446 M. ARMAND RUFFEE. 



In a series of experiments Wyssokowitch injected into the 

 veins of animals — Ist^ simple saprophj'tes ; 2ndj bacilli patho- 

 genic for certain animals, but harmless for the animals used ; 

 3rd, pathogenic micro-organisms ; 4th, micro-organisms which 

 become pathogenic only when injected in large quantities. 

 Examining the blood of animals by cultivating it on gelatine 

 plates, he found that non-pathogenic micro-organisms disap- 

 peared with the greatest rapidity, so that the blood contained 

 none after three hours. The micro-organisms belonging to 

 the second class disappeared more slowly, i. e. in twenty-four 

 hours; whilst pathogenic micro-organisms, e, g. anthrax, di- 

 minish in number at first, so that none could be found after 

 four hours, but then multiplied rapidly, so that the blood 

 twenty-four hours after inoculation contained an incredible 

 number. The bacilli of anthrax pass into the urine only a 

 few hours before death when the urine contains blood ; other 

 micro-organisms do not pass in the urine unless some lesion of 

 the kidney is present. 



Non-pathogenic micro-organisms which form spores dis- 

 appear from the blood with exceeding slowness. Thus the 

 spores of the Bacillus subtilis, when the latter micro- 

 organism is injected into the blood, are met with in the liver 

 and spleen two or three months after the injection, even 

 when the animals have remained in perfect health. 



Wyssokowitch has found the micro-organisms of suppura- 

 tion (Staphylococcus aureus and S. albus) in the cells 

 of the milk of women suffering from puerperal fever. Ac- 

 cording to Malvoz,^ the passing of bacilli from the maternal 

 to the foetal placenta only takes place when slight vascular 

 ruptures are present. 



Clinical facts also show that repeated examinations of the 

 blood in the large majority of infective diseases does not reveal 

 the presence of micro-organisms in that fluid. In typhoid 

 fever, for instance, the bacilli are never met with in the blood. 

 (For an excellent resume of this question see J. Gasser, 'Arch. 



1 Malvoz, 'Annales de I'lnstitut Pasteur,' 1888, p. 121. 



