VIRULENT DISEASES. 201 



blood of a body dead from splenic fever possesses imme- 

 diately after death a single contagium, that of splenic 

 fever, and that twenty-four hours after death, on the 

 contrary, there are two contagia, that of splenic fever 

 and that of septicaemia. 



Some months ago a very hot discussion arose be- 

 tween Pasteur and a commission formed principally of 

 professors of the veterinary school in Turin, regarding 

 the facts above mentioned. One experiment, in the 

 success of which Pasteur was extremely interested-, 

 had been made at this school. Instead of employing 

 pure splenic fever blood, free from all contagium, the 

 Italian professors, whether from ignorance of the pre- 

 ceding facts or from inadvertence, employed the blood 

 of a diseased sheep, which, from their own showing, 

 had been dead more than twenty-four hours. Pasteur 

 immediately wrote, pointing out that the commission 

 had done wrong in using blood which must have been 

 at the same time splenic and septic. The Turin pro- 

 fessors grew angry, and affirmed that this assertion of 

 Pasteur's was incorrect ; that this sheep's blood had 

 been studied with care, and that no filaments had been 

 found in it except those of splenic fever ; and it would, 

 moreover, be marvellous, they added ironically, that 

 Pasteur from the depths of his laboratory in Paris 

 should be able to assert that this blood was mixed with 

 septic poison, whilst they, good observers, armed with 



