58o 



NATURE 



\_Ocl. 1 6, 1^79 



may have been the prototype of the Silurian Koions. What is 

 the orthography of Lydney ? S. P. O. 



October 5 



Do Bacteria or their Germs exist in the Organs of 

 Living Healthy Animals? 



In the August number of the Journal fiir praktische Chemie, 

 Messrs. Nencki and Giacosa as^ert that bacteria and their germs 

 exist in the organs of healthy living animals, in contradiction of 

 Messrs. Cliiene and Ewart, who took the negative side of this 

 question in the Journal oj Anatomy and Physiology iar April, 

 1 878. I give the chief parts and points of Nencki and Giacosa's 

 refutation. 



" Dr. Burdon Saunderson repeated Tiegel's experiments. 

 The organ just taken from a newly-killed animal was immediately 

 plunged into paraffin heated to 110°. As soon as the mass 

 cooled the surface was covered with Venetian turpentine, so as 

 to protect the specimen from infection from without by the 

 cracking of the paraffin. Burdon Saunderson announces that 

 when two days after, the organ at the bottom of the vessel was 

 taken out, it was in a clotted and rather cooked condition on the 

 outside in consequence of the heat. But the centre contained 

 numbers of bacteria in the various stages of their existence. . . . 

 The last-named authors (Chiene and Ewart) worked upon the 

 conclusion that in the time between extracting the organ and 

 plunging it into the paraffin, bacteria germs from the air fall 

 upon it, thus causing the subsequent decomposition. This was 

 to be guarded against by an antiseptic method. Their procedure, 

 therefore, was as follows : — Under a continuous spray of a 

 solution of carbolic acid, a newly killed rabbit's abdomen was 

 opened, and the liver, spleen, kidneys, and pancreas extracted. 

 The liver was cut into several pieces ; some pieces were wrapped 

 in gauze, soaked in a solution of carbolic acid. Others were 

 wrapped in unprepared gauze ; while others were put into jars 

 which were raised to a great heat, and then closed up 

 with wool, gauze, or glass covers. The same was done 

 with Hie other organs. After three days, the specimens were 

 examined, and no bacteria were found in those which had 

 been wrapped in antiseptic gauze. . . . Messrs. Chiene and 

 Ewart therefore conclude that if the organs are treated antisep- 

 tically after death, no bacteria or germs of them will be found ; 

 and that hence no germs of bacteria exist in the living, healthy 

 organs. . . ." Messrs. Nencki and Giacosa thus describe an 

 experiment which they made, in order to prove the contrary. 

 There was a vessel containing mercury ; a large glass test-tube, 

 filled with mercury, closed with a slip of glass, and inverted in 

 the vessel. The latter was then heated till the tube was one- 

 third filled with mercury vapour, which must have destroyed any 

 bacteria which could by any pos-ibility have remained in it. The 

 vessel was allowed to cool ; the quicksilver in the tube condensed 

 again; and when the mercury in the outer jar was at 120', it 

 was covered with a 5 per cent, solution of carbolic acid." Some 

 inlernal organ (liver, heart, kidneys, or spleen) was then taken 

 from a rabbit that had just been killed, and with a pair of 

 tweezers was brought under the mouth of the tube, up which it 

 ascended when let go. The apparatus was then kept at a tem- 

 perature of 40'' for several days. The results of all experiments 

 conducted in this way were favourable to the admission that 

 bacteria exist in the organs of living healthy animals. Already 

 in twenty-four hours all the organs, when examined, gave out an 

 intensely fonl odour, and showed countless split fungi in dif- 

 ferent forms. . . . The beginning of putrefaction is shown by 

 the pressing down of the mercury in the tube by the generation 

 of gases. . . . All the vessels and instruments we employed 

 were lifted out, immediately before use, from a carbolic acid 

 solution. . . . Why, then, did putrefaction not set in in Messrs. 

 Chiene and Ewart's experiments? That neither a spray of, nor 

 transient immersion in, carbolic acid will kill the germs in the 

 tissues, is proved by our experimen', in which the organ is 

 passed through the solution into the mercury and up the tube. 

