Prevention of Splenic Fever, S,-c., at the Broicn Institution. 299 
" Abdomen tympanitic, and, when opened, a quantity of red- 
coloured fluid escaped from the cavity. The stomach and 
intestines appeared healthy. The spleen was slightly enlarged 
and softened. Liver normal to the naked eye. Kidneys of 
natural size and colour. 
" Pleura; contained an unusual amount of fluid, serous mem- 
brane smooth and glistening. Lungs fairly healthy, except at 
the lower third of the left lung, which appeared airless, or nearh^ 
so, firm, of dark-red colour and sank in water (probably 
collapse). Heart and pericardium healthy. Blood in ventricles 
of heart had coagulated to a firm clot. Similar coagulation had 
taken place in the large veins." 
Blood from the heart and jugular vein and spleen, serum from 
the heart and from the affected quarter, were preserved in capil- 
lary tubes hermetically sealed, and examined by myself about 
five hours later, with the following results : 
The serum from the affected parts contained only a very few 
rods, and some few spores similar to those found in other parts. 
The serum from the blood of the heart contained very few red 
corpuscles, but in it were seen scattered spores and pieces of 
filaments attached to them. These spores were nearly 1'4 fx in 
length, and about "6 or • 7 /x. in diameter, hence they were much 
larger than ordinary bacteria.* The filaments attached to some 
also resembled pieces of the ordinary anthrax bacillus rods, they 
were of very delicate outline. 
The spleen was found to contain a very large number of 
oblong spores, some free, others with pieces of the filaments 
attached to them. 
From these fluids animals were inoculated with the following 
results. 
Experiment I. — A guinea-pig, inoculated at 12 P.M. Oct. 9, 
with fluid from the spleen, was found next evening, twenty hours 
after the inoculation, to be apparently paralysed in the hind 
limbs, with extremely low temperature. There was swelling 
and emphysema of the walls of the abdomen, and of the 
tissues of the inoculated limb. It was killed at 9 P.M., and 
the tissues and fluids at once examined. 
The skin of the thigh and of the adjacent abdominal wall 
was found to separate very readily ; the whole of the subjacent 
tissues being of blackish, almost gangrenous, appearance. The 
* It must here be mentioned that Bacilli may be found in blood and tissues 
after death, •which are not anthrax Bacilli. The proof of their anthracoid nature 
is found only in their effect when inoculated in another animal. This point is 
too complicated for discussion here. For some facts I may refer to a work of 
Dr. Timothy Lewis, in ' Microscopic Organisms found in the Blood of Man and 
Animals,' p. 41. Calcutta, 1S79. 
