Mr. Clyde took that under advisement. “You mean that this city has been concealing its diseases, and that Dr. Merritt, our new Health Officer, is only making known a condition which has always existed?” he asked presently. “Haven’t you just told me so?” “When did I tell you anything of the sort?” The younger man smiled. “That’s five questions in a row,” said he. “Time for an answer. You said that deaths from tuberculosis had increased twenty-five per cent since the new man came in.” “Well?” “You’re wrong. Tuberculosis doesn’t increase in sudden leaps. It isn’t an epidemic disease, rising and receding in waves. It’s endemic, a steady current.” “But look at the figures. Figures don’t lie, do they?” “Usually, in vital statistics,” was the imperturbable reply. “In this case, probably not. That is, they don’t lie to me. I’m afraid they do to you.” Mr. Clyde looked dubiously at the propounder of this curious suggestion and shook his head. “Don’t get it?” queried Dr. Strong. “Perhaps you recall the saying of Thoreau—I think it the profoundest philosophical thought of the New World—that it takes two to tell the truth, one to speak and one to hear it.” “You mean that we’ve misinterpreted the figures? Why, they’re as plain as two and two.” “Truth lies behind figures, not in them,” said Dr. Strong. “Now, you’re worried because of a startling apparent swelling of the tuberculosis rate. When you find that sort of a sudden increase, it doesn’t signify that there’s more tuberculosis. It signifies only that there’s more knowledge of tuberculosis. You’re getting the disease more honestly reported; that’s all. Dr. Merritt—did you say his name is?—has stirred up your physicians to obey the law which requires that all deaths be promptly and properly reported, and all new cases of certain communicable diseases, as well. Speaking as a doctor, I should say that, with the exception of lawyers, there is no profession which considers itself above the law so widely as the medical profession. Therefore, your Health Officer has done something rather unusual in bringing the doctors to a sense of their duty. As for reporting, you can’t combat a disease until you know where it is established and whither it is spreading. So, I say, any health officer who succeeds in spurring up the medical profession, and in dragging the Great White Plague out of its lurking-places into the light of day ought to have a medal.” “What about the other diseases? Is the same true of them?” “Not to the same extent. No man can tell when or why the epidemic diseases—scarlet fever, measles, whooping-cough, and diphtheria—come and go. By the way, what about your diphtheria death rate here?” “That is the exception to the rule. The rate is decreasing.”