 But it is a different thing when the organ is for a long time in 

 contact with material (the antiseptic gauze) previously soaked in 

 the solution of carbolic acid." This, Nencki and Giacosa prove 

 by experiment. And it seems to be natural that while a brief 

 iiumersion in the antiseptic solution must be amply sufficient to 

 destroy any bacteria which might have lodged upon the organ in 

 its transit through the atmosphere, prolonged contact with the 

 solution must cause the inmost parts of the specimen to be per- 

 meated by the destroying poison, thus rendering the results of 

 the subsequent examination null and void in their bearing on the 



question. In conclusion, Messrs. Nencki and Giacosa maintain 

 that pathologists must accept the fact that the germs of bacteria 

 exist in the organs of living healthy animals, and advise them to 

 consider this in their studies of infectious diseases, as the exist 

 ence of ordinary decomposition bacteria in the tissues indicate ~ 

 that it may be different forms of them which are the causes of 

 various contagious maladies. E. Burke, jun. 



Subject-Indexes to Transactions of Learned Bodies 



Mr. Garnett, in his paper printed in Nature, vol. xx. p. 

 554, proposes to make the Index to Scientific Periodicals bv 

 cutting up two copies of the Royal Society's Catalogue and using 

 this as the " copy " for the Index ; but the thought has struci: 

 me that if the "copy" of the Royal Society's Catalogue is still 

 in existence there is the material ready to hand for commencing 

 work at once. I believe the Index might be done this way 

 by any one who had access to the chief periodicals ; but the 

 title of a paper is often so very deceptive that without frequent 

 reference to the papers themselves I am afraid we should get 

 even worse mistakes than the one mentioned by Mr. Garnett. 

 Now that the last volume of the Catalogue is out it is sincerely 

 to be hoped that the Council of the Royal Society will take this 

 "Subject-Index" into consideration. Jas. B. B.mlev 



October 10 



Change of Colour in Frogs 



It is certainly a common opinion in this part of the country 

 that when frogs become of a bright yellow colour fine weather 

 may be expected. The brightness of colour can scarcely be du; 

 to the presence of sunlight, for frogs of a bright yellow may 

 frequently be found in cellars, wells, and other dark place.-. 

 Throughout the past summer and up to the present time, I have 

 noticed that the frogs in this neighbourhood have been of an 

 extraordinarily brilliant yellow tint. Again and again have I 

 heard the country people, working in the hay or corn fields, 

 under the unbroken canopy of cloud, remark — " We must be 

 going to have fine weather now, for look at the colour of the 

 frogs." These forecasts proved the reverse of successful. 



W. Clement Lev 



Ashby Parva, Lutterworth, October 10 



At the commencement of "the rains " (say, beginning (jf 

 June), in the island of Bombay, after the first showers, when a 

 little water lodges in the depressions of the old-quarry tanks, tl.e 

 frogs issue from the crevices of the trap-rock to spawn, whfn 

 the males (some of which are iS inches in length from tip of toe 

 to end of digit) assume a bright mustard-yellow colour, while tlie 

 females remain brown as usual ; and this change of colour takis 

 place so rapidly, and the frogs are so numerous, that, with the 

 falling of the showers, the bottom of the quarry becomes 

 suddenly yellow. I never saw a frog so coloured at any other 

 time, and I witnessed the fact above mentioned for at least t\. 

 successive seasons in the same old quarry. H. J. CARTER 



Devon, October 13 



Intellect in Brutes 



The case of the Norwegian dog, Nero, mentioned by Mr. 

 Horsfall in Nature, vol. xx. p. 505, is certainly an admirable 

 example of abstract reasoning. Here the dog thought as a ly 

 man would have thought how, where, and when to catch the 

 railway train suited to his purpose. It has reminded me that, 

 when I was in Malta a few years ago, a fine Newfoundland dog 

 (if I remember correctly) used to accompany Miss Hallett in her 

 ride from Sliema to Valetta on a visit to her grandfather in 

 Strada Forni. The ride is about four miles round the head of 

 the harbour. On one occasion she observed that the dog had 

 ceased to follow her, and concluded that, owing to the heat or 

 some other cause, i'. had returned home. Her surprise was con- 

 siderable on arriving in Strada Forni, for there .she found the 

 dog waiting for her at her grandfather's door. The explanation 

 is, as was subsequently discovered by a frequent repetition of 

 tlie same thoughtful dodge : the do^ had gone to the ferry, 

 waited there until passengers stepped into the boat, got in him- 

 self, was ferried across the harbour, and in this way was saved a 

 long and, it may be, a hot and a dusty run. So far as I can 

 remember, the animal had no previous experience of this short 



