224 BIOLOGICAL PROBLEMS 



cessful in irrigation treatment, chiefly, as some advo- 

 cates contend, because it dissolves sloughs. Of course 

 for the simple question of wound treatment an enzy- 

 matic reaction possesses marked advantages over a 

 simple linear chemical one, such as the action of Eusol, 

 but the interest here lies in the apparent power of 

 Eusol also to attack toxic proteins, since Dean, in 

 Manchester, has shown that it reduces very markedly 

 the toxicity of vaccines of the Shiga dysentery bacillus. 

 What is more surprising is that animals inoculated 

 with these de-toxicated vaccines are immunized in 

 just the same way as by the unaltered toxin. Now 

 if this be the case with Eusol, how much more is it 

 likely to be true of tryptic enzymes with their vastly 

 greater proteolytic and toxolytic activity. 1 



I would suggest that to this phenomenon of tryptic 

 toxolysis we may look for very great future extensions 

 of the scope of active immunization against bacterial 

 infections. 



Again, Lorrain Smith, Ritchie and Rettie, of Edin- 

 burgh, have found that intravenous injections of Eusol 

 are of great value in combating septicaemic and tox- 

 semic conditions, and they have widely urged their 

 employment. This seems to be merely another aspect 

 of the same toxolytic effect, and, as before, one feels 

 inclined to point to the superior powers of the proteo- 

 lytic enzymes and .plead for their trial in the same 

 manner. Indeed, taken in conjunction with Abder- 

 halden's discovery of a proteolytic enzyme in red 

 blood corpuscles, as well as the evidence brought 

 forward by Achalme, P. L. Marie, and others, of the 



undiluted Eusol. As with other antiseptics, however, the apparent resistance 

 of the organism used for experiment depends strictly upon the numbers intro- 

 duced, a fact generally overlooked. 



1 Those desirous of further information are referred to a paper by Donaldson 

 in the Jour. Path, and B act., Vol. XXII, No. 2, 1918. 



