DISTOMA HEPATIC UM. 261 



lowing sexual actions: self-impregnation with and without 

 copulation, and impregnation and copulation with a second 

 individual. 



Action of this parasite upon man, its phenomenology and 

 pathological anatomy. 



Mehlis mentions as observers of this parasite in the human 

 subject — 



1. Malpighi, who found it both in man and animals. 



2. Chabert, who expelled them in great numbers with his 

 empyreumatic oil from a girl of 12 years old. 



3. Bauhin, who, however, according to Bremser, had no true 

 Distoma before him. 



4. Biddloo, who was well acquainted with the alterations which 

 these parasites produce in the livers of animals, and met with 

 them also in the human liver. 



5. Wepfer, who often found the gall-ducts of the liver filled 

 with " hirudinibus." 



6. Pallas, who found Distoma fixed in the gall-ducts of the 

 liver in a female subject in the Anatomical Theatre at Berlin. 



7. Brera, who met with them in the liver of a man suffering 

 from scurvy and dropsy. 



8. Mehlis himself. He narrates the following history of a 

 widow, of 31 years old, living in Clausthal. From her appear- 

 ance Mehlis had long suspected that her liver was disordered, when 

 one day, in the year 1821, she brought him nine specimens of 

 D. hepaticum, which, as frequently before, she had thrown up 

 on the same day, still living and moving, together with a large 

 quantity of bloody coagulum, with repeated fainting fits. Gentle 

 purgatives, to remove any worms that might be in the intestine, 

 brought no more to light, and the patient felt well. Fourteen 

 days afterwards, when collecting sticks in the woods, she was 

 suddenly seized with tenesmus, and numerous worms were passed 

 agglomerated into a lump with mucus, but without fasces. In the 

 next year there occurred frequent yellowness of the face, slight 

 dyspnoea, which compelled her to sit still, short cough, uneasiness, 

 inflation of the abdomen, tension and pain in the hypochondria, 

 great weakness of the limbs, and with various convulsive appear- 

 ances and faintiug fits, vomiting of thin mucus and blood, with 

 consequent alleviation. The general health, appetite, and digestion 



