THE SPLENIC FEVER. 131 



As far back as 1849, Mr. L E. Plasse, a veterinary surgeon at Niort, Deux Sevres, 

 in France, published a work, illustrated by tables and a map, in which he announced the 

 discovery of the causes of epizootics and epidemics, with the distinguishing features of two 

 forms of charbon or anthrax, the one gangrenous and the other virulent.* It is a common 

 error, due mainly to the undetermined meaning of a much-used medical term, to regard 

 epidemics and epizootics as typhoid fevers. Thus confounding many maladies, M. Plasse, 

 in vainglorious terms which characterize his whole volume of near 500 pages, says: 

 &quot; J ai reconnu que les ficvres typhoides, qui, chez les animaux, sont semblables d celles de 

 I homme, dependent toujours d une seule et meme cause : des champignons microscopiques 

 introduits dans I cconorme animate par les aliments; et je demontrerai clairement que 

 toutes les causes qui ont etc indiquees ne sont qu indirectes et detcrminantes ; quelles sont 

 le resultat de I erreur ; et que la veritable cause est une et invariable.&quot; M. Plasse was by 

 no means the first to point to the lower forms of vegetable life as causes of disease in men 

 and animals ; but it would be an unprofitable task to enlarge on the earlier hints in this 

 great field of error and of mystery. Plasse has the credit of first publishing a comprehen 

 sive volume on the subject; and in his succinct expose of the work before us an expose 

 which he read before the Institute of France on the 9th of October, 1848 he says : 



&quot; I have had to substitute the general denomination of cryptogamy for the various expressions applied to the 

 diseases called typhoid, aud I have recognized four states of the cryptogamic maladies. 



&quot;First state, cryptogamio incubation. The toxic principle here may sojourn in the animal economy during a greater 

 or less length of time without causing marked functional disturbance ; the disease will nevertheless be recognized by 

 certain general symptoms. 



&quot; Second state, cryptogamic elimination. This is the discharge of the poisonous principle from the animal economy, 

 without apparent functional trouble, whether by the excretions, the embryo in abortion, or the sucking animal. 



&quot; Third state, external cryptogam;/. The morbid principle is eliminated without apparent disturbance, aud is fixed 

 in a more or less apparent manner on the surface of the skin, or in certain cavities which have external openings. In 

 this category are included glanders, farcy, scrofula, lupus, canker of horses feet, (crapaadiite,) elephantiasis, tinea, 

 lepra, &c. 



&quot;Fourth state, cryptogamic fever. Here the toxic principle is precipitated in the incubative stage, cither in tho 

 liquids or in the solids, in the interior, and in a manner whereby it determines a more or less intense and very various 

 reaction, according to the kind of fungus aud the system which is aft ected ; thence tho different forms of typhoid 

 fevers, such as epizootic aphthie, grippe, tho contagious typhus of cattle, suette miliairc, gangrenous pleuropneumonia, 

 variola, scarlatina, &c.&quot; 



M. Plasse heralded forth his great discoveries in terms of no doubtful meaning : 

 &quot; G est &amp;lt;1 la medicine veterinaire quil ctait reserve d arriver d ces grandes decouvertes.&quot; 

 It might be thought that he had arrived at this result after long and painful researches on 

 cryptogamic botany, and in demonstrating the presence of the lower forms of plants in 

 the tissues of such animals, or in the food which communicated disease. Suffice it to say 

 that M. Plasse s observations referred rather to the character of seasons and localities 

 remarkable for the development of cryptogamic vegetation, and supposed to induce 

 epidemics and epizootics. He has recorded some observations on intestinal disturbance, 

 induced by grasses and grains attacked by fungi which he does not name ; but, apart from 

 these imperfect records, his entire work is based on the crudest hypotheses. 



It is not my object here to give a history of the cryptogamic theories in relation to 

 the origin of disease, nor to review the able work of Charles Robin on the parasitic plants 

 living on man and animals, nor to analyze the observations of Swayne, Brittain, Budd, 

 Baly, Bull, Griffith, Bennett, Robertson, Graves, Swain, Salisbury, Hallier, Richardson, 



* Dfeouverte des causes des Epizootics et des fipiddmies; Causes et distinction de deux genres de Charbon, &c. 

 Par L. E. Plasse. Poitiers, 1849. 



