The final disposition of the typhoid bacilli, after a course of fever, was believed to be by their elimination from the body through the various organs devoted to the discharge of waste products; but recent investigations have proved that the typhoid bacillus may remain in the body for long periods without apparently affecting the health of the person, but when communicated to another, it will cause an attack of fever of the most virulent type. In one instance an outbreak of typhoid fever was traced to a woman who had fever upward of fifty years ago. It was found that the excretions of her body contained immense quantities of living typhoid bacilli. She was a cook by trade, and it was found on tracing her history that wherever she had worked there had been epidemics of typhoid. A still more remarkable feature of the life history of the typhoid bacillus has recently been made public. A typhoid epidemic was traced to a nurse who had attended cases of typhoid fever, but had never suffered from an attack of that disease, and yet was discharging large quantities of the bacilli. These cases can be explained only on the theory that these microörganisms find some place, possibly, as has been suggested, in the gall bladder, where they find food sufficient to keep them in an active state of multiplication, but where the conditions prevent the absorption of the toxins they excrete. How far these curious incidents in the life of the typhoid bacilli are common to other bacilli is not known; but if it is true of other infectious diseases, the fact will explain the origin of those obscure and mysterious cases that occur without any known exposure to the infection. [Sidenote: Bacteria Aim to Destroy the Body] In concluding this inquiry as to the nature of infection and its effects on the body, the following statement of a biologist as to the bacterium seems justified: “When it enters a living body, it aims directly at the destruction of the latter. It multiplies rapidly, tends to scatter its broods throughout the tissues, and all the while gives off the most powerful poisons. This agent is wickedly implacable, neither giving nor asking quarter. The battle that it wages with the body can terminate only by the destruction of one of the combatants.” Viewed in the light of the past history of infectious diseases, this is not an overdrawn picture. If we estimate the deaths from smallpox in ancient times, from cholera in modern times, and from tuberculosis (consumption) throughout all time, the destruction of human life by bacteria cannot be overstated. The bacterium has been a wickedly implacable foe to the human race in the past. Invisible, intangible, everywhere present, it has proved omnipotent in its destructive attacks upon communities.