GLANDEES. 485 



of glanders, and that it is reasonable to assume that this trans- 

 mission is effected by the bacilli-laden discharges being blown 

 about in the form of dust, after they have become dry. In support 

 of this assumption they state that frequently the lungs alone are 

 affected, and that they often show the oldest changes. Sir John 

 McFadyean, who follows in the footsteps of these two German 

 authorities, remarks that the almost constant presence of these 

 bacilli in the lungs of horses which have caught the disease in a 

 natural manner, and their customary absence from the abdominal 

 organs of these animals, are strong grounds for believing that the 

 breathed-in air is the principal carrier of the disease. This in 

 halation theory ignores not only Schlitz's view (p. 484), but also 

 two very important facts : First, that the act of drying these 

 bacilli kills them (p. 482), and that, unless they were more or less 

 dry, they would be in an unsuitable condition to float in the air. 

 Second, that the nostrils, which are quite as much exposed to the 

 influence of the breathed-in air as the lungs, are much less fre- 

 quently affected, and an outbreak in them is almost always secon- 

 dary to one in the lungs. Also, the supporters of the inhalation 

 theory ignore, or have not considered, the significant fact that 

 only in extremely rare cases does glanders affect the respective 

 mucous membranes of the eyes, vagina or penis, all of which would 

 be more or less constantly exposed to bacilli-laden air. Some 

 years ago, there were veterinary surgeons in South Africa- who 

 believed that Cape Horse Sickness (p. 464) was transmitted by 

 means of inhalation, because there are many cases of horse-sickness 

 in which the lungs are the only organs affected. Since then, the 

 researches of Edington and others have proved that ingestion is 

 almost always the means of communication, and that inhalation 

 plays little or no part in the production of this disease. These 

 considerations suggest, at least to me, the conclusion that the 

 comparatively high susceptibility of the lungs to an attack of 

 glanders, is due, not to the air which they inspire, but to a special 

 power which they appear to possess, of arresting the passage, 

 through them, of glanders bacilli that are in the blood. The 

 assumption that the lungs have this special power of retention is 

 strengthened by the fact that even in farcy, they are very rarely 

 free from these microbes, and that the heart is seldom if ever 

 affected. The spleen, which is largely concerned in the changes 

 undergone by the red and white corpuscles of the blood, probably 

 possesses this power of retention to some extent ; because, next to 

 the lungs, it is the internal organ which most frequently suffers 

 from attacks of these organisms. 



The question as to the action of air as a carrier of glanders 

 can be settled only by very extended and elabor-at© experiments. 



