LIFE-HISTORY 137 



but one pip in each quarter. Then the skin of the 

 orange will represent what is left of the red blood- 

 corpuscle, the flesh will represent the divided sporo- 

 cyte, each quarter will represent a spore, and the 

 pip will represent its nucleus. 



At this stage the skin to which the red corpuscle 

 has been reduced breaks, and the spores fall into the 

 liquid part of the blood (Fig. i, 9). The pigment 

 granules which escape at the same time also pass into 

 the liquid of the blood, and are eaten up and removed 

 by those scavengers of the vascular system, the white 

 corpuscles. Each of the spores, after remaining a short 

 time in the fluid of the blood, attaches itself to a new 

 red corpuscle, penetrates its body, and becomes a 

 small amcebula, which repeats the life -history de- 

 scribed above. In this way a few organisms will 

 soon produce enough spores to infect a very large 

 number of blood-corpuscles ; as many as 60 per cent, 

 are in some cases infected. The severity of the attack 

 naturally depends in a great degree on the number of 

 corpuscles infected. Laveran not only first recognized 

 and described the organism* we are dealing with, but 

 he definitely connected its presence with malaria ; but 

 it was not until some time later, in 1885, that Golgi 

 described the sporulation of the sporocyte and pointed 

 out that the moment of the escape of the spores from 

 the red corpuscle coincides with the paroxysm of the 

 fever. Since all the amcebulae of one crop are at about 

 the same stage of growth in any one host, millions of 

 spores in a well-infected patient are thrown into the 

 liquid of the blood at about the same time ; and it is 

 clear that this must be accompanied by a profound 

 disturbance of the system. This disturbance mani- 

 fests itself in a feverish attack. The period when the 

 spores have left the corpuscles and are free in the 



* It had been seen before by Virchow and others, who, 

 however, did not recognize its importance. 



