Lice are interesting, if not particularly engaging, little bjects, and
it is not surprising that Mr. Ernest Brown and Mr. erwald Ramsbotham should be concentrating some attention them. The result is a joint circular on what is impressively 'axed " The Incidence of Lousiness," a subject on which the cuation of school-children has cast some light, and a recent vestigation by Dr. Kenneth Mellanby much more. The rt played by lice as carriers of disease is well known, and importance of dealing with the evil needs little demon- dm- What is less known is the extent to which infesta- 'n is prevalent. A table in the memorandum of the two stries shows that in ten industrial cities examined roughly 5o per cent. of 'girls between the ages of three and eleven are infested. In the case of boys of those ages the figure is under 3o per cent., and conditions in rural areas are much better than in urban. The remedy prescribed, and rightly, is more assiduous education in cleanliness. Infested children who have gone to the country have improved rapidly in the matter of, well, lousiness, unattractive though the term may be.