400 Chapter XII 



cussion, however, loses much of its importance in view of the results 

 obtained with potassium arsenite. 



According to Samoi'loff 1 , soluble salts of silver in the animal 

 organism undergo a fate similar to that of Hornemann's soluble iron 

 salt and are absorbed by the phagocytic elements. It must be noted, 

 further, that according to the experiments of Arnozan and Montel 2 , 

 the leucocytes absorb such drugs as calomel and salicylate of soda. 



These observations all clearly show that the phagocytes must not 

 be looked upon as cells capable of seizing merely the dead bodies of 

 micro-organisms and of animal cells, always fearing and avoiding 

 poisons and only able to come forward when protected by some other 

 antitoxic function. The phagocytes no doubt often exhibit a negative 

 susceptibility for many poisons, when these are introduced into the 

 animal organism in too large a quantity. But these cells are most 

 resistant to toxic substances and protect the higher elements from 

 the poison. Under these conditions, it is quite natural to assign to 

 the phagocytes the r&le of the fighting agents of the animal organism 

 against poisons and we may even enquire whether these elements do 

 not produce the antitoxins. It has been pointed out that it is very 

 difficult to attribute this function to the cells susceptible to the toxic 

 action, the spermatozoa in the production of antispermotoxin, the 

 red blood corpuscles in the development of antihaemotoxin, or the 

 nerve cells in the production of tetanus antitoxin. Moreover since, 

 according to Ehrlich's theory, it is only the haptophore group which 

 excites the formation of antitoxins on the part of the elements which 

 possess the corresponding receptors, it is quite possible that the 

 phagocytes, thanks to the facility with which they absorb the poisons, 

 occupy an important place as producers of antitoxins. I have already 

 [421] formulated this hypothesis, and several investigators, amongst whom 

 may be cited Gautier 3 and Courmont 4 , have received it favourably, 

 though in the imperfect state of our knowledge, it cannot, as yet, 

 be fully demonstrated. It might perhaps be objected against this 

 hypothesis that in many instances, after the injection of micro- 

 organisms living or dead, in spite of a vigorous leucocytic reaction 

 the organism of the animal does not produce any antitoxin. In such 



1 Arb. d. pharmak. Instit. z. Dorpat, 1893, Bd. ix, S. 27. 



2 Communication to the XHIth Intern. Congress of Medicine in Paris, 1900. 



3 " Les toxines microbieniies et animales," Paris, 1896. 



4 In Bouchard's Traite de Pathologie generate, Paris, 1900, t. in, 2 me partie, 

 article " Inflammation." 



