A symposium on virus and rickettsial diseases was held in June 1939 in Boston under the auspices of the Harvard School of Public Health. This volume is an amplified record of the thirty-four papers presented at that meeting. In view of the many recent developments in the field of the virus and rickettsial diseases, this volume should be welcome at the present time. It has been some years since any comprehensive work covering this field has been published in the English language.
The following virus and rickettsial diseases affecting man are discussed: variola, vaccinia, measles, mumps, dengue fever, venereal lymphogranuloma, influenza, psittacosis, poliomyelitis, epidemic encephalitis, equine encephalomyelitis, rabies, lymphocytic choriomeningitis, louping ill, yellow fever, the typhus fever group, the spotted fever group and the tsutsugamushi disease group. The review of these diseases is well carried out. The role of animals as reservoirs for certain of these diseases is considered, and