THE MICROBE OF PLEURO PNEUMONIA. 
235 
of the animal or give rise to more or less serious toxic manifes¬ 
tations, without the invasion of the tissues by one single mi¬ 
crobe ; at any rate, it is an advantageous condition for culture 
the microbial! auto-intoxication being diminished, if not sup¬ 
pressed ; and, again, products from the organism of the subject 
entering the bag, which may be favorable to the culture of the 
microbe ;—this is the most frequent result; and when the bag 
is open, the richest culture is generally found. 
“This method,” say the authors, “ is very advantageous to 
preserve delicate microbes, and succeeds with many species.” 
Perhaps it would succeed with the pleuro-pneumonic virus ? 
Our suppositions were confirmed. 
Bags of collodion, filled with bouillon inoculated with a 
trace of pleuro-pneumonic serosity, carefully closed and placed 
in the peritoneal cavity of a rabbit, after 15 or 20 days, contain 
an opal liquid, slightly cloudy and albuminous. This liquid 
contains no cells, no bacteria cultivatable in ordinary bouillons. 
But microscopic examination with a very large power (about 
2000 diameters) and a very powerful light, reveals in them a 
mass of small refringent and motile points of such tenuity that 
it is impossible, even after coloration, to make out exactly their 
form. If in the peritoneum of the same rabbit a second collo¬ 
dion bag has also been introduced, containing ide 7 itical biit not 
inoculated bouillon, one can be convinced that the changes of 
the liquid of the first bag are not due purely and simply to the 
osmotic exchanges which have taken place through the walls 
of the bag ; as, indeed, the liquid of the second bag, the witness^ 
has preserved its primitive transparency and limpidity. 
In reality, the motile and refringent points of the inoculated 
liquid, so numerous that notwithstanding their extremely small 
size, they made the bouillon opalescent, are living beings which 
have germinated to infinity, assisted by the changes undergone 
by the fluid of culture and thanks to the prevention of the 
phagocytic action by the walls of collodion. 
This is proved by inserting in the peritoneum of a sound 
rabbit two collodion bags, one containing bouillon inoculated 
