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then used the rubble to construct an enormous land bridge – approximately 180-270 m wide and 800 m long – from the shore to the city on the island. He then executed 10,000 citizens and sold another 30,000 into slavery.
The land bridge still stands today.
    References
    Encyclopaedia Britannica , 2008 Ultimate Reference Suite—‘Murex’, ‘Tyre’, ‘Theopompus of Chios’ and ‘Heracles’.
    Mikkelson, Barbara, ‘The saltpeter principle’, Urban Legends References Pages, 13 August 2001; http://www.snopes.com/military/saltpeter.asp.
    ‘Raising an army’, New Scientist , 27 April 2002, p 73.
    ‘Raising an army’, New Scientist , 29 June 2002, p 65.

Sports Drinks
(Electrolyte Up My Life)
    In general, exercise is a good thing. When you exercise vigorously, you usually get hot and sweaty, lose some body water and perhaps become a little dehydrated. So what is the best way to replenish this lost fluid? This is where it gets tricky.
    Some people think that they should guzzle down plain water to rehydrate.
    However, other people believe the exact opposite to be true. They believe that plain water is dangerous because it can flush essential electrolytes from their bodies and upset their metabolic balance. This is why they choose a sports drink to rehydrate.
    Yet another group believe that it is impossible to drink too much.
    However, none of these beliefs is entirely true.
    Dehydration Can Kill
    Yes, dehydration can kill you—indeed, each year nearly two million children under the age of five die from dehydration brought on by infectious diarrhoea. In severe cases, water alone cannot rehydrate you—you need water with the right amounts and types of sugars and salts added.
    This knowledge is not new. The great Indian physician and surgeon, Sushruta—a truly wise person—was aware of this 2,500 years ago. He was skilled in nose and eye surgery and was the first person known to operate on bladder stones. He knew of heart pain (angina), seemed to understand the concept of blood flow in arteries and veins, and accurately described the illnesses leprosy, diabetes and hypertension.
    He also recommended that infectious diarrhoea be treated by drinking not plain water, but rather a mixture of rice water, carrot soup and coconut juice. He was right. Plain water was not the best fluid for treating infectious diarrhoea, such as that caused by cholera.
    In fact, it was the modern treatment for cholera, based on Sushruta’s traditional ideas, that led to the first generation of sports drinks.
Cholera Today?
Amazingly, the disease cholera still exists today.
According to the World Health Organization in 2002, about ‘88% of diarrhoeal diseases in the world are attributal to unsafe water, sanitation, and hygiene’.
In July 1994, thanks to yet another war, over half a million Hutu refugees were interned in a camp in Zaire in Africa. Over 12,000 died from cholera. The death rate of those infected with cholera was about 50%, ‘as a result of inadequate supplies of water, sugar and salts’.
There was an outbreak of cholera in Zimbabwe in late 2008. By April 2009, about 100,000 people had been infected, and about 4,000 had died.
    It’s Enough to Give You the….
    Cholera is the illness caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. It is usually spread by drinking water contaminated with the bacteria. The infective dose in healthy adults is about 100 million bacteria. The incubation period is about 1.5 to 5 days. It kills people by giving them such copious diarrhoea, that they dehydrate.

The modern treatment for cholera led to the first generation of sports drinks.
    Cholera—Natural History
    Cholera is the illness caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae. It is usually spread by drinking water contaminated with thisbacterium. The infective dose in healthy adults is about 100 million bacteria, with an incubation period of about 1.5 to 5 days. It kills people by giving them such copious diarrhoea that they become severely