Variola and vaccinia, their manifestations and inter‐relations in the lower animals: A comparative study

Abstract

IN the course of certain experiments on the bacteriology of vaccine lymph, an account of which has been published elsewhere; I was confronted by an insuperable difficulty, as it then appeared, in the practical testing of certain of the results of my work.Continuous experimentation on children being obviously out of the question, I was iiaturally led to turn my attention to the discovery, if possible, of some one or more of the lower animals, which, by reason of their passing through the various stages of vaccination, and more especially variolation, in a manner comparable with that witnessed in the human subject, might serve me for control experiments.With this object in view, I carefully examined all the available literature on the subject, but the result of such search, unfortunately, was not encouraging.I n the attempt to give experimental confirmation to the theory of Jenner, who, arguing from the prophylactic effects of vaccine against human smallpox, termed cow-pox, variola vaccinae, or smallpox of the cow, numerous observers, including Thiele, McMichael, Sonderland, Ceely, Badcock, Martin, and Reiter, and, in more recent times, Voigt, Hime, Haccius, Klein, Simpson, and others have inoculated animals of the bovine species with human variolous lymph.I n a considerable number of these experiments, however, no local result has been obtained, and even in those cases which have been regarded by their authors as successful, the result of primary transmission has borne little resemblance, either in the appearance at the site of inoculatiob, or in the accompanying symptoms, to smallpox, as witnessed in the human subject.I n point of fact, so wide has been the divergence, that the