'328 Wisconsin State Hobticultural Society. 



bacteria, or from practicea wholly independent of all such 

 organisms. Though some evidence has been adduced in favor of 

 the first hypothesis, many new facts must be discovered before 

 the problem is solved." 



Dr. George M. Sternberg, surgeon of the United States army, 

 and member of the National Board, of Health, and translator of 

 Dr. Magnin's work on Bacteria, says : 



" There would be an end to all animal life, or rather there 

 would never have been a beginning, if living animals had no 

 greater resisting power to the attacks of these parasites, which by 

 numbers and. rapid development make up for their minute size, 

 than has dead animal matter. Nature has placed in the living 

 tissues of animals a resisting power against the encroachments of 

 bacterial organisms invading and surrounding them, which is 

 sufficient for ordinary emergencies. But when the vital resistance 

 of the tissues is reduced, on the one hand by wasting sickness, 

 profuse discharges, etc., or, on the other hand, the vital activity 

 of the invading parasitic organism is increased, the balance of 

 power rests with the infinitesimal but potent micrococcus. * * * 

 Experiment has demonstrated that, by some unknown mechan- 

 ism, the ordinary bacteria of putrefaction, and, under certain cir- 

 cumstances, even pathogenic organisms, may be introduced 

 directly into the circulation without the production of evil con- 

 sequences, and that after a short interval microscopical examina- 

 tion does not reveal their presence in the blood." 



Many more opinions of the same character, and even stronger, 

 could be given, but these will suffice to show that all scientific 

 men do not regard this as a settled question. There are also 

 other points which have a bearing on this subject, that may well 

 be mentioned here, viz.: that innoculation with a certain kind of 

 germ does not always produce the same disease. Where virus 

 containing Bacillus Anthrax has been used, the result in some 

 cases has been septicaemia instead of splenic fever, and in recent 

 experiments in the innoculation of rabbits with the microbe found 

 in the saliva of one who died of hydrophobia, part of the ani- 

 mals died of this disease, and part of purulent fever and septi- 

 caemia. An experiment of the same character in Berlin produced 



