Inoculation for Pleuro-P neumonia in Cattle. 



271 



to clanger ? Instead of such contradictory statements, we should 

 have wished to have seen the Doctor nobly taking his stand and 

 saying, — 'These cases are the only exceptions, in my oicn opera- 

 tions, to the rule which I have proved in hundreds of instances to 

 belong to inoculation as preventive of Pleuro-pneumonia : — as 

 exceptions, they show how great is the value of my discovery. 

 And in truth we wdll now say, for ourselves, that if this system of 

 inoculation be built on a foundation equally secure with that of 

 inoculation or vaccination for small-pox, not ten times the num- 

 ber of failures which have occurred in M. Willems' establishment 

 will lessen our opinion of its value. It must be remembered, 

 however, that Dr. Willems originally took his stand on the un- 

 tenable ground, that inoculation properly performed never icould 

 fail to give immunity to the animal against Pleuro-pneumonia. 



VYe turn now to the assertion that the animals were " inocu- 

 lated, as an experiment, with pus {not lymph),^^ an assertion by- 

 the-bye ecjually correct with that of our having inoculated the 

 animals. 



Dr. Willems says we made a note of the case ; this we have 

 admitted to be strictly true ; and fortunately we have that note 

 still standing in our memorandum-book. It runs as follows : — 



" Sept. 1, 1852, — Saw two cows with deep incisions in their tails, situated 

 far above the place of inoculation, and freely discharging a glairy albuminous 

 or serous fluid. Dr. Willems called this " bon virus." He took some, secured 

 it between two pieces of glass, and gave it me. He also inoculated two cows 

 with it to show me the manner of operating." 



Thus we see that w^hen these cows were inoculated it was " bon 

 virus,^^ so good that we were presented with some of it, to bring 

 home for use on the cattle of England ; but when one of these 

 self-same cows (for it is not said that both of them were inoculated 

 on September 1st, and therefore possibly not with the same 

 material) contracted the disease of Pleuro-pneumonia, then it 

 was viruletit matter/' ^' pus {not Ji/mph).'' We have more notes 

 in our memorandum-book, and will produce one, as possibly it 

 may refer to the other cow mentioned in the foregomg extract as 

 being " inoculated during September last." 



'• Sept. 9. — Saw two cows at Willems sen.'s, with gangrene of their tails, or 

 rather of the stumps, their tails having been amputated high up. They were 

 inoculated with serous fluid expressed from a diseased lung. The fluid is said 

 not to have been good, hut yet twenty more cows were inoculated with the same 

 material. These cows are reported to have done well. Doubtless one of these 

 animals will die ; the superior part of the stump, labia, and adjacent parts are 

 gangrenous. A portion of gangrenous skin was sliced off by Dr. Willems, who 

 said, with emphasis, in answer to my question, that the virus it contained was 

 tres-hon. When asked again if it was not charoed with gangrenous materials, 



' Non. non' was the reply I considered this skin such a treasure that 



I begged a bit of it, and carefully packed it up in the M3I. Willems' pre- 

 sence." 



