INTRODUCTORY j 



Trachoma. Inclusions resembling those that occur in the cells 

 of cancers were described in the cells of the mucosa of the eyelids in 

 cases of trachoma or ' granular lids ' by N. C. Ridley in 1894. l These 

 bodies have been rediscovered and described by Halberstaedter and 

 von Prowazek. 2 The latter succeeded in inoculating one eye of an 

 orang-outang, and the animal's other eye became aut(>irfoculated. 

 Prowazek regards certain red-staining granules as the infective bodies. 



Syphilis. This infective fever, ' diluted by time ' with its heredi- 

 tary transmission, is one of the most tragic phenomena of human 

 existence. It may, of course, be a pure coincidence that Schaudinn 

 discovered mobile spiral bodies that he regarded as protozoa ten years 

 after I had described as protozoa certain hyaline and cell-Jike bodies 

 in syphilitic tissues. It may also be a coincidence that twelve years 

 after I had found that inoculation of the rabbit's cornea with matter 

 from a primary syphilitic sore was followed by the appearance of 

 hyaline bodies comparable to the Cytoryctes variola, the cornea and 

 other parts of the rabbit's eye should be found to be suitable 

 media for the study of the pathological processes of syphilis, 

 including the appearance of the spiral bodies (Spiroch&ta or Spironema 

 luis). Some consideration of these questions and of work relating 

 to them will be found in the following pages. It required much 

 time before it was realized that syphilis formed one of the group 

 of the exanthemata or infective fevers in which skin eruptions are 

 marked symptoms. Another aspect of syphilis is, to my mind, 

 equally striking ; I mean the formation of syphilitic lesions that 

 closely simulate tumours, whether of epithelial or of connective- 

 tissue type. This aspect of the pathology of syphilis also will be 

 dwelt on in the following pages. 



Cancer. At present a general impression appears to prevail 

 that the parasitic view of cancer has been definitely relinquished. 

 Recourse to works of reference 3 on infectious diseases shows that 



1 N. C. Ridley, Transactions of Ophthalmological Society, vol. xiv. 



2 Halberstaedter and von Prowazek, Arch. aus. d. K. Gesund., vol. xxvi., part, i., 

 1907. 



3 Such as the ' Jahresbericht liber . . . Pathogenen Mikro-organismen' of 

 von Baumgarten and Tangl. 



