26 BACTERIOLOGY. 



to further investigations, and as the all-important ques- 

 tion was that concerning the relation of these micro- 

 scopic organisms to disease, attention naturally turned 

 into this channel of study. Even before the hypothesis ' 

 of spontaneous generation had received its final refutation 

 a number of observations of a most important nature had 

 been made by investigators who had long since ceased to 

 consider spontaneous generation as a tenable explanation 

 of the origin of the microscopic living particles. 



In the main, these studies had been conducted upon 

 wounds and the infections to which they are liable ; in 

 fact, the evolution of our knowledge of bacteriology to 

 its present development is so intimately associated with 

 this particular line of investigation that a few historical 

 facts in connection with it may not be without interest. 



The observations of Rindfleisch, in 1866, in which 

 he describes the presence of small, pin-head points in 

 the myocardium and general musculature of individuals 

 that had died as a result of infected wounds, represent, 

 probably, the first reliable contribution to this subject. 

 He studied the tissue-changes round about these points 

 up to the stage of miliary abscess-formation. He refers 

 to the organisms as " vibrios." Almost simultaneously 

 von Recklinghausen and Waldeyer described similar 

 changes that they had observed in pysemia and, occa- 

 sionally, secondary to typhoid fever. Von Reckling- 

 hausen believed the granules seen in the abscess-points 

 to be micrococci and not tissue-detritus, and gave as 

 the reason that they were regular in size and shape, and 

 gave specific reactions with particular staining-fluids. 

 Birch-Hirschfeld was able to trace bacteria found in 

 the blood and organs to the wound as the point of en- 

 tranoe^ and believed both the local and the constitutional 



