THE DIARRHEA OF CHILDHOOD

The diarrheas of childhood are important because of their urgency, and attract attention because of certain features which make them somewhat distinct from the comparable gastro-intestinal disturbances of later years. Errors of diet may not be more common in infancy and childhood than at subsequent periods of life, and the cause of diarrhea in the earlier years may be essentially the same as later; but somehow they appear to be attended with more serious consequences. A consideration of literature of recent years will bring to mind numerous investigations tending to associate some of the types of infantile diarrhea with the presence of well recognized bacteria, for example, the Shiga bacillus, in the digestive tract. There is little doubt, however, that clinically indistinguishable forms of diarrhea are related to other micro-organisms, if not caused by them, so that it has even been thought probable that, after all, there may be no