FLEUKO-PXEUMONIA. 613 



the inoculation of the virus of pleuro-pneumonia, in order to 

 induce a mild form of the disease on healthy animals, and 

 prevent their decimation by severe attacks due to contagion. 

 Dr Willems met with much encouragement, and perhaps 

 more opposition. Didot, Corvini, Ercolani, and many more, 

 accepted Dr Willems' facts as incontestable, and wrote advo- 

 cating his method of checking the spread of so destructive a 

 plague. The first able memoir which contested all that had 

 been said in favour of inoculation appeared in Turin, and was 

 written by Dr Reviglio, a Piedmontese veterinary surgeon. 

 This was supported by the views of many more. Professor 

 Simonds wrote against the plan; and in 185-4 the French 

 Commission, whose Report we have before mentioned, con- 

 firmed in part Reviglio's views, though from the incomplete- 

 ness of the experiments further trials were recommended. 



Inoculation is performed as follows : A portion of diseased 

 lung is chosen, and a bistouri or needle made to pierce it so 

 as to .become charged with the material consolidating the lung, 

 and this is afterwards plunged into any part, but more parti- 

 cularly towards the point of the tail. If operated severely and 

 higher up, great exudation occurs, which spreads upwards, 

 invades the areolar tissue round the rectum and other pelvic 

 organs, and death soon puts an end to the animal's excruciat- 

 ing suffering. If the operation be properly performed with 

 lymph that is not putrid, and the incisions are not made too 

 deep, the results of the operation are limited to local exuda- 

 tion and swelling, general symptoms of fever, and gradual 

 recovery. The most common occurrence is sloughing of the 

 tail ; and in London, at the present time, dairies are to be seen 

 in which all the cows have short tail stumps. 



Dr Willems and others have gone too far in attempting to 

 describe a particular corpuscle as existing in the lymph of 

 pleuro-pneumonia. All animal poisons can be alone disco- 



