504 ^ HcBmatozoon in Human Blood. [part hi. 



the blood has not, however, been recognized, either in man or in animals, their 

 sojourn in such channels must at all events be of very short duration. 



But that a condition should exist in which human blood should be infested by 

 living active worms in either an embryo or mature state, to the extent hereafter to 

 be described, had, I presume, scarcely been surmised — a condition in which they 

 are persistently so ubiquitous as to be obtained day after day in numbers, by 

 simply pricking any portion of the body, even to the tips of the fingers and toes 

 of both hands and both feet of one and the same person, with a finely pointed 

 needle. On one occasion six excellent specimens were obtained in a single drop of 

 blood by merely pricking the lobule of the ear. 



Towards the beginning of July 1872, whilst examining the blood of a native 

 suffering from diarrhoea, a patient at the Medical College Hospital under Dr. 

 Chuckerbutty's care, I observed nine minute Nematoid worms in a state of great 

 activity on a single slide. On drawing the attention of my colleague. Dr. Douglas 

 Cunningham, to the preparation, he fully coincided in my opinion that they were 

 precisely the same kind as those observed by me more than two years previously 

 (in March 1870), as being constantly present in Chylous urine. 



In a report on the microscopic characters of choleraic dejecta published at the 

 time, both separately and also in the form of an Appendix to the Sixth Report 

 of the Sanitary Commissioner with the Grovernment of India, I had occasion to 

 allude to this condition of the urine in connection with some cells observed 

 in it, which closely corresponded in appearance with cells constantly present in 

 choleraic discharges, and the opportunity was taken of drawing attention to the 

 Entozoon, which was at the same time figured and described. [See Plate XI L] 



For the sake of convenience it may be well to refer to this case again. The 

 patient was a deaf and emaciated East Indian, about twenty-five years of age, under 

 the care of Mr. R. T. Lyons, at the General Hospital, and was kept under 

 observation for a period of two months, during which time his urine continued to 

 present a white, milky appearance, and yellowish- white coagula rapidly formed in 

 the vessel into which it had been voided. When a small portion of the gelatinised 

 substance was teased with needles on a slide, and placed under the microscope, 

 delicate filaments were seen, partly hidden by the fibro-albuminous matter in which 

 they were embedded, and which I at first considered to be scattered filaments of 

 a growing fungus. After being watched for some time, however, they were seen 

 to coil and uncoil themselves, so that all doubt as to their nature was at an end. 

 I had opportunities of showing them on various occasions to several persons, and 

 having perfectly satisfied myself that their occurrence was not accidental (the fact 

 of the patient not being a female diminished the risk of fallacy on this point in 

 no small degree), nor yet the result of subsequent development in the urine, after 

 the manner of the anguillulae which are so well known to develop in vinegar or 



