Such injections belong to
the simplest and surest means of producing suppurations free from
living bacteria.
Tuberculous guinea pigs, on the other hand, are killed by the
injection of very small quantities of such diluted cultivations. In
fact, within six to forty-eight hours, according to the strength of
the dose, an injection which is not sufficient to produce the death of
the animal may cause extended necrosis to the skin in the vicinity of
the place of injection. If the dilution is still further diluted until
it is scarcely visibly clouded, the animals inoculated remain alive
and a noticeable improvement in their condition soon supervenes. If
the injections are continued at intervals of from one to two days, the
ulcerating inoculation wound becomes smaller and finally scars over,
which otherwise it never does; the size of the swollen lymphatic
glands is reduced, the body becomes better nourished, and the morbid
process ceases, unless it has gone too far, in which case the animal
perishes from exhaustion. By this means the basis of a curative
process against tuberculosis was established.
Against the practical application of such dilutions of dead tubercle
bacilli there presented itself the fact that the tubercle bacilli are
not absorbed at the inoculation points, nor do they disappear in
another way, but for a long time remain unchanged, and engender
greater or smaller suppurative foci.
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