Page:The Art of Living in Australia.djvu/31

 PREFACE. xvii known as rickets is in the old country marked in many cases by bending of the bones, giving rise to deformities of the limbs, &c. The Australian type of the disorder, however, is milder altogether, and is of a different character. The Australian child is straight- limbed almost without exception, yet the Australian type of rickety disease, as I pointed out in 1891, is quite a definite affection. At the Congress of Naturalists and Physicians at Strasburg in 1885 the great German pathologist. Professor Virchow, called attention to a sphere of research in which, he alleged, neither the French nor the English had hitherto accomplished any- thing of importance, namely, the modifications of the organism, and particularly of the special altera- tions of each organ, connected with the phenomena of acclimatization. This reproach cannot be denied. We have not yet reached the stage in Australia of noting the effect which climate has upon the system in general, much less of inquiring into the changes which occur in such organs as the liver, spleen, &c. But apart from investigating the phenomena of ac- climatization, it is very plain that the people of Australia have never given any heed to their semi- tropical climate, or else the food-faults now universally practised would have been rectified long before this. It has always been a matter of interesting specu- lation as to what the characteristic type of the future