PART I.] Untrustworthy Nature of Experiments on Delicate Animals. 167 



de M. Thiersch a Munich ont prouve que de petits morceaux de papier imbibes dans 

 les selles des choleriques etaient capables de produire les formes du choldra." We 

 ourselves attempted carrying out a series of observations on such animals, but found 

 the results so hopelessly contradictory that we determined on resorting tb others of 

 more robust constitution, even though in many ways they might not be so manage- 

 able.* 



We have already recorded a considerable number of such experiments, and trust 

 that the evidence deducible from them and those now about to be referred to will be 

 deemed sufficient to settle at all events some of the points so strongly debated 

 at present in connection with the causation of disease. 



We have in this, as in the former series of observations, selected the pariah dog 

 as the most suitable and readily attainable animal, and need scarcely add that the 

 precautions then taken not to inflict unnecessary pain have been strictly adhered to ; 

 anaesthetics being administered whenever any experiment which could prove painful 

 had to be undertaken, and the animals kept under their influence as long as the 

 experiments lasted. Such of the animals as it was deemed necessary to destroy were 

 invariably placed under the influence of chloroform and not permitted to awaken, so 

 that they certainly met with their death in a less painful manner than would other- 

 wise have been their fate ; for, sooner or later, they would have fallen into the hands 

 of the men employed in diminishing the number of the dogs prowling about 

 the streets. 



Having on a former occasion given somewhat fully the details of numerous experi- 

 ments, we do not deem it necessary again to repeat in detail for each case the 

 various steps which were taken, but shall describe the experiments in as concise 

 a manner as possible, as the copious notes which have been accumulated, although of 

 value to ourselves in forming an opinion as to the lesson which each observation 

 conveys, would only be tedious to the reader, and unnecessarily add to the length of 

 our report. 



In our summaries of each group of experiments we shall include the data already 

 published, and thus epitomise the results of all the experiments bearing on this 

 subject which we have conducted — results based on careful and more or less prolonged 

 observations of the effects produced by septic agents on some two hundred animals, 

 forming, if we be not mistaken, a more extended series than any yet recorded, and 

 certainly one conducted upon a greater number of animals likely to yield more 

 trustworthy data. 



* That it is not without some show of reason that we place but little confidence in the results of experiments 

 with such delicate animals is evident from the following remarks by Professor Parkes, in his Report on Hygiene 

 for 1873, which has reached us since this paper was in the press. Dr. Parkes states, in reference to the very 

 experiments cited at the Vienna Conference, that Professor H. Ranke of Munich had found that filtering paper 

 unsoiled with the discharges produced injurious effects on mice.— Army Medical Report, Vol. XIV, 1874, 

 page 253. 



