EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF MALIGNANT PUSTULE, ETC. 425 
Thus, when the disease is to remain local, the step of arrest 
following the evolution of the pustule is that where it may lose 
its virulency. Sometimes, as I will demonstrate later, the viru- 
lency already developed to a certain degree in a ganglion, dies 
out in that organ before the time when it might have appeared in 
the blood. 
The attentive study of the malignant pustule of animals ap¬ 
parently refractory to anthrax or little predisposed to it, then 
proves on one side that this pustule is a complete virulent anthrax, 
no matter how localized it may he; it proves on the other side 
that the generalization of this local condition operates, if not 
exclusively, at least principally through the intermediate of the 
lymphatic system, as every time this system remains indemn, the 
disease aborts and is followed by no serious consequences. Of 
course it is difficult to say why, in cases apparently identical, this 
system may remain nearly indemn in such subjects, while in 
others it becomes the seat of deep lesions. Its more or less 
marked development according to the individuals, its different 
degrees of susceptibility, do not suffice to explain these differences. 
What is certain, however, is that in the young age, at the time 
when the animal enjoyes all its activity and strong impressiona¬ 
bility, anthrax becomes frequently general as sequelae of malig¬ 
nant pustule. 
It is evident that the lymphatic system, especially its ganglions, 
plays here an essentially special part. If it was limited to absorb 
virulent agents, to transport them in the circulation with the 
lymph, it would already do so, and the material that it carries 
would rapidly reach its destination. In conclusion, let us remark 
that in all cases of carbunculous tumors or malignant pustules 
without lesions of the lymphatic glands, the virulency of the 
tumor dies out quickly, and general infection is prevented. This 
fact of the spontaneous extinction of virulency, far from being 
exceptional in dogs and the other animals which take anthrax 
with difficulty, becomes the rule ; for in adult age it may be seen 
nineteen times out of twenty. The bacteridie, though dissemi¬ 
nated in the canal of the tumor, in its tissues and blood vessels, in 
the surrounding oedema, dies there, and dies whether the irritation 
