CHAPTER XXXVIII. 



PLASMODIUM MALARI^E (MALARIAL PARASITES ; 

 LAVERANIA) AMCEBA COLI (AMCEBA DYSEN- 

 TERIC OF COUNCILMAN AND LAFLEUR ; DYSEN- 

 TERIC AMCEBA). 



MANY attempts have been made from time to time 

 to discover a specific organism in malaria. As early as 

 1846, according to Marchiafava and Bignami, an Ital- 

 ian observer (Risori) suggested the possible parasitic 

 nature of the disease. In 1880, Laveran announced the 

 discovery of certain parasitic bodies in the blood of 

 patients with malarial fever. He recognized that they 

 were parasites, and raised the question whether they 

 were amoebae. Subsequently, influenced no doubt by 

 the presence of the motile filaments, he suggested the 

 term osdllaria malarice. Marchiafava and Celli de- 

 scribed with great accuracy the intracorpuscular amoe- 

 boid form, to which they gave the name plasmodium. 

 The most important additional fact was added by Golgi, 

 who pointed out the association of the paroxysm with 

 the segmentation of a group of the malarial organisms. 

 Laveran' s work and the differentiation by the Italian 

 observers of varieties of the parasite in different clinical 

 forms of the disease have since received full confirma- 

 tion, and the testimony is now unanimous in France, 

 England, India, America, Italy, and Germany that 

 these bodies are always present in the malarial fevers. 



