A report of microscopical & physiological researches into the nature of the agent or agents producing cholera / by T.R. Lewis and D.D. Cunningham.

  • Lewis, T. R. (Timothy Richards), 1841-1886.
Date:
1872
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A report of microscopical & physiological researches into the nature of the agent or agents producing cholera / by T.R. Lewis and D.D. Cunningham. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    t c 1 ultimately it formed a wide clear area of fluid around the clot. The number of white corpuscles at first visible was small and not noteworthy, but with the formation of the ring of clear serum a series of most remarkable pheno- mena gradually presented itself. Normal sized white corpuscles began to migrate into the fluid, but in addition to these, and in far greater numbers and activity, were much larger and more delicate bioplastic bodies; cells they were not, for they had not at this time the faintest differentiation of wall, contents, or nucleus. They were simply masses of fluid bioplasm—bioplasm so fluid and diluted as in many instances to be almost, if not entirely, indistinguishable by refraction from the surrounding medium. Again and again, And the changes which has a patch of scattered granules gradually take place m it. been noted moving in unison across the field, and only after prolonged examination and most careful management of the light has it appeared that the individual granules were really included in a portion qf bioplasm and were moved by its movements only. Gradual- ly the consistence of these large bioplastic masses appears to increase, and they, as it were, grow into sight (Tig. 2). Their movements are extremely constant and free, no mere alterations of form, but free progression, along with such movements. The alterations in form vary extremely, some- times consisting of the emission of rounded and lobulated protrusions, and at others of the running out of elongated slender extensions and threads. Coincidently with the appearance of these bodies in the The serous spaces in the marginal serum, others of a similar clot- nature may be observed in the serous spaces in the clot, and at this time also, in some cases, an abundance of small refractive bioplasts may be detected in the same localities. These small bioplastic bodies have seldom been seen to move or alter form, and, save slight increase in size, have not been observed to undergo any change, and seem shortly to disappear. In a few instances also the interspaces of the clot are occupied by very delicate branched fibrilbe, but this is by no means a constant or characteristic phenomenon. The question here arises, are these large masses of bioplasm the results of very rapid th^°ma!s^nof Sasma* which new development, or are they present have crawled out of the clot. ^ ^ &Qm ^ bcginningj but so fluid and so closely approaching the surrounding medium