9.  The population of Hindostan is nearly three hundred millions, and at least one hundred million pounds of faecal matter is deposited on the open ground everyday, and has been for centuries.

10.  Much of this foul matter is washed by rains into their tanks and pools of water, which they use indiscriminately for washing, cooking, and drinking purposes.

11.  The poison of cholera has repeatedly been carried in soiled clothing packed in trunks and boxes, and conveyed to great distances.

12.  Articles of food, even bread and cake, as well as apples, plums, and other fruit, handled by persons in the incipient stages of cholera, have been known to convey the disease.

13.  The number of epidemics produced by cholera discharges getting into drinking water are almost innumerable, and those from contaminated milk are not few.

14.  The first case of cholera is generally counted from the first fatal one, whereas this is almost always preceded by non-fatal ones, which have escaped notice.  And each subsequent fatal case is interwoven by one, or several, or even many, non-fatal causes.  If the string of a row of beads is broken, and the beads scattered everywhere, it would be just as improper to say that they had never been upon a string as to say that, because all the fatal cases of cholera cannot be traced to equally fatal ones, no connection ever existed between them.

These points are necessarily stated categorically, but every one can be proved, if proof is called for.  The numerous and very large pilgrimages of the Hindoos must not be forgotten.

John C. Peters, M.D.

83 Madison Avenue.

* * * * *

DR. KOCH ON THE CHOLERA.

An important and influential conference[1] upon cholera was opened in Berlin at the Imperial Board of Health on the evening of July 26.  There were present Drs. v.  Bergmann, Coler, Eulenbrg, B. Fraenkel, Gaffky, Hirsch, Koch, Leyden, S. Neumann, Pistor, Schubert, Skreczka, Struck, Virchow, and Wollfhuegel.  The conference had been called at the instance of the Berlin Medical Society, whose President, Prof.  Virchow, explained that it was thought advisable Dr. Koch should, in the first instance, give a demonstration of his work before a smaller body than the whole society, so that the proceedings might be fully reported in the medical press.  He mentioned that Herr Director Lucanus and President Sydow had expressed their regret at being unable to be present, as well as many others, including Drs. Von Lauer, Von Frerichs, Mehlhausen, and Kersaudt.  Before the meeting Dr. Koch exhibited microscopical specimens and drawings of the cholera bacillus, and demonstrated the method of its preparation and cultivation.  The preparations included specimens of choleraic dejections dried on covering glasses, stained with fuchsin or methyl-blue, and examined with oil immersion, one-twelfth, and Abbe’s condenser; also sections of intestine preserved in absolute alcohol, and stained with methyl-blue.  There were also cultures in gelatin, etc.