, TRICHINA SPIRALIS. 349 



tion, from the careful translation (out of the "Gazette Medicale de 

 Paris ") published in the "British Medical Journal" for the 25th 

 of April, 1863 (New Series, No. 121, p. 426). After alluding to the 

 interesting fact that it is only during the brood-migration that we 

 meet with the Trichinae in the serous cavities, glands, and cellular- 

 connective tissue, Davaine observes that the symptoms produced by 

 these parasites in animals may present these successive and more 

 or less distinct phases : — 



" The first phase is characterised by intestinal disorder produced 

 by the development of the larv^ in large numbers, and their 

 adhesion to the mucous membrane of the intestine. In this stage, 

 M. Davaine has seen rabbits die with intense diarrhoea ; one of two 

 cats which he fed with trichinised meat had diarrhoea for at least a 

 fortnight, but survived. Of five or six rats fed on a similar diet, 

 one only, which was pregnant, died of diarrhoea, after abortion on 

 the eighth day. According to M. Leuckart, the passage of the 

 embryos of Trichinge through the intestinal walls sometimes pro- 

 duces peritonitis. This intestinal phase often becomes blended 

 with the next ; it may be relieved by the expulsion of the worms 

 by means of the diarrhoea, or may cease with the natural death of 

 the worms. 



" The second stage presents general symptoms — muscular 

 pains, etc. These phenomena are dependent on the introduction 

 of the Trichinae into the muscles ; they rapidly acquire their 

 maximum intensity, and have not a long duration. The appear- 

 ance and duration of this stage are in complete relation with the 

 development and length of sojourn of the Trichinge in the intes- 

 tines ; in fact, in this entozoon, oviposition is not slow and of long 

 duration, as in many nematoid worms ; the genital tube is rapidly 

 formed, and the ova, in its whole length, are developed almost 

 simultaneously, so that the embryos, arriving soon at maturity, are 

 at once thrown out in large number into the intestine, and the 

 mother Trichina dies exhausted. If it be remembered that the 

 embryos do not escape before the eighth day, that a certain number 



