SYNOPSIS OF CONTINENTAL VETERINARY JOURNALS. 225 
fowls, who naturally warm themselves by close contact, &c. 
A combination of all these causes can lead to production of 
a stratum favorable for the development of the disease. 
Although I have often met free granules in the blood 
plasma such as I have described and figured, I do not dare 
state that they are micrococci in the true sense of that term 
used by Hallier” 
To M. Toussaint belongs the merit of having determined 
the part which these granules perform in cholera of fowls, 
similar to that of Bacteridia in anthrax, of having attributed 
to them their real nature and functions, and of having given 
demonstrations of them. He thus expresses himself on this 
point in the paper which he addressed to the Academy of 
Sciences in May last :—“ An attentive examination of the 
blood show's in that liquid a considerable number of 
moving granules, either single or in pairs. The blood of 
fowls, when introduced by inoculation into rabbits, produces 
death in twelve to fifteen hours, and the above-mentioned 
microbia may be found in the blood and the tissues. 
This organism can be cultivated in an artificial liquid. A 
drop of blood having been introduced into twenty grammes 
of the proper liquid the parasite multiplies with great 
rapidity, and soon all the solution is intensely crowded. M. 
Pasteur, to whom I sent specimens of the parasite, has cul¬ 
tivated it, and he affirmed, on the 4th March, 1879, that 
it is, indeed, to cholera of fowls what the Bacteridium is to 
anthrax. When it has been dried it retains its properties 
for many months, as may be proved by inoculation, or the 
retention of vitality may be proved in another way, by 
placing rabbits in a hutch in which at least a month before 
other rabbits succumbed to the disease; the new comers 
will succumb in their turn. It is allowable, in such cases, 
that the microbia in the excrements dried up, and were 
taken in with the food by the animals who succeeded those 
that previously succumbed.” On 10th February last M. 
Pasteur communicated to the Academy of Medicine the 
results of certain new researches which he has made on cho¬ 
lera of fowls :—“ We know how energetically that which we 
have hitherto termed the virus of cholera of fowls manifests 
its presence. The most infinitesimal quantity, such as might 
be collected on the point of a needle, gives rise to inevitably 
fatal results in fowls into which it is inserted ; as many ani¬ 
mals as are inoculated die.” M. Pasteur, by a means which 
at present he keeps secret, has so attenuated this virus that 
it is no longer superior to organic resistance; on the con¬ 
trary, the latter determines return to health after manifesta- 
