SOCIETY MEETINGS. 
379 
points would be ia.iscd, which would lend us, or enable us to 
treat these cases on a more scientific basis. 
Dr. J. H. Eddy of Stockton was then called upon to enter¬ 
tain the meeting, which he did by reading a very practical thesis 
on “Tetanus.” 
TETANUS. 
Mr. President and Gentlemen:— At the last meeting of this Association, I was 
appointed by our honorable President, Dr. Spencer, to write a paper upon some subject 
pertaining to the veterinary profession. I do not propose by presenting for your con¬ 
sideration this paper upon the subject I have chosen, which is Tetanus, to speak much 
from practical experience, but nevertheless the following may serve to refresh your 
memories and perhaps give some of you new ideas. 
I he word tetanus is derived from a Greek word which means to stretch. It is a 
specific disease characterized by continual contractions of the voluntary muscles and 
later the involuntary, with tension and rigidity of the parts affected. When the term 
tetanus is used it applies to the whole body being involved, it is often seen where only 
the muscles of mastication are involved, it is then called trismus, if the muscles of the 
ceivical and dorsal regions are involved it is called opisthotonos, if the muscles of one 
side are involved the term tetanus lateralis is used. 
This disease is now considered to be due to a micro-organism, which is a drum 
stick shaped bacillus called the bacillus tetani or the germ of Nicolair, so named from 
the discoverer who discovered it in 1886, but it seems that Rosengoff and Koch found 
it at about the same time. The germ has a spore of reproduction at one end, and is 
a rue rob ic in character. lliis fact is quite important; we will understand by this why 
a small puncture or closed wound is more liable to be followed by this disease than a 
large open one. No doubt some of you have seen cases where tetanus developed after 
a wound had almost completely healed, it then having the nature of a closed wound, 
the anaerobic character of the germ explains this, the exogenous character of the germ 
was discovered by Nicolair, April 1887; he found it in the soil especially around old 
gardens, it is found in horse manure, also on surgical instruments improperly cleaned 
after they have been used on a wound infected with the germ, and it may be trans¬ 
mitted in this way from one animal to another. In the diseased animal the germ re¬ 
mains near the seat of introduction, and it is found in the secretions of the wound, in 
the nerves leading from the wound, and some claim to have found it in the spinal 
cord. The presence of the oxygen of the air causes the germ to remain in a partial 
dormant state, but as soon as it is introduced into a wound, where the air is excluded, 
combined with the heat and moisture it causes it to develop and reproduce. Ivitasato, 
a Japanese student in Dr. Koch’s laboratory isolated the soil bacillus and reproduced 
the disease in animals by inoculation, thereby proving that the germ found in the soil 
was identical with that found in the wound of an animal affected with the disease. 
Prof. Ivitt of Munich made some interesting experiments in the way of inoculating 
several horses from a horse that had died from tetanus; he says that tetanus in the horse 
is caused by a bacillus identical and resembling that of human and soil bacillus. 
Another interesting contribution on this subject is that of Dr. Bassano whose excellent 
