188 ANIMAL PAEASITES. 



more regular and more careful in the choice and preparation of 

 food, and perhaps even still more that these cystic worms decrease 

 in a district in the same degree as the number of free dogs 

 becomes less, which they may, in consequence of dog-taxes, &c. 



2. Direct therapeutics. If the embryos be once introduced 

 and developed, our art possesses no remedy, except the puncture 

 and complete removal of the cystic worm itself, for, as we shall 

 see in the Echinococci, it is by no means impossible that injured 

 cystic worms may again recover themselves. Vesicles, at which 

 we cannot get with the trocar, remain inaccessible to treatment. 

 Whatever number of cysts there may be, the same number of 

 punctures must be made in the different places where they are 

 situated, if a cure be desired. Next to puncture with the 

 trocar, the galvanic acupuncture might be worth a trial. 



There is no doubt that the Cysticercus tenuicollis sometimes 

 decays spontaneously, and that in this case an alleviation of 

 any symptoms may take place by the simultaneous diminution 

 of the swelling caused by absorption. In the pig, at the bottom 

 of those cysts which contained dead Cysticerci, I have repeatedly 

 found the latter more or less covered with a calcareous crust, 

 with their walls collapsed, their caudal vesicle empty and con- 

 tracted, the rest of the cyst filled with a chalky, fatty mass, 

 containing cholesterine, the walls of the enveloping cyst shrivelled, 

 and, when the cyst is situated in the liver, its walls thickened. 

 There is no doubt that the therapeutist must constantly endeavour 

 to discover how Nature conducts this process, which brings 

 about the death of the Cysticerci. Inflammations of the en- 

 veloping cysts usually appear to cause the death of the worm, 

 and the question arises, whether, besides puncture, we can by 

 any other means induce inflammation of the enveloping cyst, arid 

 by this the death of the worm. At present, we are acquainted 

 with no such therapeutical agent. See also Graefe's observa- 

 tions on Cysticercus celluloses. 



Literature. ' Bonetus Sepulchr./ 1. c. Kolpin and Block, in 

 ' Biblioth. nova/ pp. 393 and 394. Treutlin, ' Observ. pathol. 

 anat./ pp. 14 16, tab. iii, figs. 1 4. Jorden's ' Helminthol./ 

 p. 56, tab. v, figs. 8 11. Gmelin, ' Syst. Nat./ p. 3059, No. 5. 

 'Zeder Naturgesch./ p. 458, No. 11.' Wepfer in < Biblioth./ 

 No. 390. Leuckart, ' Die Blasenbandwiirmer und ihre En- 

 twicklung/ Giessen, 1856, p. 4, et seq. (Historical). Principal 

 work, * Undersogelder over den i Island endemiske Hydatide. 



