520 Chapter XVI 



continue my investigations. When I explained to him my view that 

 \ the inflammatory reaction on the part of the amoeboid cells could 

 ^ only be understood by accepting the hypothesis that the white 

 corpuscles gave chase to the micro-organisms and destroyed them, 

 Yirchow replied that in pathology just the opjjosite was invariably 

 taught The general opinion was that micro-organisms were certainly 

 found inside the leucocytes and that they made use of these cells as 

 a means of transport and of dissemination through the body. 



During my stay at Messina my researches were limited to the 

 lower animals, but later I began to study inflammation and the 

 phenomena of infection in the Vertebrata. It was not until eight 

 months after I had commenced my researches in this direction that I 

 decided to publish my results. I first set them forth in an address 

 given at Odessa before the Congress of Naturalists and Medical Men 

 in 1883. Later, they were published in a special article inserted in 

 Claus's Arheiten at Vienna^, and in a small work which appeared in 

 the BiologiscTies Centralhlatt^. I sought especially to develop the 

 idea that the intracellular digestion of unicellular organisms and of 

 many Invertebrata had been hereditarily transmitted to the higher 

 animals and retained in them by the amoeboid cells of mesodermic 

 origin. These cells, being capable of ingesting and digesting all 

 kinds of histological elements, may apply the same power to the 

 destruction of micro-organisms. In order to support this conclusion 

 I introduced various kinds of bacteria into the bodies of some of the 

 lower animals and I demonstrated that they were ingested and 

 destroyed by the amoeboid cells. It was evident, however, that this 

 proof was not sufficient. I then set myself to study the diseases of 

 small Invertebrata sufficiently transparent to be observed directly 

 under the microscope. The Daphniae, those small Crustacea so 

 numerous and so frequent in fresh water, furnished me with a favour- 

 [544] able medium in which to study a real struggle which takes place 

 between their leucocytes and the spores of a vegetable parasite 

 belonging to the group of the Blastomycetes. In many cases tlie 

 amoeboid cells guarantee the integrity of the animal by devouring a 

 large number of these spores and transforming them into an inert 

 detritus. In other cases, on the contrary, the fungi get the upper 

 hand in the struggle ; they succeed in germinating and in overcoming 

 the resistance of the leucocytes by reproducing themselves rapidly 



^ Arh. a. d. zool. Inst. d. Univ. Wien, 1883, Bd- v, S. 141. 

 2 Biol GentralU., Erlangen, 1883, Bd. m, S. 560. 



