ubercle-bacilli; but only a certain percentage will get consumption. In
the remainder the bacilli perish without leaving even a trace.

Very often the inclination to pulmonary consumption may be recognized
from the external characteristics. As a rule the respective individuals
have a slight body, thin lean skin, weak muscles, delicate skeleton, a
long, narrow, flat chest, flattening of the regions over and below the
shoulderblades, wide intercostal spaces, a winglike projecting of the
scapulae, long neck, clubby, knoblike appearance of the ends of the
fingers.

Furthermore it has been found, that pulmonary consumptives on an average
have a _smaller heart_ than is essential to a healthy body. On the other
hand the volume of the lungs of consumptives is very often abnormally
large.

There are a large number of _diseases_ that predispose to pulmonary
consumption. It is mainly the _enfeebling_ action of the same, which
brings about such results. For this reason the _chronic_ diseases
contribute so much toward the multiplication of the number of
consumptives, because they stipulate a continuous weakening of the
organism and an emaciation of the system. To these belong Bright's
disease, which very often turns into pulmonary consumption,
greensickness or chlorosis, anaemia, continued febrile diseases, severe
chronic suppuration, chronic catarrh of the stomach, frequent
pregnancies, childbed diseases. Thus we may often see young chlorotic
girls afflicted with consumption, especially when they marry young and
enjoy the honeymoon to its utmost limits. Then also women will easily
become consumptive when they give birth to a child every year,
especially when the social conditions in which they live are of an
unfavorable nature, and they are perhaps inclined to consumption
already. Childbed on the whole inclines to arousing the dormant
inclination toward pulmonary consumption.

Of other diseases we have mentioned measles and whooping cough, as
diseases that are only too easily succeeded by consumption. To these may
be added typhus, especially when it is of a more protracted nature, and
the reconvalescence is slow and incomplete.

Furthermore all those workmen that have to do with dust, are exposed to
the danger of being stricken with pulmonary consumption. The dust enters
the lungs, irritates and injures the same and so produces a favorable
soil for any tubercle bacilli that may happen to penetrate. On the whole
metal dust is