Contributions to the experimental pathology of spirillum fever / by H. Vandyke Carter ; communicated by James Andrew.

  • Carter, H. V.
Date:
[1880]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Contributions to the experimental pathology of spirillum fever / by H. Vandyke Carter ; communicated by James Andrew. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    length of incubation period, can be said to result from such previous attack; and, lastly, it demonstrates that a very small quantity of blood, or hardly more than the amount of lymph commonly employed in vaccination, will suffice, when introduced beneath the skin, to convey a pronounced spirillar infection. Fifteenth experiment.—W. T. [vide Experiment 10), on the second day of observed fever, or upwards of thirty- two hours after its initiation, the defibrinated blood, obtained after death by chloroform, was found to contain abundance of active spirilla, which were seemingly unaffected by the inhaled narcotic, and it was therefore employed for further testing the communicability of spirillum fever at first remove from man. Three monkeys had each a few minims of blood minus fibrin subcutaneously injected in the same manner and hour ; of these two were fresh acquisitions from the bazar, and the third (C. below) was the companion of R. T. (vide Experiment 5), which, although in closest propinquity to that fever-stricken animal, had never shown any sign of contagion. The results are briefly described below, and the fever charts are appended entire, with the exception of the first two days, when night observations were not complete. 2. N. W. T. (also termed “ biter ;; from its vicious¬ ness). The temperature rose beyond the mean for a few hours, and then became nearly normal; on the third day it rose again simultaneously with that of the two other animals, and rather higher, being at 11 p.m. 106°, and the monkey still very wild ; the blood contained many spirilla. Next day the temperature subsided a little, being 103*8° at 11 a.m.; the animal now seemed ill; its blood was highly contaminated, and death was inflicted when there was every prospect of the attack continuing as in its neighbours. 3. R., the other fresh monkey, showed but little varia¬ tion of temperature for forty-six hours, when fever came on rather gradually but decidedly (104*2° in the first