EXTENSION OF THE GERM THEORY 399 



matter of fact, she did die on the eighteenth of July at 

 nine in the morning: as may be seen, after a very long 

 illness, for the first observations were made over a month 

 before: the illness was also very painful, for the patient 

 could make no movement without intense suffering. 



An autopsy was made on the nineteenth at ten in the 

 morning, and was of great interest There was purulent 

 pleurisy with a considerable pocket of pus, and purulent 

 false membranes on the walls of the pleura. The liver 

 was bleached, fatty, but of firm consistency, and with no 

 apparent metastatic abscesses. The uterus, of small size, 

 appeared healthy; but on the external surface whitish 

 nodules filled with pus were found. There was nothing 

 in the peritoneum, which was not inflamed; but there 

 was much pus in the shoulder joints and the symphysis 

 pubis. 



The pus from the abscesses, upon cultivation, gave the 

 long chains of granules not only that of the pleura, but 

 that from the shoulders and a lymphatic of the uterus as 

 well. An interesting thing, but easily understood, was 

 that the blood from a vein in the arm and taken three- 

 quarters of an hour after death was entirely sterile. Noth- 

 ing grew from the Fallopian tubes nor the broad ligaments. 



Interpretation of the disease and of the death. The pus 

 found in the uterus after confinement became infected with 

 germs of microscopic organisms which grew there, then 

 passed into the uterine lymphatics, and from there went 

 on to produce pus in the pleura and in the articulations. 



Seventh observation. On June eighteenth, M. Dole"ris 

 informed me that a woman had been confined at the Cochin 

 Hospital five days before and that fears were entertained 

 as to the results of an operation that had been performed, 

 it having been necessary to do an embryotomy. The lochia 

 were sowed on the i8th; there was not the slightest trace 

 of growth the next day nor the day after. Without the 

 least knowledge of this woman since the eighteenth, on the 

 twentieth I ventured to assert that she would get well. I 

 gent to inquire about her. This is the text of the report: 

 " The woman is doing extremely well; she goes out to- 

 morrow. 



