An account of certain organisms occurring in the liquor sanguinis / by William Osler.

  • Osler, William, Sir, 1849-1919.
Date:
1874
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An account of certain organisms occurring in the liquor sanguinis / by William Osler. 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.

    8/14 (page 396)
    displayed by the small free corpuscles at the margins, which, previously quiescent, begin a species of jerky irregular movement, at one time with their pale disk-surfaces uppermost, at another presenting their dark linear profiles (fig. 5, a & b). Not unfrequently, some of these are seen with a larger or smaller segment of their circumference thicker and darker than the other (fig. 5, c). Earliest, and perhaps the most plentiful, of the forms are those of a spermatozoon-like shape (fig. 5, cl), attached to the mass either by the head or tail; while, simultaneously, long bow-shaped filaments appear (fig. 5, e), having an enlargement in the centre. Straight hair-like filaments (fig. 5, f) may also be seen, but they are not very numerous. The time which elapses before they begin the wavy movement is very variable, as is also the time when they break away after once beginning it. Fila- ments may be seen perfectly quiescent for more than half an hour before they move, and others may be observed quite as long in motion before they succeed in breaking away from the mass. Commonly it is in the smaller masses, and where the development is feeble, that filaments re- main for any time adherent. The spermatozoon-like forms appear, at the head, on one view flattened and pale, on the other dark and linear (fig. 5, cl); consequently the head is discoid, not spheroidal. The bow- shaped filaments also present a dark straight aspect when they turn over (fig. 5, e), and are by far the longest of the forms, some measuring as much as one 900th of an inch. Many intermediate forms between the round discoid corpuscles and those with long tails are met with in the field, and are figured at fig. 5, cj. Small rod-shaped forms are very numerous, most of which, however, on one aspect look corpuscular ; but in others this cannot be detected, or only with the greatest difficulty; slight enlargements at each end may also be seen occasionally in these forms (fig. 5, A). Usually late to appear, and more often seen in the profuse develop- ments from large masses, are the forms with three or more tail-like pro- cesses attached to a small central body (fig. 5, A). Among the granules it is extremely difficult to determine accurately the number of these pro- cesses, the apparent number of which may also vary in the different posi- tions assumed by the element. As to the ultimate destiny of the indi- vidual forms, I have not much to offer ; I have watched single ones, with this view, for several consecutive hours without noticing any material alteration in them. The one represented at fig. 6 was watched for four hours, that at fig. 7 for five, and the changes sketched. The diffi- culty of following up individual filaments in this way is very great, not only from the ensuing weariness, but from the obstacle the red corpuscles offer to it. With regard to the movement of the filaments, this, at first sight, bears some resemblance to that known as the Brownian, exhibited by