INFLUENZA. 567 



may there not similarly exist in the blood a principle to 

 render inert the virns of influenza 1 



It is beyond dispute that tuberculosis has been produced 

 time and again by inoculation ; yet how often has inocula- 

 tion in this case been followed by negative results ! and the 

 same may be said of almost every other contagious disease. 

 As to the fact mentioned by Williams that transfusion of 

 blood from a diseased to a healthy animal failed to produce 

 influenza, I must confess m)^ inability to understand what 

 such an experiment proves, and have no great hesitation in 

 asserting that it proves absolutely nothing. In support of 

 my assertion I will cite the following experiment performed 

 by M. Paul Bert, a well-known French scientist. He caused 

 the entire blood of a dog in a state of furious rabies to be 

 transfused into a healthy animal, and found that the latter, 

 kept under observation for a year, manifested no symptoms 

 of the disease. And as to the spontaneous appearance of 

 influenza in localities where contagion was out of the ques- 

 tion, I would merely state that such reasoning appears to 

 me to be the veriest sophistry, for it is well known that 

 glanders in the horse and rabies in the dog sometimes occur 

 spontaneously also, and that in localities where contagion 

 is out of the question, yet no one doubts the existence of a 

 contagious principle in either of these diseases. I think 

 that I have conclusively shown, and that you will agree 

 with me, that the occasional spontaneous occurrence of 

 influenza is not to be taken as a proof that the disease is 

 of a non-contagious character. 



William Gibson, after describing the disease as it came 

 under his observation, continues : ' This disease, though no 

 ways mortal, yet was so very catching that when any horse 

 was seized with it, I observed those that stood on each hand 

 of him were generally infected as soon as he began to run 

 at the nose, in the same manner as small-pox communicates 



