Ridgeon.  I am deeply obliged to you. [Overcome, he sits down on the chair near the couch].

B. B. Not at all, not at all.  Your own merit.  Come! come! come! dont give way.

Ridgeon.  It’s nothing.  I was a little giddy just now.  Overwork, I suppose.

Walpole.  Blood-poisoning.

B. B. Overwork!  Theres no such thing.  I do the work of ten men.  Am I giddy?  No.  No.  If youre not well, you have a disease.  It may be a slight one; but it’s a disease.  And what is a disease?  The lodgment in the system of a pathogenic germ, and the multiplication of that germ.  What is the remedy?  A very simple one.  Find the germ and kill it.

Sir Patrick.  Suppose theres no germ?

B. B. Impossible, Sir Patrick:  there must be a germ:  else how could the patient be ill?

Sir Patrick.  Can you shew me the germ of overwork?

B. B. No; but why?  Why?  Because, my dear Sir Patrick, though the germ is there, it’s invisible.  Nature has given it no danger signal for us.  These germs—­these bacilli—­are translucent bodies, like glass, like water.  To make them visible you must stain them.  Well, my dear Paddy, do what you will, some of them wont stain.  They wont take cochineal:  they wont take methylene blue; they wont take gentian violet:  they wont take any coloring matter.  Consequently, though we know, as scientific men, that they exist, we cannot see them.  But can you disprove their existence?  Can you conceive the disease existing without them?  Can you, for instance, shew me a case of diphtheria without the bacillus?

Sir Patrick.  No; but I’ll shew you the same bacillus, without the disease, in your own throat.

B. B. No, not the same, Sir Patrick.  It is an entirely different bacillus; only the two are, unfortunately, so exactly alike that you cannot see the difference.  You must understand, my dear Sir Patrick, that every one of these interesting little creatures has an imitator.  Just as men imitate each other, germs imitate each other.  There is the genuine diphtheria bacillus discovered by Loeffler; and there is the pseudo-bacillus, exactly like it, which you could find, as you say, in my own throat.

         SirPatrick.  And how do you tell one from the other?

B. B. Well, obviously, if the bacillus is the genuine Loeffler, you have diphtheria; and if it’s the pseudobacillus, youre quite well.  Nothing simpler.  Science is always simple and always profound.  It is only the half-truths that are dangerous.  Ignorant faddists pick up some superficial information about germs; and they write to the papers and try to discredit science.  They dupe and mislead many honest and worthy people.  But science has a perfect answer to them on every point.

A little learning is a dangerous thing;
Drink deep; or taste not the Pierian spring.