Unfortunately, the ordinary physician does not always recognize the disease in its first stages, and a person may suffer for months with consumption, and even pass the time when the cure of the disease would be possible, without its being recognized. Such sick persons are treated for catarrh, for an obstinate cold and bronchitis, for grippe or malaria, whereas a proper diagnosis of the disease would be a recognition of the early stages of consumption and thus would prompt the patient to start at once on the necessary methods for cure. Nor is it possible to recognize the disease by any one definite indication. The cough which was once thought to be the deciding symptom is very often absent until the last stages of the disease. Expectoration of blood is similarly one of the last symptoms, exhibited only when too late for remedial measures. The presence of the tuberculosis bacillus or "T. B." in the sputum is also not generally found until the tissue of the lungs has become well advanced towards destruction, too late for remedy. Experts in diagnosis attach great importance to family history, and have learned to expect the disease in persons when exposure to contagion is inevitable. They will recognize the disease from evidence not discernible to regular practitioners. For instance, if one member of a family is known to be affected, any chronic indisposition in another member, involving, perhaps, a daily rise in the temperature of the body, not sufficient to arouse alarm, but apparent in the listless behavior of the person, may be enough to suggest the beginning of the disease. An expert may detect the clogging up of the lung tissue by an examination of the lungs themselves, and probably this direct examination, with a record of the daily rise and fall of temperature, particularly if the suspected patient has a listless feeling and a gradual loss of weight, would be sufficient to suggest the ordinary remedies.