214 PARASITES OF MAN 



and supplied with good and wholesome nourishing food. The 

 patient had already, for a long period, treated himself with 

 steel wine, yet was continually getting worse and worse. He 

 had not taken the pulp of the fig. As I was unaware he had 

 suddenly become so ill, they hastily despatched a message to 

 the town. There was no good to be expected from the further 

 employment of iron, and the patient was in such a condition that 

 from the very first I despaired of his recovery. I immediately 

 prescribed the pulp of the Gammeleira (Ficus dolicvria), but 

 it could not be easily obtained. Considering that the Gamme- 

 leira would have a drastic effect, I therefore prescribed two 

 grammes of elaterium, to be divided into eight doses, of which 

 he should take one every three hours." Dissatisfied with this 

 advice, however, Dr Wucherer goes on to say that on reaching 

 home he carefully looked up the literature of the subject. " In 

 a ' Geologico- Medical Report ' by Professor Hirch, recorded in 

 the ninety-sixth volume of ' Schmidt's Jahrbucher/ I found 

 how Griesinger had recognised the Anchylostoma as the cause 

 of the Egyptian chlorosis, which was clearly identical with our 

 hypoamia. He had employed this commended anthelmintic. I 

 resolved the more to prescribe the pulp of the Gammeleira 

 when I found it described as a worm-expelling remedy in 

 Martin's ' Systema Materiaa Vegetabilis Braziliensis/ The next 

 morning, however, when I arrived at the monastery I learnt 

 that my patient died about two hours after a slight evacuation. 

 Only after much resistance would they permit the sectio cada- 

 veris. I merely opened the abdomen, and was surprised to find 

 everything as Griesinger had described. During the next 

 season, through the courtesy of my colleagues attached to the 

 General Infirmary at Bahia, especially of Drs Silva Lima, 

 Faria, and Caldos, I was enabled to open more than twenty 

 bodies of anaemically deceased individuals. All were selected 

 as miserably poor in condition, but only five were bodies of 

 persons in whom hypoaemia was diagnosed, and in these there 

 were a great number of Anchylostomes in the small intestine. 

 The intestines of the other bodies contained either none, one, or a 

 few." Dr Wucherer next states that he compared the characters 

 presented by his entozoa with those given by Dubini, Diesing, 

 and Yon Siebold, and found a perfect agreement throughout. 

 He sent several examples to Griesinger, who also established 

 their identity, and communicated the results of his investiga- 

 tions accordingly (' Archiv fur Heilkunde/ 1866, s. 387. 



