Note 51 — Chapter V · BACTERIA IN THE SOIL
Reading edition
The conditions requisite for an outbreak of enteric fever were, according to Pettenkofer, (a) a rapid fall (after a rise) in the ground water, (b) pollution of the soil with animal impurities, (c) a certain earth temperature, and lastly (d) a specific micro-organism in the soil. These four conditions have not, particularly in England, always been fulfilled preparatory to an epidemic of typhoid. Yet the observations necessary for these deductions were a definite step in advance of mere dampness of soil.