Etiology of tubercle, with comments on Doctor Robert Kochs bacilli / by Henry Mac Cormac.

  • M'Cormac, Henry, 1800-1886.
Date:
1882
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Etiology of tubercle, with comments on Doctor Robert Kochs bacilli / by Henry Mac Cormac. 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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    sumption regarded,- the result not the cause of the disease. Farther research will, I trust, lead you and the profession at large to the adoption of this view. It will be a glad day for the world when it proves so. Wishing you every good fortune, and this above all the rest, I am, dear Doctor Fox, your sincere wellwisher and friend, HENRY MAC CORMAC. Belfast, 20th July, 1882. * The following, in respect of the inoculation of rahhits with saliva, appears in the British Medical, 9th April, 1881, p. 571. On making further inquiries, I received from M. Vulpian the communication here appended. I cannot recon- cile the discrepancy of statement, hut possibly M. Vulpian does not mean to ad- vert to any except recent experiments : — INOCULATION OF SALIVA. “ On the occasion of the reading of the letter of M. Pastern- by M. Parrot to the meeting of the Academie de Medeeine, relating to experiments by inoculating rabbits with the saliva of children who had died of ordinary diseases, M. Vulpian presented to the Academy a note, in which he communicated the results of analogous experiments performed by him in his Laboratory at the Faculty of Medicine. M. Vulpian injected under the skin of rahhits saliva collected at the very moment of the experiment from perfectly healthy individuals; and this injection killed the rahhits so inoculated in forty-eight hours. The blood of these rabbits was found filled with microscopic organisms ; among which was found a special organism, discovered by M. Pasteur in the course of his experi- ments with inoculation of the saliva of a child who had died of rabies. One drop of this blood, diluted in ten grammes of distilled water, and injected under the skin of other rahhits. also brought on the death of these animals : the blood of which was similarly filled with microscopic organisms. These singular results, of which the interpretation is by no means easy, present also the no less singular peculiarity of not being stable. Rahhits placed in identical conditions, and in- oculated with the same saliva, experienced no ill effects from their inoculation, and continued in excellent health. It would, therefore, appear that experimental microbiology is not yet on the way to become either an easy or clear science, notwithstanding M. Pasteurs fiat lux. Writing from London, a medical friend observes, “ Several experimenters have failed to develop Kochs bacilli by the staining method which he describes. They cannot he seen under ordinary circumstances.” Paris, 16th June, 1S82. Monsieur et tres honore Confrere, Je n’ai fait aucune communication soit a 1’Academie de Mddecine, soit a l’Academie dcs Sciences, sur l’injection des matieres diverses sous la peau des animaux. Jo ne crois memo pas qu’une communication ait ete faite par un autre investigates, a l’une ou a 1’autre de ces Acaddmies, dans ces demiersmois. Veuillez agrder, je vous prio, l’exprcssion de ma considdration la plus distin- gudo. A. VULPIAX.