LOUIS PASTEUR 487 



13. One more great task remained. The disease Hydro- 

 called rabies or hydrophobia, communicated by the bite p ' 

 of a dog, had resisted all attempts at treatment. It not 

 only caused perhaps the most frightful death known to 

 medical science, but was the source of terrible anxiety. 

 After being bitten, an individual did not know for many 

 months whether he would get the disease, so slow was 

 its development. The cause, now understood to be a 

 minute protozoan, was not known in Pasteur's time. 

 Pasteur saw, however, that the problem was analogous 

 to that of the other germ-produced diseases, and won- 

 dered whether a vaccination method could succeed. 

 Obviously, one could not vaccinate the whole popula- 

 tion, of whom only a minute fraction would be likely 

 to be bitten by a rabid dog. It was possible, by using 

 rabbits, to prepare attenuated virus and thus carry out 

 the plan of vaccination. Why not vaccinate after the 

 bite, and get ahead of the slowly developing virus, 

 which gradually made its way to the central nervous 

 system ? This might succeed, if too much time had not 

 elapsed and the bite was not too near the brain. The 

 method was worked out successfully with animals, but 

 Pasteur dreaded applying it to a human being, not 

 knowing whether the reactions would be the same. In 

 July, 1885, there came to the laboratory a little Al- Joseph 

 satian boy, Joseph Meister, accompanied by his mother. 

 The child had been bitten in fourteen places by a mad 

 dog, and could not be expected to escape the disease. 

 Friends, knowing of Pasteur's experiments, had advised 

 Mme. Meister to appeal to him. He did not know 

 what to say, but after a consultation with his colleagues, 

 resolved to attempt the new treatment. The inocula- 

 tions, by means of a hollow needle, were at first very 

 mild, but increased in virulence as time went by. Pas- 



