Darwin is discussing diseases transmitted from Europeans to the natives. Note that he has no suspicion even of the “germ theory of disease”.(except for measles)
“The Rev. J. Williams, in his interesting work, 2 says, that the first intercourse between natives and Europeans, “is invariably attended with the introduction of fever, dysentery, or some other disease, which carries off numbers of the people.” Again he affirms, “It is certainly a fact, which cannot be controverted, that most of the diseases which have raged in the islands during my residence there, have been introduced by ships; 3 and what renders this fact remarkable is, that there might be no appearance of disease among the crew of the ship which conveyed this destructive importation.” This statement is not quite so extraordinary as it at first appears; for several cases are on record of the most malignant fevers having broken out, although the parties themselves, who were the cause, were not affected. In the early part of the reign of George III., a prisoner who had been confined in a dungeon, was taken in a coach with four constables before a magistrate; and although the man himself was not ill, the four constables died from a short putrid fever; but the contagion extended to no others. From these facts it would almost appear as if the effluvium of one set of men shut up for some time together was poisonous when inhaled by others; and possibly more so, if the men be of different races. Mysterious as this circumstance appears to be, it is not more surprising than that the body of one’s fellow-creature, directly after death, and before putrefaction has commenced, should often be of so deleterious a quality, that the mere puncture from an instrument used in its dissection, should prove fatal. " “

I feel chronologically challenged, here, Dr Bill. When is this relative to the "germ theory of disease"?

When, as the result of my first communications on the fermentations in 1857-1858, it appeared that the ferments, properly so-called, are living beings, that the germs of microscopic organisms abound in the surface of all objects, in the air and in water; that the theory of spontaneous generation is chimerical; that wines, beer, vinegar, the blood, urine and all the fluids of the body undergo none of their usual changes in pure air, both Medicine and Surgery received fresh stimulation. {e.a.}

http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1878pasteur-germ.html

But since the passage Bill is reading is datelined January 12th, 1836, perhaps it’s not so outrageous Darwin might not have had a clue on this, no, Bill?

not have had a clue

On the other hand, we may see here the germ of his ideas on evolution.

It certainly suggests a dawning focus on the nature of separately developed populations, doesn't it?

Nor is it the white man alone that thus acts the destroyer; the Polynesian of Malay extraction has in parts of the East Indian archipelago, thus driven before him the dark-coloured native. The varieties of man seem to act on each other in the same way as different species of animals -- the stronger always extirpating the weaker.

http://www.literature.org/authors/darwin-charles/the-voyage-of-the-beagle/chapter-19.html

On the other hand perhaps Darwin was 1850 years too late:

http://forums.about.com/ab-ancienthist/messages?msg=2910.109

Bingley

Dear Bingley: thanks for the Varro URL. I wonder if any of the thousands of physicians who were Latin scholars ever commented about that passage. And I'm surprised that it was not mentioned when I was in medical school.

Fascinating, Bingley. I guess it confirms the observed tendancy for empirical knowledge to surface in varied empires at varied epochs; and that any lingering model we may carry of human enlightenment being an 'onwards & upwards' process should be finally dismantled.

Of course, Varro was just making a WAG. If you look around enough you'll find all kinds of WackaDoodle Ideas (WDIs) from all eras. Sometimes, as in the case of the measurements by the ancient Greeks of the size of the Earth, they are well-reasoned, other times, also by the ancient Greeks the notion that everything is made of water, they are not. When someone comes up with a WDI that just happens to be fairly close to our present-day understanding we forget that it was just a WDI.

Good general point, mebbe. But I think it depends how rooted in practical observation the WDI was, and it seems to me that Varro's particular stab about swampy conditions was on the money ~ a W of Mess Instruction almost ;)

I spent four years in Public Health, starting as a epidemiologist. I read a stack of public health journals every week, went to public health lectures given by a lot of the best brains in Boston. And never hear of Varro before.
I'm still surprised about that

what's with the about.com login? are you guys all members?

Dear tsuwm: the only problem I had with it was one of the accursed pop-up ads with x-box hidden.When I widen top bar to get at the x, I can't get at the down arrow to scroll down. I just used it again, same problem.
I don't join anything, I have plenty on my plate right now.

sorry, I should have tried to be more precise: when I click on the link it takes me to a login page--it is a link to about.com's message forums.

I tried entering as a guest, but that didn't work either.

strangernstranger - just let me in again with no problem. Well, the text is this for anyone not able to see it:


From: KL47 Jun-3 4:40 pm
To: THEMANIAC777 unread (109 of 250)

2910.109 in reply to 2910.107

While the Romans had no way of seeing individual micro-organisms, at least some of them deduced that such creatures existed. In the mid-1st century BC, M. Terentius Varro wrote a book about farming called Rerum Rusticarum de Agri Cultura. In Book 1, chapter 12, he writes of swamps (loca palustria) "quod crescunt animalia quaedam minuta, quae non possunt oculi consequi, et per aera intus in corpus per os ac nares perveniunt atque efficiunt difficilis morbos." ("where tiny animals grow that are unable to be perceived by eye, and that get into the body, along with air, through the mouth and nose and cause serious illness" [my translation].)
The concept of airborne pathogens was thus already established when Varro wrote his book, though - ironically - I suspect that, given the context, the specific pathogens he had in mind were those responsible for malaria, which do not spread through the air but are rather transmitted primarily by mosquito bites. Whether Varro's concept of germs had any influence on other aspects of Roman medical practice is difficult to say.