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Further Work on the Development of the Hepatomonas of Kcda- 

 Azar and Cachexicd Fever from Leishman- Donovan Bodies. 



By Leonard Bogers, M.D., F.B.C.P., F.B.C.S., B.S., Indian Medical Service. 



(Communicated by Sir Michael Foster, K.C.B., F.B.S. Received October 16, — 



Bead December 14, 1905.) 



[Plate 7.] 



In 1903 Lieutenant-Colonel Leishman, B.A.M.C., described certain bodies in 

 the spleen of a fatal case of chronic fever in a soldier invalided home from 

 near Calcutta, which he considered to be degenerate trypanosomes, on 

 account of their resemblance to the breaking-up dead trypanosomes found in 

 the spleens of rats 48 hours after death, and he therefore suggested that 

 trypanosomes might be present during life in this class of fever. Major 

 Donovan, I.M.S., (2) of Madras, however, very shortly after showed that 

 Leishman's surmise was not correct, as he found similar bodies to those 

 described by Leishman in fresh blood obtained by puncturing the spleen 

 during life, but no trace of trypanosomes ; and after examining Donovan's 

 specimens, M. Laveran (3) pronounced the parasite to be a Piroplasma, and 

 suggested the name Piroplasma Donovani for them. 



Donovan (4) also claims to have found the parasites in the red corpuscles 

 of the peripheral blood, but his coloured illustrations of them very closely 

 resemble ring-parasites of malaria, and have only one chromatine body, and 

 his statements in this respect have not been confirmed by any other observer. 

 Boss (5) suggested that the parasite probably belonged to a new genus, and 

 proposed to call it Leishmania Donovani, and Manson and Nuttall also 

 favoured the view that it is a distinct genus. In the following year, 1904, 

 on my return to India from leave, I commenced an investigation of the 

 subject, with a view to finding further stages of the life history of the 

 parasite which might throw light on its true nature and classification. In 

 the meantime Lieutenant Christophers, I.M.S., had been placed on special 

 duty by the Government of India to investigate the subject, and after 

 making a careful study of the parasite in different tissues of the body, he 

 suggested that they might be spores of a microspordium. (6) 



My first endeavour was to find some method of keeping the parasite alive 

 outside the human body, and after a number of trials success was obtained 

 by preserving spleen blood containing the parasites under sterile conditions 

 in a cold incubator, preferably at about 22° C. For this purpose the fresh 

 blood obtained by spleen puncture during life was placed in small sterile 



