448 PRINCIPLES OF VETERINARY SURGERY 



mals suffering from tetanus. Pestana in 1891 inoculated 

 cavies with tetanus toxin and sacrificed them by hjcmorrhage 

 after the first appearance of the first symptoms. He gave 

 tetanus to mice by injections of fifteen drops of the blood or 

 emulsion of the muscles of the injected point, but extracts 

 from the kidneys, spleen, liver, lungs, medulla oblongata 

 and other muscles proved innocuous. He proved that if 

 the cavy is not killed until after generalization of the disease 

 the quantity of the toxin is diminished. It is never found in 

 the nerve center, medulla or urine. Similar results have 

 been obtained by other experimenters. Kartulis and Blu- 

 menthal in 1896, Knorr, Marie and Jacobs in 1897, ^"<^1 Cour- 

 mont and Doyon in 1898, could not prove that the toxin was 

 eliminated by the kidneys. Marie, in 1897, systematically 

 investigated from hour to hour the behavior of the toxin in 

 a rabbit that had recei^'ed ten cubic centimeters of toxin into 

 its blood. He has established, in the mouse, that the blood 

 is no longer poisonous after the seventh hour, although con- 

 tractions do not appear until the forty-eighth hour. The 

 nerve centers, muscles, kidneys, liver, testicles, ovaries, 

 spleen and marrow, ground and emulsified and injected into 

 mice proved to be harmless. The toxin has disappeared and 

 is not found in the secretions. Marie supposes that it has 

 combined with the cellular protoplasm. 



These experiments have been confirmed by Blumenthal. 

 He has found it easy to find toxin in the tetanized cavy. while 

 in the rabbit the poison disappeared about the thirtieth hour, 

 that is, during the period of incubation. It was always absent 

 when the symptoms have appeared. He assumes that the 

 toxin has combined with the cellular substance. In cold- 

 blooded creatures, such as the carp, the frog and the axo- 

 loth, which do not become tetanized at a low temperature, 

 as well as in the turtle, Metchnikoff has found the toxin to 

 be preserved for months. In the frog heated and tetanized 



