EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCHES WITH THE MICROBES 

 OF CHICKEN-CHOLERA. 



By Dr. Oscar Katz. 



Introduction. 



It will be remembered that Pasteur recommended, as a means 

 for rabbit-extermination on a large scale, the disease commonly 

 known under the name of cliolera des poioles, chicken- or fowl- 

 cholera. The Royal Intercolonial Commission, appointed in April 

 last year by the Australasian Governments to inquire into, 

 and report upon, the schemes submitted for the extermination of 

 rabbits in Australasia — a prize of £25,000 being offered for a 

 successful remedy by the New South Wales Government — at once 

 took the necessary steps to make itself acquainted with Pasteur's 

 proposal. Being, however, dissatisfied with the information already 

 to hand about the merits of this particular disease, or rather the 

 microbes of this disease, as rabbit-exterminators, and considering 

 the results of the experiments performed in France by Pasteur or 

 under his direction, and of those by his delegates in Sydney, as 

 unsatisfactory, it decided to have experiments of its own carried 

 out. 



As chief expert officer to the Commission, I was entrusted with 

 this work. A laboratory — intended also for the investigation of 

 any other scheme that might be worthy of consideration — was built 

 on an hitherto unoccupied islet, called Rodd Island, in Iron Cove 

 (Leichhardt Bay), a western portion of Port Jackson. The little 

 island, of solid sandstone, and covered here and there with scrub, 

 was well adapted for the object in view. Its plateau was mostly 

 formed of loose sandy soil. The laboratory, a substantial building 

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