PART III. J Vegetable Organisms in '' Typhoid- Fever'' of the Pig. 581 



M. Pasteur, bearing in mind the difference between bacilli of charbon and their 

 " spores " as regards tenacity of life, determined to ascertain whether a similar condition 

 did not exist in septicaemia. Three animals which had died of charbon were examined 

 — a sheep, dead 6 hours ; a horse, dead 20 to 24 hours ; and a cow, dead over 48 

 hours. The blood of the sheep, which had only recently died, contained charbon- 

 bacteridia only; that of the horse bacteridia, together with ^' vibrions de putrefaction ;" 

 whereas that of the cow contained only " vibrions " of the kind last mentioned. 



Inoculations with the blood of all three animals were followed by death. The 

 autopsies (conducted immediately after death) of the guinea-pigs which had died after 

 inoculation with material from the two last-mentioned animals, revealed extensive 

 inflammation of the muscles of the abdomen and limbs, with accumulations of gas 

 here and there, the liver and lungs discoloured, the spleen normal in size, but often 

 diffluent; the blood of the heart not coagulated, although this characteristic was 

 more evident in the liver — quite as evident as in any case of charbon. Strange to 

 say, writes M. Pasteur, the inflamed muscles contained mobile " vibrions ; " these were 

 still more numerous in the serosity of the abdominal cavity, and some of them were 

 of great length.* A drop of this fluid would rapidly kill an inoculated animal, but 

 ten or twenty had no effect after it had been filtered. The " vibrions " are not 

 found in the blood till after or very shortly before death, and such blood is said to 

 manifest no virulent properties if taken direct from the heart without contamination 

 with the tissues outside it. 



The movements of these " vibrions " were stopped on subjecting them to the 

 action of compressed oxygen, but they were not killed, because on coming into 

 contact with the oxygen they were transformed into corpuscles-germes, the " spores " 

 of Dr. Koch. This, it may be remarked in passing, is a novel and rapid method of 

 producing reproductive elements in plants. 



Not only do these " vibrions " of septicaemia withstand the action of compressed 

 oxygen, or rather become transferred by its action from perishable filaments to 

 apparently imperishable corpuscles-germes, but they, like the " spores " in charbon, 

 also withstand the action of absolute alcohol. Hence, M. Pasteur infers that 

 septicaemia, as well as charbon, is caused by organisms-^the parasite of the former 

 being mobile, but that of the latter not. 



It will be more convenient to analyse these results hereafter. 



C— Vegetable Organisms in Pneumo-enteritis " Typhoid-fever "—of the Pig. 

 In February of the present year Dr. E. Klein, F.K.S., brought before the Koyal 

 Society a portion of the result of an experimental inquiry (which had been conducted 



* M. Pasteur, on noticing this condition, asks why it is that a circumstance so general in deaths of this 

 kind had hitherto esca{)ed notice ; and replies to the query, that it was doubtless owing to the attention of 

 previous observers having been devoted solely to the blood. It seems strange that M. Pasteur's specially 

 selected collaboi'atev/r, and adviser in medical matters, did not inform him that this very appearance was about 

 the best known of ail the phenomena characterising septic poisoning. 



