LIFE OF ELIE METCHNIKOFF 155 



As he failed to solve the problem of the specificity 

 of the cholera vibrio on animals, he resolved to experi- 

 ment upon himself and consumed a culture of cholera 

 vibriones. He did not contract cholera, which made 

 him doubt the specificity of the vibrio, and therefore 

 he consented to repeat the experiment on one of his 

 workers (M. Latapie) who offered to submit to it : 

 the result was the same. He then did not hesitate 

 to accept the offer of a second volunteer (M. Jupille). 

 The preceding results having led him to suppose that 

 the cholera vibrio became attenuated in vitro and 

 might perhaps serve as a vaccine against cholera, he 

 gave a culture of long standing to the young volunteer. 



To his astonishment and despair, Jupille began 

 to manifest the typical symptoms of cholera, and a 

 doctor who was particularly conversant with the 

 clinical chart of the disease declared the case a 

 severe one because of the nervous symptoms which 

 accompanied it. 



Metchnikoff was in mortal anxiety, and even said 

 to himself that he could not survive a fatal issue. 

 Fortunately the patient recovered, and this terrifying 

 experiment proved indisputably the specificity of the 

 cholera vibrio. Yet the irregularity of its action 

 showed that in certain cases conditions existed which 

 prevented the inception of the disease, and Metchni- 

 koff supposed that this might be due to the action of 

 the different intestinal micro-organisms. 



In order to simplify the question, he began by 

 making experiments outside the organism. He sowed 

 the cholera vibrio with divers other microbes and 

 saw that some of them facilitated its culture whilst 

 others prevented it. Similar experiments within the 

 organism of animals gave no conclusive results ; the 



