730 
One rabbit (No. 1919) and one monkey (No. 1917), which had received 1.5 
cubic centimeters of the bouillon culture obtained from the stomach, died. 
Monkey No. 1917 was found dead March 29. The post-mortem examination 
revealed nothing characteristic; smears from the organs showed a very small 
diplococeus, absolutely unlike the Okata-Kokubo coccus both in morphology and 
in cultural properties. 
Rabbit No. 1919 was found dead on March 30. The autopsy showed a 
peritonitis with blood-tinged fluid in the abdominal cavity; the liver contained 
numerous microbie foci. The cultures inoculated from the organs developed a 
large, spore-forming bacillus, staining by Gram’s method. 
SPECIAL PATHOLOGY. 
Baelz, Scheube, N. Miura, Yamagiwa, and Pekelharing and Winkler 
have particularly advanced our knowledge of the special pathology of 
beriberi. 
Pekelharing and Winkler,” after giving due credit to Baelz and Scheube for 
having first shown that the principal seat of the disease in beriberi is the 
peripheral nervous system, point out that the changes in the nerves are not of 
the nature of an inflammatory, but of a degenerative, process. Their conclusions 
read as follows: 
“Anatomical examination is in perfect accord with the inference drawn from 
clinical observation, that beriberi is a multiple neuritis. An extreme and very 
extensive affection of the peripheral nerves predominates, and as one approaches 
the central nervous system, the pathological evidence of nerve change diminishes. 
The anterior roots of the spinal nerves are always healthy; but in the posterior 
roots one sometimes meets with a slight atrophy of the fibers, which is always 
infinitely less on the proximal side of the intervertebral ganglion than on the 
distal prolongation of the nerve. In the spinal cord some variations of secondary 
importance are met with in the large nerve cells of the anterior cornua, but 
more constant still is a slight loss of fibers in the extension of the posterior 
roots in the two radicular zones, unaccompanied by any swelling of the axis 
eylinder, granular degeneration of cells, or multiplication of nuclei. We consider 
that we have established the claim that beriberi should be ranked among the dis- 
eases that are described under the name of multiple peripheral neuritis. However 
highly we esteem the work done by Baelz and Scheube, we consider that 
the proof has only now been given by us, inasmuch as we have clearly demon- 
strated that the nerves are attacked in the very first phase of the disease, and 
our anatomical observation has undoubtedly confirmed this affection of the 
nerves in a very great number of cases, In every beriberi patient some symptoms 
of degeneration, as well as of regeneration, in the peripheral nerves can often 
be found.” 
Pekelharing and Winkler also demonstrated that beriberi is not a form of 
pernicious anemia, as had previously been claimed. They made a number of 
systematic blood examinations and proved that neither an oligocythemia nor an 
oligochromemia of a marked degree was present. A number of other authors 
(among them Wright) have later confirmed the results of their investigations 
in this respect. Wright estimated the haemoglobin and made blood counts in 26 
cases of beriberi. A moderate anemia was found in several cases. The number 
of red-blood corpuscles varied from 4,600,000 to 6,120,000, and the leucocytes 
from 6,720 to 7,600. 
* Pekelharing and Winkler: Beriberi, English edition (1893), London. 
