THEORY OF THE ACTION OF BACTERIA IN ANTHRAX. 655 
of the phlogogenic matter has not yet been explained : it is 
possible that it depends on the peculiar properties of the 
blood of the animals in which the parasites are developed, 
but some experiments, unpublished as yet, lead me to think 
that they may be owing to polymorphism. 
When the bacteria produce a matter which is only slightly 
inflammatory, they act more especially by their physical pro¬ 
perties, and cause death by the obliteration of the capillary 
vessels of the essential organs; such is the case with the 
rabbit, the sheep, and the guinea-pig, where these lesions 
are almost exclusively met with. To the more intense phlo¬ 
gogenic properties correspond vascular lesions of another 
order; the rupture of the capillary vessels and effusions of 
blood more or less considerable which exist simultaneously 
with the vascular obliterations, as is seen sometimes in sheep, 
and always in the horse and the ass. Lastly, the inflamma¬ 
tory properties may predominate, and death take place, when 
the number of the bacteria is relatively inconsiderable; the 
vascular ruptures then become of extreme importance; they 
are found especially in the walls of the heart of the dog. 
It now remains, in order to complete this theory, to ex¬ 
amine and explain the lesions of the lymphatic system. The 
following are the facts which have been derived from my ex¬ 
periments : 
Three cases are possible : 
1. The Anthrax was transmitted by inoculation to an animal 
which died without showing vascular ruptures. 
2. The Anthrax was transmitted to the animal by injection 
direct into a vessel. 
3. The Anthrax was .[transmitted either by inoculation or 
by intravascular injection to an animal which in the course 
of the malady showed more or less numerous vascular 
ruptures. 
In the first case researches made on the fresh or hardened 
ganglia and by means of sections, showed no bacteria except 
in those situated in the course of the lymphatics, proceeding 
from the inoculated spot, where they were found in immense 
numbers. 
In the second case no ganglion showed the presence of 
bacteria in the sinus; the only ones met with were contained 
in the blood-vessels of the follicles. 
In the third case all the ganglia situated in the course of 
the lymphatics, proceeding from the points where the vascular 
ruptures existed, were gorged with bacteria; the infiltrations 
in the neighbourhood of the rupture showed heaps of them, 
formed of long entangled filaments, and the ganglia had a 
