126 TOXINES AND ANTITOXINES. 



BOTULISM TOXINE. 



A third true toxine is the active principle in many cases of 

 flesh poisoning. 



Considerable light was thrown upon the fairly obscure etiology 

 of botulism by the discovery of VAN ERMENGEM,* who isolated 

 from a poisonous ham a saprophytic bacillus, B. botulinus, which 

 even then he concluded to be the producer of a specific, extremely 

 active toxine. According to KEMPNER, it can also be detected in 

 the faeces of swine, and ScHNEiDEMUHL 2 regards it as the cause 

 of the so-called birth-paralysis of cattle. Although substances 

 had already been isolated at an earlier period, and asserted to be 

 the active agents in the poisoning e.g., that isolated by v. ANREP S 

 from sturgeon's flesh yet botulism toxine was the first that was 

 proved to be the specific poison of flesh poisoning, and a true 

 toxine. 



VAN ERMENGEM isolated it by filtration of cultivations of his 

 Bacillus botulinns. It is extremely poisonous, the lethal dose 

 for man being as little as 0-035 mgm. This in itself points to 

 its being a true toxine. A further proof is the specific nature of 

 its action, the symptoms of illness produced corresponding 

 exactly with those of botulism. 



It produces the same symptoms in the eyes, aphonia, constipa- 

 tion, and retention of urine. Fever does not occur. Finally, 

 symptoms resembling those of bulbar paralysis are manifested, 

 and end in death. 



Its action does not begin until after a certain period of 

 incubation. 



According to FoRSSMAN, 4 the mode of introduction has an 

 influence upon the results. Thus, intercerebral injection did not 

 produce the same characteristic form or intensity of illness as 

 followed subcutaneous injection ; there was a greater difference 

 with intraperitoneal, and the greatest with intrapulmonary in- 

 jection. Violent dyspnoea is then the predominating symptom 

 of the poisoning. Moreover, after interpleural injection the 

 toxine is five to nine times as poisonous, although the period of 

 incubation after a single lethal dose is longer. On the other 



1 Van Ermengem, " Ueber einen neuen anaeroben Bacillus u. s. Bezieh. 

 zum Botulismus," Zeit. f. Hyg., xxvi., 1, 1897. 



2 Schneidemiihl, " Ueb. Botulismus beim Menschen und die sog. Geburts- 

 paralyse bei Rindern," Centralbl.f. Bakt., xxiv., 619, 1898. 



3 v. Anrep, "Intoxication par les ptomaines," Arch. Slaves de Biol., i., 

 341, 1886, quoted by v. Ermengem, loc. cit. 



4 Forssman, "Beitr. z. Kenntn. d. Bakt. d. Botulismus," Author's 

 abstract in Centralbl.f. Bakt., xxix., 541, 1901. 



