DISEASES OP THE BLOOD. 167 



of an animal which will not become affected, an abscess 

 forms, and so the organisms are confined and then thrown 

 off. M. Pasteur has announced that by a special method 

 of culture he has so modified the bacterium of fowl 

 cholera that inoculation with the altered fungus secures 

 immunity from future attacks of this invariably fatal dis- 

 order. When confirmed, the learned Frenchman may be 

 able to apply his method to the similar disease, anthrax.^ 



Splenic Fevee, Splenic Apoplexy, Essential Charbon, 

 is one of the most frequent forms of anthrax in cattle. 

 It is remarkable for its sudden invasion, its extreme 

 fatality (99 per cent., Simonds), and its rapid course. It 

 occurs among cattle of all sorts, especially those at pasture, 

 and supplied with water contaminated with excreta and 

 sewerage. It is also attributed to bad or too nutritive 

 food, to sudden changes of diet, and other ordinary 

 influences ; but almost every outbreak may be traced to 

 contagion, either direct or indirect. This used to be and 

 still is cited as an example of a disease of a specific charac- 

 ter, originating spontaneously ; but now we know the 

 apparent commencement of the attack is simply when the 

 bacilli begin to manifest their effects. For some time 

 they must have been multiplying in the system. Until 

 lately, then, investigators have not been accustomed to 

 look for causes in the past, except the most recent, and 

 until actual experiment proved conservation of the spores 

 in all their power of development, we were right not to 

 attribute cases of this kind to others which preceded them 

 some time. Also we have only just learned the various 

 forms which anthrax may assume. 



Symptoms. — The appearance of the disorder among a 

 number of cattle is denoted frequently by death of some 

 of them in even so short a time as two hours. Thus, 

 several may be found dead when the shed is entered in the 

 morning. Others are affected, but withstand the disease 

 longer, though death generally occurs before twenty-four 



' Since the above was written, Professor Toussaint, the distinguished 

 teacher of physiology at the Toulouse Veterinary School, has announced that 

 anthrax blood from which the bacilli have been removed by filtration is 

 effectual for what he terms " Anthrax Vaccination.'* 



