THE ADRENALS AND BUCHNER'S ALEXINS. 625 



chemotactic influence, a reaction in each soldier cell; the sec- 

 ond line of free, mobile, phagocytic leucocytes in the plasma 

 bathing the first line of defense, ever ready to pounce upon any 

 single enemy who may have escaped the attacks of the first 

 line; the vascular endothelial walls, built of phagocytic cells; 

 the slowly moving, searching leucocytes in the plasma itself, 

 able to send one or more pseudopodia through their stationary 

 fixed kindred of the capillary walls, then pass into the neigh- 

 boring lymph-spaces themselves, to reinforce, if need be, the 

 connective-tissue phagocytic cells and surround the threaten- 

 ing germ; and finally the great cremator and eliminator, i.e., 

 the liver, constantly supplied with a quantity of oxidizing sub- 

 stance which no other organ, except the lungs, can approach 

 all constitute a system of defense wonderful in the extreme. 



BUCHNER'S BACTERICIDAL ALEXINS. 



What phagocytosis really means is but meagerly depicted 

 in this brief summary of its role, and yet it is undoubtedly 

 supplemented with functions calculated not only to afford even 

 greater protection against disease to the cellular structures of 

 which the various organs are built, but also to facilitate and 

 insure the proper execution of all functions, organo-vital and 

 protective. Indeed, the higher in the evolutive scale a living 

 structure has reached, the greater seem the precautions taken 

 by Nature to preserve its integrity. 



A seemingly strong argument against phagocytosis as the 

 only source of physiological immunity soon appeared after 

 Metchnikoff's earlier labors became known: i.e., the fact that 

 various body-fluids the plasma, exudates, etc. were quite 

 able to destroy bacteria without the presence of leucocytes. 

 Thus, Pfeiffer, 16 having injected contaminated bouillon into 

 the peritoneal cavity of guinea-pigs, found, after withdrawing 

 some at intervals of ten, twenty, and thirty minutes after the 

 injection, in the peritoneal fluids of these animals, motionless 

 granules representing as many degenerated and dead bacteria. 

 The peritoneal cavity containing but a minimum proportion 

 of leucocytes, he failed to admit that this evident destruction 



"Pfeiffer: Zeitschrift fur Hygiene und Infectionsk., vol. xvi, p. 287, 1895. 



