36 



and Waldeyer followed with similar discoveries. The 

 work of Klebson " Gunshot Wounds" (1872) opened the 

 new epoch in pathological investigation. The examina- 

 tion of numerous gunshot wounds, both before and after 

 death, showed that the organs and tissues exhibiting 

 morbid changes due to such wounds were populated by 

 bacteria ; serous surfaces, both those opened by the 

 bullet and those which, though still intact, lay adjacent 

 to an abscess or to the track of the missile ; the walls 

 of blood-vessels, not only those which had been the seat 

 of secondary hemorrhage, but also those which, while 

 not ruptured, showed beginning thrombus formation ; 

 metastatic abscesses in liver and lung ; leucocytes in 

 and near the track of the bullet all contained colonies 

 of bacteria. A series of experiments upon animals 

 showed that while the injection of putrid liquids, con- 

 taining naturally myriads of bacteria, was followed by 

 continuous fever and metastatic abscesses i.e., pyae- 

 mia the injection of the same liquids after filtering 

 through clay and thus deprived of solid particles, in- 

 cluding the organisms, was followed by fever just as in- 

 tense, though transient, but never by metastatic ab- 

 scesses i.e., septicaemia. 



The work of Klebs, which proved that, there must be 

 some intimate relation between the pathological processes 

 and the bacteria, was soon followed by a series of accu- 

 rate experimental observations by Samuel, from which he 

 concluded that the varying effects of putrid fluids upon 

 the living animal were due to various substances therein 

 contained ; that the specific septic (toxic) influence is the 

 effect of certain volatile matters, probably combinations 

 of sulphur and of ammonia ; to the bacteria he ascribed 

 the influence whereby the infection is localized progress- 

 ively in various organs remote from the original wound. 



Billroth concluded, as the result of much careful 

 clinical and experimental observation, that the presence 

 of bacteria was the result and not the cause of certain 

 changes in secretions and tissues. He assumed the for- 

 mation, during inflammation and putrefaction, of a 



