62 
THE NATURALIST AND COLLECTOR 
Ehrlich used veg-etab'le poison while 
Behring proved these facts as applied 
to tetanus (lockjaw) and diptheria. 
Diptheria is produced by a dumb-bell 
shaped bacillus, known from its discov¬ 
erer as the Klebs-Lceffler bacillus. 
These occur in nearly solid masses in 
the false membranes in the throat. A 
portion of this membrane is placed in 
a culure tube with blood serum. The 
bacilli grow rapidly in the serum and 
soon it becomes thoroughly permeated 
with the bacilli and the diptheretic 
toxin they produce. The bacilli are 
killed by the addition of five per cent 
carbolic acid and a certain amount of 
serum is injected into a horse. A slight 
rise in temperature and a Slight swell¬ 
ing occur. The blood of the horse 
rapidly produces a substance, diptheria 
antitoxin, which neutralize the toxin 
of the Klebs-Loeffler bacillus and also 
gives the living cells of the body 
greater power of resisting the poison 
or toxin. 
The horse receives these injections at 
intervals of a few days for six or eig'ht 
weeks; by this time he can receive a 
very large dose without any effort; his 
blood is saturated with the antitoxic 
substances. 
At this time a large vein in the neck 
is opened and from three quarts to a 
gallon of blood received into a steril¬ 
ized receptacle. These are put on ice 
for about fourty-eight hours; by this 
time the blood has separated into a 
firm clot and a clear yellow supernat¬ 
ant fluid, the serum. Guinea pigs are 
used in determing the antitoxic 
strength of the serum; and it is then 
put up in small bottles containing a 
dose each. A small quantity of some 
antiseptic is added to prevent decay. 
This is Diptheretic Antitoxin and it 
will not only prevent but also cure 
diptheria. We also have Antitoxin for 
Tetanus prepared in a similar man¬ 
ner but it is not on the market. If re¬ 
cent reports from Germany are to be 
relied upon we are shortly to have 
Antitoxin for cholera, etc. 
Will C. Hall. 
A new Discovery. 
^DHE aboriginal remains unearthed a 
X few weeks ago in a cave of the 
Port Royal mountains, in Ja¬ 
maica, promise us an interesting 
glimpse of a vanished race. 
An account by Dr. J. E Duer- 
den, of the Jamaica Museum, states 
that the Arawaks; who were a peace¬ 
able people probably numbering about 
600,000 at the time of the discovery of 
Jamaica by Columbus in 1494, were so 
cruelly treated by their Spanish con¬ 
querors that the original type seems to 
have been completely destroyed be¬ 
fore the English conquest of the Island 
in 1656. Little was left to show that 
these Indians ever existed. The only 
two aboriginal skulls hitherto known 
were found in a cave at Pedro Bluff, 
and practically the only relics of the 
native arts and manufactures have 
been some fragments of primitive pot¬ 
tery and a few flint implements and 
beads. The new find includes the 
skeletons of not less than twenty-four 
individuals of all ages from early in¬ 
fancy upward. With these were a 
canoe of cedar-wood, a well preserved 
mortar of arbor-vitee, two small earth¬ 
enware vessels, a flint implement, 
bones of the coney, and some marine 
and land shells. The cave is too small 
for a habitation for so many persons, 
and it is supposed to ha^e been used as 
a burial-place and perhaps also as a 
refuge from the Spaniards. 
Every precious stone known to the 
lapidary has been found within the 
limits of the United States. 
