212 THE AMERICAN MONTHLY [September, 



red corpuscles are developed. They are about one-third the diameter 

 of red corpuscles, the larger ones are distinctly discoid, they have noth- 

 ing w^hatever to do with fibrin formation, and may even be obtained 

 from blood which has coagulated. This author supposed that these 

 corpuscles were developed within some cell which ruptured and liber- 

 ated them. He examined an immense number of slides before finding 

 such a cell. He succeeded, however, and looks upon the latter as a 

 mother-cell for which he proposes the name of 7natricyte. As to the 

 period of rupture of these matricytes. Dr. Edington states that very few 

 albocytes are seen in the blood during a fast, but they are noticed very 

 soon after the ingestion of food. The albocytes, as their name indicates, 

 are colorless at first, and probably spherical, they then progressively in- 

 crease in size and, by the acquirement of haemoglobin, become mature 

 red corpuscles. 



Small Doses. — The Homoeopathic Physician quotes with glee the 

 following from Dr. Koch's address on " Bacteriology" at the Interna- 

 tional Medical Congress, in Berlin : '' Certain bodies, such as volatile 

 oils, and certain metallic salts, such as nitrate of silver, and prepara- 

 tions of gold, even in very small doses (i in t ,000,000, and even less), 

 destroy the tubercle bacilli in a very short time." 



Medical Alliance in "Washington. — The physicians of Washing- 

 ton are organizing a Medical Alliance, the principal object of the or- 

 ganization being to protect the profession against dead-beats — that is to 

 say, those who can pay the doctor, but will not. All schools of medi- 

 cine are included in the Alliance. Careful provision is made against 

 inflicting any hardship upon the worthy poor. 



Dr. G. M. Sternberg is one of the few savants who have set out to 

 discover the microbe of a given disease and did not find it. In 1879 he 

 began this investigation, and he still announces that the result of his 

 research is negative, and that he does not yet know what microbe pro- 

 duces yellow fever. It is a case of rare moral courage. 



The Pneumococcus. — From a very instructive paper by J. J. 

 Kinyoun, M. D., in the Journal American Medical Association 

 for August 9, 1890, we abstract the following facts concerning the 

 micro-organism of lobar pneuinonia. Studied experimentally, it grows 

 best upon agar gelatine and bouillon between 35° and 38° C, with the 

 peculiarity of ceasing to grow in about four days, and dying, if not 

 transplanted to fresh nutrient media within that time. The agent 

 which thus destroys it is its own ptomaine. In the culture of the pneu- 

 mococcus we simulate the conditions that are present in the buccal 

 cavity. There the ptomaine, as fast as formed, is removed, either by 

 absoption or by solution in. the saliva. At ordinary temperatures it 

 lives about three weeks. 



In the saliva are found several other bacteria which exert an influence 

 upon the growth of the pneumococcus. This can be shown experi- 

 mentally ; for, if they are planted together in nutrient media, these be- 

 ing kept at blood temperature and transplanted every day upon fresh 

 soil, within a few days the pneumococcus will generally have dis- 

 appeared. But when cultures of the pneumococcus, inoculated with 

 various other micro-organisms, were subjected to the. temperature of 

 freezing, the pneumococcus showed an enormously greater power of sur- 

 vival. 



