3. _Scares and Wonders_ There are certain subjects which come within my ken upon which paragraphs are published in the papers nearly every other day of a wildly romantic and misleading character. These subjects may be classified as: (1) Living and extinct monsters. (2) Cures for cancer and tubercle. (3) Unsuspected dangers of infection by disease-germs. It would hardly be pleasant for me to quote these paragraphs in order to deny their statements. They are often headed, “For the Little Ones,” or “From a Foreign Correspondent.” The old-established and better title for such announcements is “For the Marines.” I shall endeavour to mention as they occur to me, among other things, new and duly-certified facts relating to monsters, and to the investigation of disease. With reference to reports which have been seriously put forward during the past year, I may say that the alleged discovery of a mammoth in North America 71ft. long and 40ft. tall is nonsense. In the announcement to which I allude, the measurements have been altered from some original and more correct statement and made to appear astonishing by error or design. No new facts of importance bearing upon the treatment of either cancer or tubercle have been lately discovered which can be explained to the general public. Work is proceeding nevertheless. No new source of danger from disease-germs has been detected since this time last year. It is true that the dust in railway carriages, and especially in sleeping-cars, which are not properly cleaned every day after occupation by travellers, is full of microbes, and, like the dust of rooms which have been crowded by human beings, may be a source of disease infection. The remedy for this is careful cleansing after each journey, and a special construction of the cars like a tiled bath-room, so as to avoid the accumulation of dirt. At present this is, and long has been, neglected. Another serious and more recent danger is that arising from the crowding of passengers in underground railway tubes. Both in Paris and London this has been recognised as a real and pressing danger. Trouble has been given by the dust raised in the Paris Tube, but the danger caused by dust has been avoided in London. It is a definitely-ascertained fact that many bacteria, including disease-producing kinds, are rapidly killed by exposure to strong sunlight. Hence underground tubes and the chinks and recesses of railway carriages are more liable to harbour disease-germs than the open-air roadways and the carriages which ply on them. Great cleanliness and the use of germicide washing fluids are the obvious precautions to be taken in the absence of sunlight.