On certain Organisms isolated from Cancer, fyc. 431 



" A Preliminary Note upon certain Organisms isolated from 

 Cancer, and their Pathogenic Effects upon Animals." -By 

 H. G-. PLIMMER, M.E.C.S., F.L.S., Pathologist, and Lecturer on 

 Pathology and Bacteriology, St. Mary's Hospital, London. 

 Communicated by Professor J. KOSE BRADFORD, F.E.S. Ee- 

 ceived February 22, Eead March 9, 1899. 



(The following specimens were exhibited at the reading of the paper : 



1. Sections of the cancer from which the cultures were made. 



2. The cultures on various media. . 



3. Preparations of the cultures. 



4. Sections of the organs of the animals in which tumours have been produced. 



5. Animals, or portions of them, in which tumours have been produced.) 



During the past six years I have been studying the cell-inclusions 

 found in cancer, and their relation both to the origin and course of 

 the disease; and for this work I have had to examine 1278 cancers 

 taken from various organs and parts, and of all possible varieties. Out 

 of this large number of cases there have been a few nine in all in 

 which the cell-inclusions have been extremely numerous ; so that at 

 the growing edge, and even far into the tumour, scarcely a cell could 

 be found without an inclusion, sometimes with as many as thirty-six 

 even of these inclusions in one cell ; and these bodies have been similar 

 to those which Metschnikoff, Euffer, and others, as well as myself, 

 have regarded and described as parasites, standing in causal relation- 

 ship to the disease. In two out of the nine cases mentioned, these 

 bodies have been present in enormous numbers ; and I have succeeded 

 in isolating from the last of these remarkable cases, an organism, 

 which is pathogenic, in a peculiar manner, to certain animals, and 

 whose virulence I have been able to keep unimpaired for some 

 months. 



Previous Work on the Experimental Production of Tumours in Animals. 



The only work, I think, that needs mention here in connection with 

 this heading is that of Sanfelice, in Cagliari, and of Eoncali, in Eome. 

 Sanfelice has produced tumours in animals with organisms which he 

 isolated from infusions of various fruits ; and they both have isolated 

 organisms from cancers, which, I believe, from their descriptions I 

 have not seen their cultures are morphologically somewhat similar to 

 those I am about to bring before you. But Sanfelice's organism 

 appears to have been very difficult to isolate in a virulent form from 

 human cancer, and to keep virulent ; so that in his last paper,* he 



* ' Zeitschrif t fur Hygiene,' 1899. 



