238 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



favourable to its development as other parts of the body. The value 

 of the method has been proved by the subjection of 244 animals to its 

 action. 



Experiments on Pasteur's Method of Anthrax-Vaccination. * — 

 In his own name and the names of Messrs. Chamberland and Eoux, 

 L. Pasteur gives a summary report of a series of experiments made 

 by them in May and June 1881, near Melun (Seine-et-Marne), at the 

 request of the Agricultural Society of that place, in order to 

 demonstrate the vaccinating power of a modified form of anthrax 

 virus, as already described.! 



Fifty-eight sheep, of different breeds, ages, and sexes, two goats, 

 eight cows, a bullock, and a bull having been placed at their disposal, 

 they set aside 10 of the sheep and inoculated 24 of the remaining 50, 

 together with 1 goat and 6 cows, with a mitigated form of anthrax 

 virus, and then, after 12 days, with a stronger solution. After a 

 further interval of 14 days, the 31 vaccinated animals, together with 

 the 24 sheep, 1 goat, and 4 oxen still remaining unvaccinated, were 

 inoculated with a very deadly form of anthrax virus, vaccination being 

 carried out alternately on vaccinated and unvaccinated animals. The 

 company, including numerous local and departmental authorities and 

 professional men, were assembled after two days to witness the results of 

 the experiments. All the subjects of the i^reliminary inoculation were 

 found, to all appearance, in good health (one died subsequently from 

 a cause other than anthrax), but of the others, 21 sheep and the goat 

 had already perished from the disease, 2 more sheep died in the 

 presence of the spectators, and the twenty-fourth died at the close of 

 the day. None of the oxen died, but all developed large swellings 

 round the point of inoculation, and their temperature rose 3°. A large 

 number of those present expressed their conviction of the importance 

 of the method adopted. 



Professor Milne Edwards | has compared some of the facts brought 

 forward by M. Pasteur with the phenomena of alternation of generations 

 exhibited by some Hijdrozoa, and suggested that experiments should 

 be made to ascertain whether in this case, as in that of the septic 

 organisms described by M. Pasteur, variations in the temperature or in 

 the amount of air dissolved in the water, might be made to produce 

 whichever stage of these animals might be required. 



Some experiments, as reported by Bouley,§ were also made publicly 

 at Chartres, with the view of testing the principles laid down by 

 M. Pasteur, and supported by his experiments at Melun. They differ 

 from those experiments in employing infected blood for the inocula- 

 tions instead of artificial growths of the virus. Thus 19 sheep already 

 inoculated, together with 16 which had not been inoculated, were all 

 injected with half a syringeful each of a mixture of blood and splenic 

 pulp taken from a sheep which had just died of anthrax ; 15 of the 16 

 unvaccinated sheep died within 3 days of the operation ; the 19 which 



* Comptes Kendus, xcii. (1881) pp. 1378-83. 

 + See this Journal, i. (1881) p. 499, &c. 

 + Comptes Kendns, xcii. (1881) p. 1383. 

 § Ibid., xciii. (1881) pp. 190-2. 



