329 
ON TRICHINA SPIRALIS. 
By W. Muller, M.D., Homburg. 
Bor many years past the trichina spiralis (class Nema¬ 
todes) have been found in the muscles of hogs, wound up in a 
spiral form, and enclosed in chalky capsules; and Dr. Owen 
discovered and described them in the muscles of men. Pro¬ 
fessor Zenker, of Dresden, was the first who proved, by a 
full and exact statement of a case, and a careful and minute 
post-mortem examination, that the development and wan¬ 
dering of the trichinae in the human body produce violent 
symptoms similar to those of typhus fever, and cause, most 
probably, in many cases, the death of the individual. 
Experiments made by Professor Virchow,* of Berlin, and 
Professor Leuckart, of Giessen, by feeding animals with 
pork in which were trichinae, proved the same as Professor 
Zenker’s observations in the above-mentioned case, namely, 
that the trichinae, when taken into the stomach, commence 
almost immediately their development, male and female, and 
innumerable embryons. The young worms, perforating the 
intestines, enter the muscles, and, wandering in them, pro¬ 
duce the violent symptoms of the disease above mentioned, 
until they become incapsulated in the muscles, in which state 
they are innocuous. 
In Hettstaedt, a small town in Prussia, containing about 
5000 or 6000 inhabitants, a veritable epidemical propagation 
of trichinae commenced in the middle of October last, in 
consequence of the infected persons having eaten a kind of 
sausage (not thoroughly cooked) made of pork in which were 
trichinae. 
In some cases small portions of muscles were taken by 
Middeldorpf’s harpoon from the persons infected, and whilst 
suffering with the disease; and by submitting those por¬ 
tions to microscopical examination trichinae, were discovered 
in them. 
In the evening of the 9th of November last I was sum¬ 
moned by a telegram from the physician of Hettstaedt, in¬ 
forming me that a relation of mine was suffering from the 
trichina disease; that he had also a pneumonic affection, and 
was very ill. On my arrival on the following day I found 
the patient—who previous to the attack was a strong and very 
healthy man, twenty-three years of age—perfectly conscious, 
* Vide Virchow’s ‘Archiv,’ vol. xviii, p. 561. 
vol, xxxvii. 22 
