442 MICRO-ORGANISMS AND DISEASE [chap. 



of the animal be produced by opium without furthering 

 in the least the process of the experiment ? ^ This has 

 been tried over and over again ; watery extract of opium is 

 injected into the peritoneal cavity, and narcosis lasting for 

 one hour is produced, but the animals remain well ; 

 tincture of opium is subcutaneously injected, the animals 

 fall into narcosis, lasting for from forty to eighty minutes, 

 but no result is obtained from the previous introduction of 

 the comma bacilli ; in fact, the experiment as designed by 

 Koch was repeated by me on a large number of guinea- 

 pigs, thirty in all, but instead of producing narcosis by 

 injection of tincture of opium into the peritoneum I 

 produced it by intraperitoneal injection of watery extract 

 of opium, or subcutaneous injection of tincture of opium 

 and watery extract of opium, but all in vain. The comma 

 bacilli used .were of recent broth culture, or of gelatine 

 culture, and were beyond question or doubt the choleraic 

 comma bacilli. 



From all these considerations it appears to me un- 

 warranted to conclude that the multiplication of the 

 comma baciUi in the small intestine, and their fatal action 

 by the chemical products they elaborate, takes place on 

 account of a relaxation and arrest of the peristaltic move- 

 ment by the opium. Another explanation appears to me 

 much more probably correct. It is this — provided the 

 intestine is iirst made diseased, either in consequence of 

 slight peritonitis, as was probably the case in the guinea-pig 

 that had aborted, or in the experiments when tincture 

 of opium is injected into the peritoneal cavity, or from 

 other reasons, the comma bacilli that are present in the 

 intestinal cavity undergo rapid multiplication, and by 

 their chemical products not only increase the disorder of 

 1 The Praclilioner, 1886 and 1887. 



