156 APPENDIX. 



therefore the reaction, when properly performed, 

 can be relied upon. 



When the test was first published Wassermann 

 regarded the reaction which occurred as one between 

 mutually specific bodies, i.e. between antigen and 

 antibody, the resulting combination having the 

 power to anchor the complement. Through the 

 work of Marie & Levaditi, of Landsteiner, Miiller 

 and Potzl, of Weil and Braun, and still other in- 

 vestigators, it soon became apparent that the test 

 could also be carried out by using extracts of non- 

 syphilitic tissue, i.e. of other pathological tissue or 

 normal tissue. That, of course, meant that the 

 view of a reciprocal specific relation between anti- 

 body and organ extract, in the sense that typhoid 

 antibody and typhoid bacilli are reciprocally re- 

 lated, had to be abandoned. This does not, how- 

 ever, effect the reliability of the reaction for diag- 

 nostic purposes, for it has been found that positive 

 results are still only obtained when the serum or 

 spinal fluid is of syphilitic origin.* 



Working under Wassermann's direction, Forges 

 and Meier stu.died the nature of the substances 

 concerned in the reaction, and began by precipi- 

 tating the organ extracts with alcohol and testing 



* It may be well to state that according to Landsteiner, Muller 

 and Potzl the serum of animals infected with dourine (trypanoso- 

 miasis) also gives rise to inhibition of haemolysis when tested 

 according to the above method. This has been confirmed by 

 Hartoch and Yakimoff. Whether this will affect the value of the 

 Wassermann test in humans can only be decided by further 

 clinical tests, especially in cases of human trypanosomiasis. 



