j nately the men of science have I risen to the occasion. They havef sent out expedition on expedition, i Prof. JLaveran in 1880 saw under] the microscope the living parasiie

|of the disease in full activity. A host of scientists spent them selves in the search for the cue The mosquito was found to be a medium of inoculation and war, indirectly resulting in drainage) of swamps and the bringing of j lands under the plough, was j

urged against them. Native children are a means of distribution of the malarial microbes. The savants to-day are waging, a blessed war against disease in almost every known county. The facts on which the article treats ire taken from a book by M\i x Ross and other writers arid as a mere record of what these brave men do, is \ book that tvi.ry library surely should have. We

j live in an age of action—we Lu v | down to the great athlete, the singer, the dancer, the financier, he forests of India tnd lav ! he warehouses of London, ther.are {mep greater than athle e

and singer and dancer, statesmen or general, whose lives are spent in working in the greatest noblest fashion for their fellow man. To them is all honor, those great students of life, before whom great men are small.