ANTHRAX. 267 



injected quickly succumbs to the disease, its blood 

 also being invaded by the parasite. 



The view that the infectious properties of an- 

 thrax blood depend upon the presence of this 

 parasite was strongly contested, and since Da- 

 vaine's first experimental inoculations, a host of 

 investigators have entered the field. The question 

 is admitted by all to be of the greatest importance, 

 and has been most thoroughly investigated by the 

 experimental method, every point made by those 

 in favor of the parasite-germ theory having been 

 stoutly contested by conservative opponents. The 

 literature of the subject, although so recent, is 

 very voluminous ; and the fact that the anthrax 

 bacillus is the essential infectious element in an- 

 thrax blood, and that the disease anthrax is due to 

 the multiplication of this parasite in the body of 

 an infected animal, has been established in the 

 face of the most exacting scientific criticism. 



Klebs first showed that .anthrax blood loses its 

 infectious properties after filtration, while the fil- 

 trate is virulent ; but as other solid elements 

 (fibrine and globules) were retained as well as the 

 bacilli, this was not accepted as proof that the 

 latter were the essential infectious particles. 



This proof has been furnished by inoculation 

 experiments with pure-cultures of the anthrax 

 bacillus, which have now been made by numerous 

 experimenters in various parts of the world. By 

 successive cultures, in which a small amount of 

 material is used to inoculate a considerable quan- 



