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Show 574 PROF. OWEN ON TRICHINA SPIRALIS. [Julie 20, in the University of Heidelberg at that date, and runs as follows :- " Prof. Tiedemann has found in the body of a man who was excessively addicted to drinking brandy, and who died from dropsy after several violent attacks of gout, white, stony concrements in most of the muscles, especially at the extremities. They were imbedded in the cellular tissue between the muscular fasciculi, frequently also attached to the membranes of the arteries. They were from 2 to 4 lines long and roundish in shape. Subjected to chemical analysis by Professor Gmelin, they were found to consist of:- " Phosphate of Lime 73 Carbonate of Lime 7 Animal matter, like albumen or fibrine, 20 100." The pathognomic inference was that these calcareous particles indicated a diffused form of arthritic deposit. The acceptable fact is the analysis of the salts, which are attracted by the adventitious cysts after their lengthened retention in the muscular tissue, giving rise to the physical condition noticed in the dissection of the subject in St. Bartholomew's Hospital. The foregoing details, chiefly of personal interest, I should not have intruded on the notice of the Zoological Society, save for the great and unexpected importance of the minute parasite which has become notorious since it first came into scientific existence in the pages of our publications. A brief record of this development of Trichina, the last that is likely to come from my pen on the subject, may, perhaps, be condoned. I would premise, however, that, soon after the discovery of the wormlet, my friend Dr. Arthur Farre, F.R.S., added interesting facts to its anatomy from microscopic observations of the Trichina in its larval and encysted condition l. The German comparative anatomists Luschka2 and Leuckart3 have made known and admirably illustrated the anatomy of the species in its mature and procreative state. Where and how is Trichina spiralis to be met with mature ? Certainly not in the muscular tissue of mankind : all the examples there found have the generative organs undeveloped, as represented in plate xii. of the Trans. Zool. Soc, loc. cit. Mr. Bowman, F.R.S., was, I believe, the first to notice the presence of vermicules, which he referred to Trichina, in the sarco-lemma of the muscles of an eel *. Trichina have been subsequently detected in the voluntary muscles of the hedgehog, badger, cat, dog, but most frequently and abundantly in those of the hog. In 1852 1 London Medical Gazette, December 1835. 2 Siebold and Kolliker's Zeitschrift, vol. iii. 1851. 3 Ibid. vol. iv. 1852. 4 Art. M U S C L E in the ' Cyclopaedia of Anatomy,' and Transactions of the Royal Society for the year 1840. |