62 PROTOZOA AND DISEASE 



vaccinated cornea. Up to that time syphilis had not been success- 

 fully transmitted to any animal, but this did not exclude the 

 possibility that some of the stages of the parasite's life might be 

 traced in the rabbit's cells. The result I described in 1895. 1 



In Fig. 19 I reproduce the illustration that accompanied this 

 description. Of these bodies I then wrote that I had not been able 

 to trace such a series of forms as would justify a positive opinion as 

 to their nature, but that their similarity to Guarnieri's bodies was 

 suggestive, adding ' though as yet (1895) no animal has been found 

 which reacts to the virus of syphilis exactly like the human subject ; 

 yet it is probable, if sporozoa are present in this disease, that they 

 may be found to live for a time, and even multiply, in some of the 

 lower animals.' 



My observations regarding the results of inoculating the rabbit's 

 cornea with syphilis were confirmed by E. Pfeiffer, 2 who found 

 hyaline bodies both in the cells of the cornea and in the subepithe- 

 lial tissue. Since that time our knowledge of the reaction of 

 animals to syphilis has been greatly augmented, starting from 

 Metchnikoff and Roux's discovery that the chimpanzees and other 

 anthropoid apes are susceptible to syphilis. Since this was estab- 

 lished, other apes, dogs, and, to a certain extent, rabbits, have been 

 found suitable media for the reproduction of the spironema, as will 

 be further noticed below. 



The primary sores that I examined in sections prepared in the 

 same way (fixation in Foa's solution, and acid hsematoxylin and 

 eosin staining) as the secondary lesion represented in Figs. 15 and 17 

 showed bodies that I believed to be of the same nature. The 

 sections having been destroyed, I have to trust to my memory, which 

 records them as distinctly smaller but otherwise similar i.e., hyaline 

 and nucleated bodies which differed in their high refractive power 

 and staining reactions from the leucocytes present in the same 

 sections. 



Siegel 3 has described small motile bodies provided with a 



1 Cent, fiir Bakt., March 15, 1895. 



- E. Pfeiffer, ibid., Abt. i, 1895. 



3 J. Siegel, Munch. Med. Woch., Nos. 28 and 29, 1905. 



