We can now recognize consumption before the lungs are seriously diseased.

Among the most useful methods with children is the rubbing or scratching of a few drops of the toxin of the tubercle bacillus, tailed _tuberculin_, into the skin.

If the children are healthy, this will leave no mark, or reddening, at all; but if they have tuberculosis, in two-thirds of the cases it will make a little reddening and swelling like a very mild vaccination.

But in order to get any good from this, cases must be brought to a doctor, early, without waiting for a bad cough, or for night sweats.
Signs of Consumption.

The signs that ought to make us suspicious of a possible beginning of tuberculosis are first, loss of weight without apparent cause; fever, or flushing of the cheeks, with or without headache, every afternoon or evening; and a tendency to become easily tired and exhausted without unusual exertion.