291 



in Hygiene, i.e. the local Medical Officer of Healthy 

 conies on the scene, and the result of his scientific in- 

 vestigation is that he testifies at the inquest that,, 

 while the soup when freshly made was perfectly 

 wholesome, the presence of a defectively trapped 

 drain in the kitchen had resulted in such contamina- 

 tion of it while standing in the copper, that, although 

 tasting and smelling perfectly sweet, it yet contained 

 multitudes of airborne septic bacilli, which had 

 resulted in this lamentable epidemic of " ptomaine 

 poisoning."* 



From the previously given description of the 

 pathology of the disease, and from the above range of 

 actual cases, exemplifying as they do both the various 

 channels of infection and the differing degrees of 

 individual results, we see the futility of expecting 

 what I have been asked for more than once — a 

 "simple ciue" for Septicseuiia. Such a cure would 

 mean something which would not only directly kill 

 the entire number of bacilli which in countless 

 myriads are permeating the blood and tissues of the 

 bird, but would also necessarily have the power 

 of simultaneously so combining with the chemical 

 poisons generated by these bacilli, as to form an inert 

 and harmless substance in such a solution that it 

 might be excreted by the kidney and other organs, 

 without detriment to them. But when we come to^ 

 the consideration of the various chemical substances 

 with the power of destroying even the))acilli — for that 

 they have any neutralizing influence on the poisons 

 thrown out l>y the bacilli is very doubtful — we shall 

 soon see that a " cure," sufficiently strong or sufficiently 

 large to effect its object in the body of one bird by per- 

 meating the whole of its blood and tissues, would be 



* Ptomaines are the toxins thrown out by .septic bacilli. 

 They are very like some of the known alkaloids derived from, 

 the higher vegetables. 



