InjlamTnation and Fever. \\ 



a special power of resistance to some other organic poisons. 

 Thus the hog, which is supposed to be proof against snake- 

 bite, is also, to a large extent, proof against the pus-forming 

 bacteria. For further notice of this subject see article on 

 Pycemia. 



Pus. This is a white, or yellowish-white, creamy -looking 

 product, composed of a clear, transparent fluid, rendered 

 opaque by numerous floating pus-corpuscles. These pus- 

 corpuscles have the same size as the white globules of the 

 blood {^-^^ris to ^TrVir ^"^h) and are peculiar in that each 

 shows within it three or more nuclei, which become visible 

 on the addition of a drop of water or acetic acid. Each of 

 the common embryonal cells found in the inflamed tissue 

 contains two nuclei, the indication of the active increase 

 by division into two, but when the supply of nutriment is 

 checked the nuclei continue to divide, while the cells remain 

 unchanged, and thus every cell comes to contain several 

 nuclei in addition to fatty granules, and constitute pus- 

 corpuscles. 



When pus is formed in a well-maintained system and tis- 

 sue, the outer layer of the lymph is developed into a fibrous 

 sac inclosing the liquid pus and constituting an abscess. In 

 an unhealthy system, or when the inflammation depends on 

 some injurious poison, like that of erysipelas, this sac may 

 not be formed, and the pus, burrowing into and between dif- 

 ferent organs, destroys the connections and substance — dif- 

 fuse suppuration. When an abscess has formed in soft 

 tissues its investing sac shrinks as it assumes the fibrous 

 character, and the confined pus being incapable of compres- 

 sion, presses the membrane outward on the side in which 

 the surrounding tissues are most loose and least resistant, 

 hence, usually, though not always, in the direction of the 

 skin, the soft tissues become absorbed and removed in the 

 track of the advancing pus ; and, finally, the latter reaches 

 a sm'face and escapes. Thus, an abscess usually bursts 



