CHOLERA. 321

tory. By injecting laudanum into the abdominal cavity
of guinea-pigs the peristaltic movements are checked.
The amount given for the purpose is very large, about
i grain for each 200 grams of body-weight. It generally
narcotizes the animals for a short time, but they recover
without injury. After administering the opium the con-
tents of the stomach are neutralized by introducing
through a pharyngeal catheter 5 c.cm. of a 5 per cent,
aqueous solution of sodium carbonate. With the gastric
contents thus alkalinized and the peristalsis paralyzed a
bouillon culture of the spirilla is introduced. The ani-
mal recovers from the manipulation, but shows an indis-
position to eat, is soon observed to be weak in the pos-
terior extremities, subsequently is paralyzed, and dies
within forty-eight hours. The autopsy shows the intes-
tine congested and filled with a watery fluid rich in spi-
rilla—an appearance which Frankel declares to be exactly
that of cholera. In man, as well as in these artificially
injected animals, the spirilla are never found in the blood
or the tissues, but only in the intestine, where they fre-
quently enter between the basement membrane and the
epithelial cells, and aid in the detachment of the latter.

Issaeff and Kolle found that when virulent cholera
spirilla are injected into the ear-veins of young rabbits
the animals die on the following day with symptoms re-
sembling the algid stage of human cholera. The autopsy
in these cases showed local lesions of the small intestine
very similar to those observed in cholera in man.

Guinea-pigs are also susceptible to intraperitoneal in-
jections of the spirillum, and speedily succumb. The
symptoms are—rapid fall of temperature, tenderness over
the abdomen, and collapse. The autopsy shows an
abundant fluid exudate containing the micro-organism,
and injection and redness of the peritoneum and viscera.

Although in reading upon cholera at the present time
we find very little skepticism in relation to Koch's
"comma bacillus," we do find occasional doubters who
believe with Von Pettenkoffer that the disease is mias-

21