TRICHINOSIS 733 



remained a short time in a weak solution of salt. Smoking the meat 

 only kills those trichinae that are near the surface. The so-called quick 

 smoking, where the ham is painted with pyroligneous, acetic acid, or 

 creasote, and left in the smoke only a short time, or not at all, affords 

 the least protection. Poisoning by raw hams, chitterlings, brain pud- 

 ding, chopped sausage, and other slightly-smoked varieties of sausage, 

 is often seen. The fact that smoked trichinous flesh is repeatedly 

 eaten without injury, is partly because it has been carefully pickled 

 for a long time before smoking, and partly because the meat in ques- 

 tion had been kept for a long time, and completely dried, which also 

 kills the trichinae. Very few cases of encapsulated trichinae, and not 

 a single one of acute trichina poisoning, have been observed in southern 

 Germany ; this is because the people there dislike raw flesh, even when 

 pickled and smoked. 



Since all persons who eat living trichinae are not equally affected, 

 and as the severity of the disease is not by any means always in pro- 

 portion to the number of trichinae probably introduced into the stom- 

 ach, we may speak of a greater or less predisposition to trichinosis. 

 But the causes on which this predisposition depends are not yet 

 known. We can only assert that it is connected with the condition 

 of the gastric and intestinal mucous membrane, or with the character 

 of the contents of the stomach and intestines, and that, after the use 

 of trichinous meat, severe diarrhoea, by which the still undigested por- 

 tions of flesh, with the trichinae contained in them, are evacuated, is 

 to be regarded as favorable. Children have a certain immunity to 

 trichinosis; at least children recover from trichina poisoning, from 

 which they certainly are not exempt, more readily than adults, per- 

 haps because they do not digest a part of the meat. 



ANATOMICAL APPEARANCE. On autopsy of the lower animals that 

 have been poisoned with trichinae, if they have died or been killed dur- 

 ing the first weeks, besides the numerous intestinal trichinae and young 

 ones that have already entered the muscles, we find in many cases the 

 remains of enteritis and peritonitis. On the other hand, on autopsy of 

 human beings who have died in the first week or two after accidental 

 poisoning by trichinae, we never find exudation in the intestine or peri- 

 tonaeum, but only the signs of a more or less intense intestinal catarrh, 

 and often a decided swelling of the mesenteric glands. This is doubt- 

 less because, on intentionally poisoning, a much larger number of 

 trichinae is given them than is swallowed by a person accidentally so 

 poisoned, consequently a much larger number of the trichinae pass 

 through the intestinal walls, and the lesion caused by them is far 

 more intense. After the fifth week, distinct signs of interstitial and 

 parenchymatous inflammation appear in the muscles as fine, grayish- 



