American Veterinary Review, 
AUGUST, 1880. 
ORIGINAL ARTICLES. 
THE CONNECTION OF THE GERM THEORY WITH THE 
ETIOLOGY OF SOME COMMON DISEASES. 
By M. L. Pasteur. 
When I found myself engaged in the studies which I am at 
present prosecuting, I was endeavoring to extend the germ theory 
to certain common affections. When shall I be able to terminate 
these researches ? With the desire to see them completed by 
others, whose activity . they may stimulate, I take the liberty of 
presenting them so far as I have advanced in them. 
Section I.— Upon Furuncles. 
In May, 1879, a person working in my laboratory had numer¬ 
ous furuncles, appearing at short intervals, sometimes affecting 
one part of the body, sometimes another. 
Keeping always in view the fact of the immense activity of 
microscopic beings in nature, the question presented itself to my 
mind, whether the pus of furuncles did not contain one of those 
organisms whose presence, development and transmission to vari¬ 
ous points in the economy, might not stimulate the local inflam- 
