Part 25

In a thesis written by M. Roux, Pasteur's laboratory assistant, last July, we read the following:--'If we examine with care a little of the pulp taken freshly from the brain of a rabid animal, and compare it with the same substance from the brain of a healthy animal, it is difficult to distinguish any difference between the two. In the rabic pulp, however, besides the granulations which are found in profusion in the healthy pulp, there seem to exist little grains of extreme minuteness, almost imperceptible even with the strongest microscopes. In the cephalo-rachidic liquid so limpid in appearance, it is possible with great attention to detect similar little grains. Can this be the microbe of hydrophobia? Some do not hesitate to affirm that it is. For ourselves, as long as the cultivation of the microbe outside of the organism has not been effected, and that hydrophobia has not been communicated by means of artificial cultures, we shall abstain from expressing a definite opinion on the subject.'

But the grand problem in regard to hydrophobia is, not so much the isolation of the microbe, as the finding of a means of preventing this frightful disease.

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Even now the experiments are in full swing. Biting dogs and bitten dogs fill the laboratory. Without reckoning the hundreds of mad dogs that have died in the laboratory during the last three years, there never occurs a case of hydrophobia in Paris of which Pasteur is not informed. Not long ago a veterinary surgeon telegraphed to him, 'Attack at its height in poodle-dog and bull-dog. Come.' Pasteur invited me to accompany him, and we started, carrying six rabbits with us in a basket. The two dogs were rabid to the last degree. The bull dog especially, an enormous creature, howled and foamed in its cage. A bar of iron was held out to him: he threw himself upon it, and there was great difficulty in drawing it away from his bloody fangs. One of the rabbits was then brought near to the cage, and its drooping ear was allowed to pass through the bars. But, notwithstanding this provocation, the dog flung himself down at the bottom of his cage and refused to bite.

Two youths then threw a cord with a slip loop over the dog, as a lasso is thrown. The animal was caught and drawn to the edge of the cage. There they managed to get hold of him and to secure his jaws; and the dog, suffocating with fury, his eyes bloodshot, and his body convulsed with a violent spasm, was extended upon a table and held motionless, while Pasteur, leaning over his foaming head, at the distance of a finger's length, sucked up into a narrow tube some drops of the saliva. In the basement of the veterinary surgeon's house, witnessing this formidable tête-à-tête, I thought Pasteur grander than I had ever thought him before.

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TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:

Footnotes have been moved to the end of each chapter and renumbered consecutively through the document.

Footnotes 7 and 8 are [enclosed in brackets] in the original, and this has been preserved.

Italic text is denoted by underscores.

Punctuation has been standardized.

Variations in spelling and hyphenation were retained as they appear in the original publication, except as noted below.

Changes have been made as follows:

Ecole changed to École in several places (École Normale)

Page ix: ETUDIES changed to STUDIES (STUDIES ON WINE)

Page 48: buding changed to budding (multiplication by budding,)

Page 166: nett changed to net (villa a net profit)

Page 219: pebrine changed to pébrine (pébrine and flacherie, also)

Page 258 earth worms changed to earth-worms (by the earth-worms.)

Page 260: resistent changed to resistant (more resistant to the)