126 



SCIENCE. 



The following abbreviations are printed in Webster's 

 Dictionary without the period : etymipn), demirep{iita- 

 tion), grog(ram), hyp,\ and hypochondria), noncon- 

 {tent), hyper(crilic), navvy for navigator; but the ab- 

 breviations above suggested should probably be followed 

 by the period. 



PR/ECOMMISSURA, ETC. 



The single words pracommissura, medicommisura, 

 and postcommissura are proposed as substitutes for the 

 compound terms commissura anterior, medins, and 

 posterior, and for their English equivalents. A similar 

 change is desirable in the case of the three cerebellar 

 peduncles, which may be more conveniently termed pra- 

 meso- and postpedunculus. So, too, the corpora geni- 

 culata (external and internal ) may be called pragenicu- 

 latum and postgeniculatum ; the brachia of the mesen- 

 cephalon become prabrachium and postbrachium, and 

 the two " perforated spaces," praperforatus and post- 

 perforatus. The " anterior pyramids " have been called 

 by Owen " prepyramids," but more exact designations of 

 these and of the "posterior pyramids" would be ventri- 

 pyramides and dorsipyramides. 



The prefixes are usually employed when the object re- 

 ferred to lies before, between, or behind other objects of a 

 different kind ; e. g. prcecordia, mediterra?ieus, and 

 posterganeus. The use here proposed is as if three dogs 

 in line were designated by prcecanis, medicanis and 

 postcanis. If the terms are objectionable, what can be 

 substituted for them ? They are certainly as legitimate as 

 are the well-established terms prosencephalon, mesenceph- 

 alon and mesencephalon. Do not the English words 

 preposition and postposition offer some analogy ? 



The following points are mainly etymological and or- 

 thographical rather than anatomical. 



THE CONNECTING VOWEL. 



With derivative words the connecting vowel is com- 

 monly i ; e.g. alipes, claviger,fatifer,fidicen,Jluctigena, 

 decimanus, neurilemma, and xiphistei num. But classi- 

 cal exceptions are mulomedicus, quadrupedus, noctuvi- 

 gilus, and decumanus. In common English and scientific 

 terms of Latin or Greek origin the o is common ; e. g. 

 ambodexter, burgomaster, gastrotomy, termonology, ven- 

 troinguinal, lateroflexion, mucopuro/enl, vasomotor, 

 curvograph, neuroglia, oculospinal, p/europeritoneal, 

 xiphosura, septopyra, hemoglobin, cepkalotribe, etc. 

 Rarely is it e as in venesection. 



Should the i or the o be used in the following terms : 

 Dorsimeson, ventrimeson, dorsicumbenl, lalericumbent ', 

 dextriflexion, sinistriversion, cephaloditction, caudiduc- 

 lion, etc.? Both analogy and euphony lead one to use the 

 i when the first part of the word is of Latin origin, and 

 the o with the Greek. 



Should any of these terms be written as compound 

 words ? 



COMPOUND WORDS. 

 The two Latin compounds known to me are veneri- 

 vagus and vesti-contubernium. The following common 

 or technical English compound words are selected from 

 Webster's English Dictionary, or the Medical Dictionaries 

 of Dunglison, or Littre et Robin, or from the writings of 

 Barclay, Humphrey, and Straus-Durckheim : Anglo- 

 Saxon, concavo-convex, dextro-gyra/e, ventro-appendicu- 

 lar, costo-vertebral, costo-alaris, caudo-pcdal, osseo- 

 cutaneous, occipilo-scapularis, dorso-lateral, slerno-clavi- 

 cular, clavo-cucullaire, clavi-stcrnal, clavio-humeralis. 

 By analogy with the foregoing, compound terms of direc- 

 tion should read dor so-ventral, caudo-ccphalic, meso- 

 lateral, sinistt o-cephalic, etc. 



HYBRID WORDS. 



Some of the terms already mentioned are formed by the 

 union of Latin with Greek words ; e. g., dorsimeson, 



meso-lateral, and caudo-cephalic ; several others are 

 likely to be employed ; e. g. clavo-masloideus, and 

 felitomy. 



Beyond the occasional intimation, in the dictionaries, 

 that a term is hybrid, the subject seems to be ignored, 

 and it might fairly be inferred that literary authorities en- 

 tertain one or the other of two opposite convictions : 

 either mongrel words are verbal monstrosities which will 

 be shunned instinctively by all well-regulated minds, or 

 there is no more serious objection to their use, or even 

 their creation, than to the employment, or even the pro- 

 duction, of mules, or the mixed varieties of grapes and 

 roses. 



However this may be, the fact is that the Latin and 

 the Greek tongues have united to form the following nine 

 hybrids which may be found in Latin writings : anticato, 

 biclinium, cryptoporticus, dentarpaga, epitogium, mono- 

 solis, monoloris, pseudo-flavus, and pseudo-urbanus. 

 Of these, the third only occurs with any degree of fre- 

 quency. 



Whoever will spend the time to look through an un- 

 abridged dictionary of the English language — and the inter- 

 est as well as the instructiveness of such a search can hardly 

 be realized by those who use the volume only for occa- 

 sional reference — will find that, after excluding the 

 twenty-five or more words ending with meter, which may 

 perhaps be derived directly from the Latin form metrum, 

 there are more than one hundred hybrid words, many of 

 them in good standing. Many more are to be gleaned 

 from the dictionaries of medicine and the other arts and 

 sciences. 



Nevertheless, it is probable that a due regard for the 

 feelings of the classical purists in whose eyes language was 

 not made for man, but rather man for language, will lead 

 scientists to refrain from the introduction of mongrel 

 terms when others will serve the purpose, and the present 

 writer will be pleased to receive suggestions leading to the 

 substitution of wholly unobjectionable words for any of the 

 hybrids which have been mentioned. 



( To be continued in our next.) 



ON CHICKEN CHOLERA : STUDY OF THE CON- 

 DITIONS OF NON-RECIDIVATION AND OF 

 SOME OTHER CHARACTERISTICS OF THIS 

 DISEASE.* 



By M. L. Pasteur. 

 IT. 



Concerning the properties of the extracts of the arti- 

 ficial cultivation ot the germ of chicken cholera, an in- 

 quiry presents itself, We have shown that these extracts 

 contain no substances capable of preventing the cultiva- 

 tion of the germs of this disease. They might, how- 

 ever, contain elements adapted to the vaccination of 

 chickens. To investigate this point I have prepared cul- 

 tivations where volume was not less than 120 c.c. After 

 filtration and evaporation at a low temperature, while 

 infinite care has been taken that its purity should not be 

 affected, this liquid has given a dry extract, which was 

 re-dissolved in 2 c.c. of water, and the totality of this 

 was injected under the skin of a chicken which had never 

 had chicken cholera. A few days afterwards the chicken, 

 after being inoculated with a virus of the greatest viru- 

 lence, died with the usual symptoms of unvaccinaled 

 chickens. 



This class of experiments led to the following obser- 

 tion, which is of the greatest importance in physiology. 

 When the extract from the cultivation of the germ of this 

 disease, corresponding to an abundant development of 

 the parasite, is injected under the skin of a fresh chicken 

 in perfect health, the following phenomena take place : 

 At first the chicken seems to suffer from a nervous dis- 



♦Translated from the Com files Rend us de t ' Academit de Sciences, of 

 May 3d, 1880, by P. Casamajor. The translation of the second paper of 

 this scries appeared in the Chemical News, vol. xlii., page 321 (December 

 31, 1880). 



