Page:Science vol. 5.djvu/522

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��in Mventy-nlue cases of cholera eiamined in Cal- ciitU. 2. He demonstrated pure cultures of the comma bacillus from Prance, Ital;, and Gunnany, all exactly alike. 3. He considers it proven that this comma bacillus occurs only fn cbolera, may be differ- eatiated from others similar to it, and is diagnostic Of the disease. 4. He demonstrated inoculation bt- perimenis upon animals, as follows; —

Five cubic ceo timetrea of aflve-per-cent solution of sodic carbonate, and in twenty minutes ten cable cen- timetres of meat-brolh containing a pure culture of the comma bacilluB, were injected into the stomach of each guinea-pig. Immediately afterwards lauda- num (one centimetre for each two hundred grama weight) was injected into the abdominal cavity. This served to narcoti/.e the animals for one-half an boor to one hour. The next day they were ill, with bristling hair, great weakness of the hind-legs and muscles of the l>ack, and died in from one to three days. Section showed swelling of the Intestinal gbinds, and the stomach and coecum full of an alka- line, colorless, flocculent Suid, contuning almost a pure culture of the comma bacillus. This experi- ment was made upon eighty-five guinea-pigs.

Similar experiments were made with Finklcr and Prior, and Denecke's bacillus, hut in much smaller number. Tbe results were very different, Piokler's bacillus producing putrefaction In the intestinal con- tents, as shown by their smell.

Tberapeutic experiments upon the inoculated ani- mals showed merely that lat^e doses of calomel, or the use of uapbtbatine, would prolong the life of the animal for a day at most. Tbe comma bacillus is easily destroyed by drying and other disinfectants, as by a one-half-per-cent solution of carbolic acid.

The observations upon man, considered by Klein and Macnamara to be of the nature of infection ex- periments. Eocb took up again, and showed, that, of the one hundred and fifty physicians who took the ' cholera course ' in Berlin, but one had cholerine, and comma bacilli were found in his dejections.

He has also found that the comma bacillus will live In well-water thirty days. In dirty canal-waler seven days, twenty-four hours in the contents of a privy, three to four days in moist linen, eigbty-one days In the har1>or-water of Marseilles (Nicati and RIelsch), and more than one hundred and forty-four days on agar-agar. Eocb has never found any reiE- i-mj form at all like the spore stage of some other bacteria.

Peltenkofer confessed himself not convinced. He Skid the Inoculation experiments were unsatisfactory. Those made with Emmerich's short staffs at Naples and at Munich were much more so. The manner in which Eocb inoculated his animals threw no light upon the subject, for only man had the disease. He cannot agree that the comma bacillus is more than a usual accompaniment of ciiolera. The epidemi- ological knowledge of cholera is to be completed by considering the comma bacillus Its cause, — a difficult thing to prove, since drying kills this organism ; and yet in lower Bengal a dry year is notoriously a favora- ble one fur the disease.

��The comma bacilli ate found only in the Intestine*, not in the organs; and yet the intestinal glands are highly absorptive. Cholera is not a combination of infection and intoxication, but an Infectious diseoMv pure and simple. It is possible that in the futtira Emmerich's staffs may be found to l>e the cause of the disease. These are found in the organs of the inoculated aiiimaU, and produce cliolera-like voinil- ing and diarrhoea. Before fully accepting the bacil- lus, more must be known of the epidemiology of tb«  disease- Since cholera is not communicaieil dIreeUrt so the cholera-germ is not ; and, since cholera de- pends upon place and time, the cliolera-'genn mttst be governed in the same way.

��ROLLESTON'S LIFE AND WORK.

RoLi.ESTON'a worthiest raemoriala ai-e the growing school of biology at Oxford, and the imi)ortant zotilogical and atiUiropological col- lectiona of its university museum. His re- markable energj', however, enabled him not only to do bis work as a teacher, and take the |)art of a leader in university jxiUtics, but to add to knowledge by investigations in many subjects. His original papers, dealing with topics pertaining to anatomy, physiology, zool- ogy, archeologj-, and itnthropolt^, are scat- tered over the pages of different joiirnalB, and the reports and transactions of various socie- ties. It is well that some of his friends have collected these scattered writings, and secured their republication in the volumes before as. Professor Turner of M in bui^h has edited them ; and Prof. E. B. Tylor of Oxford has added a brief biography, which is full of interest as giv- iug a clew to the source of the remarkable influence which Rollcaton was able to exert in favor of natural science, at a time when the traditions, and the preponderance of the sen- timent of his university, were ^^nst such studies.

Rolleston's father, vicar and chief land-owner of a small Yorkshire parish, was a good classi- cal scholar, and undertook the primarj' educa- tion of his son, who, it is said, was able to translate Homer at sight when only ten years _ of age. The lad had, tVom the first, something ' of the tastes and instincts of the naturalist : he read Izoak Walton, and Gilbert White's ever- charming 'Selborne,' and in his play-hours mounted the skeletons of mice and weasels, and stuffed the skins of birds and beasts of the neighborhood. Alter subsequent years at school, he won a classical scholarship at Pem- broke college, Oxford, and began residence in

BcitiUtllc addrtitii and napm. Bv GioBOR ROLLBrcMT,

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