Too Much Plague.

Otago Witness, Issue 2355, 13 April 1899, Page 60

Too Much Plague.

Microscopical research has its advantages within certain limits, but those limits must not be overstepped, as was the case with a cerLain scientist not very long ago.

The gentleman in question was a distinguished member of the medical profession, who was renowned foi his microscopical investigations. He could distinguish one microbe from another by a difference in the curl of their eyelashes. One day he was selected for plague duty in India, and the authorities, anxious that his talents should not be wasted, cent him to keep watch and ward at a frontier railway station wherc'an ordinary doctor had failed to pounce upon a single plaguecnusing germ. The new arrival was more vigilant. On the first day ol his taking up his duties he was able to telegraph to the local authority that he had arrested 70 passengers suffering from plague, and sent them into detention camp. The authority gasped, but controlled himself until next day, when a still more senaaticnal wire was received : " One hundred and eighty plague cases detained." The authority at once sat down and telegraphed: "Are you sure it is plague?" 'Positive," was the answer; "nave tested specimens of blood microscopically."

Then the authority ordered the specialist to test his own blood and that of his assist* ant.

He did, and in an hour or two telegraphed : " Myself and assistant in hospital, suffering from plague! "

At this point history rings dov/'i the curtain.