966 
EDITORIAL. 
Immunity against such a disease is an important matter ; 
and for a long time it has been admitted that intravenous injec¬ 
tion of pleuro-pneumonia virus confers a great protection, a last¬ 
ing immunity. This has also been the object of experiments, 
but the results have been entirely different from those that were 
expected, and which had already been declared as positive by 
others. In three series of experiments where the injection of 
liquid virus or of cultures of the microbe was made in the jugu¬ 
lar, or in the auricular vein, none of the eight cows experi¬ 
mented upon received immunity ; the injection did not modify 
in any way the receptivity of the animals. 
While I mentioned cultures in the preceding experiments, I 
may also state that those cultures are almost entirely used for 
the obligatory vaccination in France. They take the place of 
the practice of vaccination with serosity obtained from the dis¬ 
eased lung—serosity which was more or less suspected of im¬ 
purities, and which often gave rise to severe complications, 
which, in fact, have been for so many the greatest objection to 
vaccination. It seems that by the use of pure cultures scarcely 
any complications can occur. 
Is it due to their use that at last France has been relieved of 
the disease ? Some of the last monthly sanitary bulletins report 
no cases. Not likely. In many outbreaks the pole-axe has been 
the main liberator. But there seems to be a special indication 
for the use of the preventive inoculation. It is this : Upon the 
frontiers, principally those of Spain and France, there exists at 
some period of the year a kind of traveling among the cattle, 
that is to say, fields of pasture are offered to French cattle on 
Spanish ground. These cattle, in healthy condition, come in 
contact with diseased Spanish cattle, and when they return 
home they carry with them the germs of the malady ; hence 
almost yearly outbreaks. To resort to the pole-axe every year 
would be an enormous expense, and after all would prove not 
only useless, but a great danger. To guard against this, by ad¬ 
vice of the Commission of Epizootics, the preventive inoculation 
with the use of fresh and pure cultures is recommended for all 
