The History of the Subject 23 



disease. Being a very large bacillus and a strongly vegetative 

 organism, its growth was easily observed, while the disease was one 

 readily communicated to animals. 



Klebs, who was one of the pioneers of the germ theory, published, 

 in 1872, a work upon septicemia and pyemia, in which he expressed 

 himself convinced that the causes of these diseases must come from 

 without the body. Billroth, however, strongly opposed such an 

 idea, asserting that fungi had no especial importance either in the 

 processes of disease or in those of decomposition, but that, existing 

 everywhere in the air, they rapidly developed in the body as soon as 

 through putrefaction a "Faulnisszymoid" (putrefactive ferment), 

 or through inflammation a " Phlogistischezymoid " (inflammatory 

 ferment), supplying the necessary feeding-grounds, was produced. 



In 1873 Obermeier observed that actively motile, flexible spiral 

 organisms were present in large numbers in the blood of patients in 

 the febrile stages of relapsing fever. 



In 1875 the number of scientific men who had entirely abandoned 

 the doctrine of spontaneous generation and embraced the germ 

 theory of disease was small, and most of those who accepted it were 

 experimenters. A great majority of medical men either believed, 

 like Billroth, that the presence of fungi where decomposition was in 

 progress was an accidental result of their universal distribution, or, 

 being still more conservative, adhered to the old notion that the 

 bacteria, whose presence in putrescent wounds as well as in artificially 

 prepared media was unquestionable, were spontaneously generated 

 there. 



Before many of the important bacteria had been discovered, and 

 while ideas upon the relation of micro-organisms to disease were 

 most crude, some practical measures were suggested that produced 

 greater agitation and incited more observation and experimentation 

 than anything suggested in surgery since the introduction of anes- 

 thetics — -namely, antisepsis. 



"It is to one of old Scotia's sons, Sir Joseph Lister, that the 

 everlasting gratitude of the world is due for the knowledge we 

 possess in regard to the relation existing between micro-organisms 

 and inflammation and suppuration, and the power to render wounds 

 aseptic through the action of germicidal substances."* 



Lister, convinced that inflammation and suppuration were due 

 to the entrance of germs from the air, instruments, fingers, etc., into 

 . wounds, suggested the employment of carbolic acid for the purpose 

 of keeping sterile the hands of the operator, the skin of the patient, 

 the surface of the wound, and the instruments used. He finally 

 concluded every operation by a protective dressing to exclude the 

 extrance of germs at a subsequent period. 



Listerism, or "antisepsis," originated in 1875, and when Koch 

 published his famous work on the " Wundinfectionskrankheiten " 

 * Agnew's "Surgery," vol. i, chap. ii. 



