THE ADRENAL SYSTEM AND ANTITOXIC SERUM. 637 



stituted a serum which confers upon the treated individual a 

 degree of immunity commensurate with the degree of the reac- 

 tion produced in the adrenals provided these organs are not 

 seriously involved in the tuberculous process. It is, therefore, 

 probable that Koch's tuberculin gives rise to a febrile reaction 

 when a tuberculous process is present, because it adds to the toxic 

 elements incident upon the disease a new source of adrenal over- 

 activity. 



THE ADRENAL SYSTEM AND ANTITOXIC SERUM. 



We have considered so far but two of the means afforded 

 by Nature to protect the body against infection. If, however, 

 the foregoing illustrations of the relationship between adre- 

 nal functions and immunizing processes are closely analyzed, 

 it soon becomes apparent that phagocytosis and Buchner's 

 alexins including those generated through the death of leu- 

 cocytes and other globulins, endothelial cells, etc. do not, as 

 already stated, fully satisfy the needs of the situation. That 

 these agencies are capable of destroying bacteria is undoubted. 

 Behring found that the sterilizing effects of sheep's serum, for 

 instance, were far greater than those of the stronger solutions 

 of bichloride of mercury and carbolic acid employed in surgery; 

 we have also seen that the strength of the serum, as shown by 

 Denys, increased with the proportion of leucocytes contained 

 therein. But how are bacterial toxins antagonized? 



Whether there exists in the body a physiological antitoxin 

 or antitoxic bodies capable of destroying bacterial toxins still 

 belongs to the domain of conjecture. The very need of 

 Ehrlich's ingenious side-chain theory points to this. In this 

 hypothetical conception each body-cell is even more complex 

 than we now deem it to be, and is supposed to be surrounded 

 by various groups or chains of atoms which Ehrlich terms 

 "toxophoric atoms"; these would possess a specific affinity for, 

 and would unite with, toxins. The reaction involved would 

 necessarily cause the production of bodies that would be use- 

 less to the cell and therefore be cast off. While the "toxophoric 

 atoms" would be replaced in the cell, the bodies cast off from 

 the latter would remain in the blood, and being still possessed 

 of considerable affinity for toxins, they would constitute in the 



