^0 JOURNAL OF THE [April, 



experiments to obtain vaccines, or attenuated virus for protec- 

 tive inoculations, have been very successful, especially when the 

 difficulties of producing an attenuated virus are considered. 



The process for obtaining the protective virus for rabies may 

 be mentioned. He inoculates a morsel of the brain of a mad 

 dog into the brain of a rabbit, which attenuates the virus suffi- 

 ciently to act as a protective inoculation for dogs, or men bitten 

 by dogs, suffering from rabies. At first the attenuated virus 

 from the rabbit was also passed through the organism of the 

 monkey before using. This feature has been discontinued. 

 This was the first successful step towards checking rabies. 

 Pasteur has a large institute in Paris for the treatment of rabies, 

 •and there is now in this city a branch institute under the charge 

 of Dr. Paul Gibier, where about i6o persons have been success- 

 fully treated the past year. 



Considering for a moment the higher orders of plant life, the 

 microscope has shown conclusively that the functions of the 

 fungi which we see upon them is to undo the structure which has 

 been built up by the higher plants, returning the elements compos- 

 ing them to the air and soil. This is of itself a work of great 

 economic value, and must be more generally understood to save 

 our building timber and forests from the natural process of decay. 



The rapid advancement of bacteriology in the last decade is 

 largely due to the arduous labors of Koch, who, by extensive 

 microscopical investigations, discovered the specific bacillus of 

 several diseases, particularly of Asiatic cholera and tuberculosis. 

 He originated a method of staining a specific bacillus so as to 

 differentiate it irom all others in enclosed tissue or other media, 

 and found them when others not using as skilful methods failed. 

 He originated a system of solid nutritive media for cultivating 

 and isolating a specific bacillus, producing pure cultures. 'I his 

 has proven of the greatest value, for much has been learned as to 

 the manner of growth and products secreted of each bacillus 

 studied. With the pure cultures he carried out extensive inocu- 

 lations on animals, and carefully noted the effects. The latter 

 have been analyzed, resulting in his extensive experiments with 

 his so-called lymph to check the bacillus of tuberculosis in the 

 human system. It is this feature of Koch's great work which has 

 made his name a household word to-day in all civilized countries. 



