A Treatise on venereal diseases / by A. Vidal, (de Cassis,), tr., with annotations by George C. Blackman.

  • Vidal, Auguste-Théodore, 1803-1856.
Date:
1859
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A Treatise on venereal diseases / by A. Vidal, (de Cassis,), tr., with annotations by George C. Blackman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Woodruff Health Sciences Center Library at Emory University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Woodruff Health Sciences Center Library, Emory University.

    23/520
    Is there more than one virus? The existence of a virus is no longer doubted, but the question constantly arises. Is there more than one virus possessing different strength and different qualitie? This question has been proposed by every syphilographer who has sometimes met with such different effects from the virulent matter Thus, they have asked, Is there not one virus which inflames, and another which gives rise to ulceration? Or, to speak more cor- rectly, Is not blenorrhagia produced by one kind oi virus, and chancre by another? To these, Hunter replied in the negative, and explained the different effects by the difference m the surfaces to which it is applied. If specific pus is brought into contact with secreting surfaces, blenorrhagia is the result (these surfaces are the lining membranes of the vagina and urethra) ; if the same pus is applied to the skin and the mucous membranes bordering upon it (as, for example, those of the glans, the prepuce, the vulva, and the lips), a chancre will follow. But as chancres have been observed in all the mucous membranes to which it has been applied, the theory of Hunter was necessarily abandoned. A double virus was then adopted as a substitute, and this doctrine was defended by Benjamin Bell and Hernandez. I shall notice this theory when I treat of blennorrhagia, but I feel bound here to show how it has been defended by Hernandez, in the face of arguments deemed most weighty, since they were derived from the results of experiments. An experimenter by the name of Andrd inoculated himself with gonorrheal matter, which produced a chancre. To this fact Hernan- dez replies that it is of but little importance as it is an isolated one, and because it has been reported by an unknown surgeon. But Hunter likewise produced chancres in the same manner. The ob- jection now raised by Hernandez, is, that these ulcers healed spontaneously, and consequently they could not have been chancres! But he had a bubo which was followed by consecutive symptoms. The bubo, replies Hernandez, might have arisen from the irri- tation of the ulcer of the glans. The consecutive symptoms, such as ulcers in the throat and pustules, might have proceeded from other causes. We have just seen, that Hernandez would not be- lieve Andre, because he was unknown; should we not suppose that the name of Hunter, so widely known, would therefore in- spire him with the greatest confidence ? Far from it, however, and he concludes by saying; can we moreover place much de- pendence on the syphilitic nature of all the affections pronounced venereal by distinguished physicians? Still farther, Hernandez believes not even his own experiments. Thus, he inoculated convicts who preferred the operation to the labor of the arsenal. In seventeen, ulcers occurred which had no appearance of syphilis, and which were promptly cured without internal treatment. In the others, says Hernandez, it pro- duced obstinate ulcers, some of which had every appearance of syphilis, with the general symptoms which would seem to establish it. Two were cured only after using mercury. Should we not suppose that our experimenter having inoculated twelve out of seventeen of these convicts with chancre, and that too with the