We may call the substance injected the antigen and the result- 27 3 

 ing antagonistic substance the antibody. ... If the bacterial 

 body used as antigen first be digested . . . the antigenic 

 properties are lost. 



How by avoidance of digestion to retain a maximum of 

 antigenic properties while reducing to a minimum the toxic 

 properties of his vaccines had long been his goal. Wherefore 

 he had shifted from use of the older heat-killed varieties to 

 his newer, made by treatment with formaldehyde, hydrogen 

 peroxide, nitrous acid, and like substances. Thus he "detoxi- 

 cated" his "antigens" even as he made them stronger in the 

 business of producing immunity. The result was that he could 

 inject greater quantities to get, in consequence, greater anti- 

 toxic reaction by the patient or animal treated. The injectable 

 dose in the instance of tularense infection was by this method 

 pushed to eight times the old level by his coworker Foshay; 

 Rockwell did the same with streptococci; and O'Neil, with 

 some half dozen strains of undulant fever. Rabbits, goats and 

 horses were thus not only more quickly and more effectively 

 immunized, but made into the taps for antitoxic serums of 

 higher curative value in specific diseases than ever before 

 known. As will appear, two great ends had been accomplished 

 — better vaccines for the better production of "active" im- 

 munity; and better sources of antitoxine for immediate sal- 

 vation through "passive" immunity. 



Together with these stellar performances of fact, Wherry 

 asked questions. He had always been at what was behind the 

 eternal fight of one life against another. Himself, he held to 

 the view "that in response to the entrance of a foreign protein, 

 the animal body elaborates a specific ferment, capable of 

 digesting it." The ferment was universally present — in the 

 blood, in the tissues themselves. "When the protein enters a 

 second time, this specific ferment attacks it with avidity and 

 during the process of digestion toxic substances are produced, 

 and if enough protein is present, enough toxic substance may 

 be liberated to injure the animal." The injury might be general 

 and the animal die of general anaphylactic shock; or more 

 local, in which case more spotty evidences of anaphylaxis 

 appeared — the patient instead of dying got hives, or hay fever, 



