532 EXPERIMENTAL RESEARCHES WITH CHICKEN-CHOLERA MICROBES, 



Five tame rabbits, in one box, were fed on infected food, and 6 hours 

 later three fresh ones (not contaminated) were introduced into the same 

 box. Apart from the five former, one of the three latter succumbed to 

 "chicken-cholera." * 



In another experiment, four tame rabbits received microbe-contaminated 

 food, and 7 hours later when all the food had disappeared since several 

 hours, four new rabbits were penned up in the same box with the four first 

 ones. The carcasses of these four infected rabbits, which died within 23 

 hours, were left in the box. All the four additional rabbits were dead from 

 "chicken-cholera" within six days from the beginning of the experiment.t 



An experiment on a large scalej made by Loir, at Pasteur's instigation, 

 on Mme. Pommery's Estate, at Reims, on the rabbits in an enclosure of 

 eight hectares (about twenty acres), resulted in killing off the whole 

 number of rabbits there, which were estimated at more than a thousand. 

 According to the evidence given before the Rabbit Commission in Sydney 

 by Pasteur's representatives^ it was considered as probable that the mor- 

 tality among those rabbits was partly due to the transmission of the 

 "chicken-cholera" virus from rabbit to rabbit. In my opinion, this whole- 

 sale mortality can satisfactorily be explained without taking to "con- 

 tagion." 



Lastly, I adduce the experiment of demonstration performed by Pasteur's 

 delegates at Rodd Island (Sydney). Five wild rabbits, fed in one cage on 

 cabbage-leaves sprinkled with 5 com. of a virulent broth-culture, were soon 

 afterwards placed among twenty fresh rabbits (also wild) in a four-sided 

 wooden enclosure of only one square metre area (about 3' 3j" square), in a 

 stable-stall. The observation extended to a period of ten days. Within 

 this period eleven rabbits in all died, among these, three (specially marked/ 

 of the Jive which had been given infected food, while one of the latter 

 survived. The fate of the ffth of the originally infected rabbits could not 

 be ascertained, because, inadvertently, it had not been marked . Accordingly, 

 either seven or eight of the twenty uninfected rabbits died. All the dead 

 rabbits were left in the enclosure until the demonstration was concluded, 

 with the exception of three not marked ones which were removed during the 

 experiment for examination (among these, one infected one might or might 

 not have been, to judge from what has been stated above). In consequence 

 of this examination, the diagnosis "chicken-cholera" could be given in each 

 case. In order to fully decide whether the other unmarked rabbits (five) 

 also perished of "chicken-cholera" or not, a post-morttm examination 

 ■would have been necessary ; this, however, was not made. 



* loc. cit., pp. 4, 5. 



t loc. cit., p. 5. 

 X loc. cit., pp. 7, 8. 



I 



