384 TIMOTHY RICHARDS LEWIS. 



Before such views can serve as the basis of anything like 

 rational treatment it must be shown : — (1) either that these or- 

 ganisms, as ordinarily met with, are injurious when introduced 

 into the animal economy ; or, (2) that the forms found in disease 

 are in some respects morphologically different from those known 

 to be innocuous — such a difference, at least, as Virchow suggests, 

 as exists between hemlock and parsley.^ 



With regard to the first point, it has been shown over and 

 over again that all the representatives of the group of fission- 

 fungi can be introduced into the system with the greatest im- 

 punity. Not only is their complete innocuousness practically put 

 to the test by every individual at every meal, but observations 

 have been pubhshed which have conclusively demonstrated that 

 they may be introduced directly into the blood by injection into 

 the veins, or indirectly, through the lymphatics in the subcu- 

 taneous tissue, without the slightest evil consequences. These 

 facts are so well known and generally accepted that it is not 

 necessary to refer to special observations. 



With regard to the second question, however, diametrically 

 opposite opinions are held — all the advocates of the germ theory, 

 with very few exceptions, maintaining that the particularorganism, 

 in the particular disease in which they are specially interested, 

 is wholly distinct from all others ; that is, if the organism 

 happens to be anything more definite than a granule or molecule. 

 The diseases which have been specially cited in the previous pages 

 as being associated with microphytes may be divided, roughly, 

 into two classes according to the form of the attendant microphyte 

 — the septinous group, consisting of malignant pustule, septi- 

 caemia, and the mahgnant erysipelas or '^ typhoid " of the pig, on 

 the one hand, and a low form of fever commonly known as Typhus 

 recurrent, Bilious remittent, &c., on the other. 



With reference to the organisms which have been found as- 

 sociated with the first-named group, taking Malignant Pustule 

 as the type, it is to be observed that M. Robin^ in 1865 pro- 

 nounced the bacteridia of Davaine to be identical with Leptoihrix 

 buccalis ; and the well-known botanist Hoffmann has stated his 

 opinion that they do not differ from like bodies which appear in 

 milk and in meat solutions. ^ Ferdinand Cohn,^ again, in his 

 observations as to the growth of bodies of the same character in 

 hay solutions, declares that the bacilli in the latter are identical 

 in form and size with those found in splenic disease, and that the 



* ' Die Fortschritte der Kreigsheilkunde, besonders im Gebiete der la- 

 fectionskraukheiten,' 1874, p. 34. 



2 ' Traite du Microscope,' 1871, p. 926. 

 ^ Bircli-Hirschfeld, loo. cit., p. 20(5. 



* Coba's 'Beitriige,' Baud ii, Hel'L. 3, 1877. 



