DISTOMA HEPATICUM. 263 







size given only agrees with a young D. hepaticum, but still 

 better with a D. lanceolatum. But whatever it may be, this 

 Distomum could only have reached the venaportce, after it had been 

 injured by cutting, from a gall-duct which must also have been 

 injured. The mode of life of our Distomum could not allow of 

 its dwelling in the blood, and Duval might have found a correction 

 of his error at page 7 of Mehlis. 



Since this I find no further proof of the occurrence of this 

 worm in the human liver, and even in Rokitansky's rich expe- 

 rience, which is also made use of by Wedl, there is no other 

 example. 1 



I have omitted Bucholz's case, as, from the figures given by 

 Bremser, it belongs to D. lanceolatum. Bucholz found his 

 Distoma in the body of a prisoner who died of putrid fever. 

 During a visit of the Grand Duke of Weimar, Bremser asked for 

 a pair of these Distoma, which were preserved in the Museum at 

 Jena, and from the figures given by him they are specimens of 

 D. lanceolatum. To ascertain whether, besides these Distoma, 

 D. hepaticum was also present in the liver of this prisoner, I 

 applied to Professor Oscar Schmidt with the request that lie 

 would go through Bucholz's Distoma again, and inform me 

 whether the bottle in question contained only D. lanceolatum, 

 or whether D. hepaticum was also present. My letter did not 

 reach Schmidt, who was already gone to his new destination. 

 Any results which may be obtained by fresh inquiries in Jena 

 will be found in the Appendix. 



Whoever is acquainted with the devastations which this 

 Distomum is capable of producing in the livers of our herbivorous 

 domestic animals, will rejoice, with Bremser and Wedl, that these 

 animals occur so rarely in the human subject. However, it 

 is certainly necessary for the complete understanding of the 

 malady produced by Distoma, that we should give close attention 

 to the changes which these parasites cause in the livers of our 

 domestic animals when inhabited by them, as indeed has already 

 been done by Mehlis and Bremser. In the course of the last 

 winter I have been able to obtain a very abundant harvest of 

 Distoma, as these parasites have been extremely plentiful during 

 the last moist years, and especially in the autumn and winter of 



1 Rokitansky's last edition was not in my possession when I wrote this. Any correc- 

 tions that may be necessary will be found at the end of the book. [See Appendix B for 

 further information on this subject. TRANS.] 



