338 Transactions of the Society. 



ulcers. It serins, moreover highly probable that he caught .1 

 glimpse of infusoria and possibly of bacteria, for he assures us thai 

 all decomposing material swarms with similar worms. Further, he 

 gives us perhaps the first hint of tissue structure. "The heart, 

 kidneys, testicles, liver, lungs, and other parenchymatous organs," 

 he says, "you will find to be full of little structures (organula) 

 and they are like sieves by means of which nature arranges the 

 various substances according to the shape of the holes. Passage is 

 thus given only to atoms of a certain shape."* 



With all these observations to his credit, and considering the 

 very early date at which they were made, it seems but right that 

 the name of Pierre Borel should be rescued from the oblivion in 

 which it has long lain, overshadowed by his great successors of 

 the classical period. Cesi and P>orel may indeed be regarded as 

 the founders of microscopical observation. 



We may conclude our sketch of the pioneer microscopists with 

 a consideration of the work of the German Jesuit, Athanasius 

 Kircher (1601-1680), who by long domicile in Eome came deeply 

 under the influence of Italian science. 



Kircher was a very voluminous and wordy writer, the succes- 

 sive appearance of whose numerous works was awaited by the 

 learned and curious with an eagerness that it is now difficult to 

 understand. In most of his works he is quite uncritical and 

 lacking in judgment, though he displays some originality, combined 

 with a remarkable power of absorbing both information and 

 misinformation. In his book on the Plague, however, published 

 in 1658,f he shows genuine insight, and gains a clear though 

 distorted view of organisms of minute size acting as the vehicles 

 of contagion. Being himself a practical microscopist, Kircher was 

 aware of some of the difficulties and possibilities of the method. 

 Thus, although his work is characterized by total disregard of 

 "control" observations, and is undeniably marred by his mediaeval 

 credulity, he yet shows a first-hand acquaintance with minute 

 life, which proves that he had himself endeavoured to explore the 

 microscopic world and had perhaps seen infusoria. He develops 

 a view of infection depending on the supposed observation of 

 organisms in the blood of plague patients. These minute " worms " 

 in the blood of the plague-stricken were, however, not bacteria but 

 more probably rouleaux of red cells. Kircher's observations or 

 " experiments," as he calls them, were undertaken with a view 



* " Observationum Microscopicarum Centuria," The Hague, 1656, Obs. 76. 



t " Scrutinium Physico-Medicum contagiosa? Luis, quae Pestis dicitur, quo 

 origo, causae, signa, prognostica Pestis, nee non involentes malignantis Naturae 

 effectus, qui statis temporibus, cselestium influxuum, virtute et efficacea, turn in 

 elementis ; turn in epidemiis hominum animantiumque morbis elucescunt, una 

 cum appropriatis remediorum Antidotis nova doctrina in lucem eruunter," Rome, 

 1658. Dedicated to Pope Alexander VII. 



