Disinfectants and disinfection.

  • Smith, R. Angus (Robert Angus), 1817-1884.
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Disinfectants and disinfection. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    is far beyond the reach of patents, and is well used in this country for many purposes, although these purposes, as we believe, may be made very much more numerous. The preservation of meat is not yet brought to perfection, otherwise the cattle of distant parts of the world would be brought into our markets. Flesh becomes infected rapidly, and we require to invent new modes of disinfection in order to increase the supply of meat in this country, and thereby enable us to keep up that physical strength which always was a characteristic of a Briton, and which seems to be the main cause of his energy and success. It is not at all clear that in this department we can have any aid from the ancients. We are able to leave them when we arrive at the preservation of animal food; but if it is some pleasure to do so, it is not with perfect satisfaction, because we are aware that we ourselves have not made such progress as to allow us to boast. Indeed, there is a department, namely, that of the preserva- tion of the human body from decay, in which we find Egypt to have excelled the world, and to an extent which must ever be one of the wonders of history. A dry climate was a great aid; but even taking that into consideration, the work was well done. They removed the parts of the body which had least tenacity and most moisture, as these are invariably found to decay most rapidly. In very warm and dry countries, preservation of thin pieces of flesh can be made by mere exposure to the sun. The moisture is removed before corruption begins. The mode of cutting it into stripes and laying it out to dry is therefore adopted. It is marvellous what smaU changes in the atmo- sphere affect the success of this plan. It is said on the La Plata, where this is sometimes done, that if a smaU cloud appear on the horizon, no bigger than a hand, the drying will not be effected before corruption begins. This is not quite