Scientific Memoirs by
side; or there may be two globules of equal or unequal size, and the nucleus
pressed between them into a triangular or cocked-hat shape; and so on until we
come to groups of 30 or 40, which are then almost always of small size, very
little, if at all, larger than a blood corpuscle, and either adhere closely together
round a central nucleus to form a mulberry mass or are only loosely connected,
and it is in this last case sometimes impossible to demonstrate either a nucleus,
or any limiting membrane. Occasionally the component hyaline particles are
not globular, but wedge-shaped or polyhedral, which is evidently the result in
many cases of mutual pressure, but not always, for a very remarkable form is
sometimes met with, viz. a solitary hexagon of large size, surrounded by a thin
membrane and provided with a nucleus on one side, just as in the case of the
largest globular forms.
The nature of these hyaline bodies is a mystery, but they are certainly not
peculiar to rhinoscleroma. Identically the same bodies were described in 1885
by Surgeon-Major D. D. Cunningham in Part I of these Memoirs, as occurring
in Delhi Boil. He was at that time inclined to look upon them as organisms
of some kind, and this view was confirmed by the remarkable discovery that
bodies of similar form and showing the same re-actions with aniline violets, are
found in certain encysted amæboid organisms; these being possibly the same
as the globular bodies found by Nothnagel in monads, vide Ziegler's Pathology,
para. 479.
It has recently, however, been found by the writer that precisely similar
forms are constantly present in Elephantiasis arabum, in small number and of
small size it is true in the ordinary fibrous condition of the disease; but abundant
and of every variety and form, just as in rhinoscleroma, in some unusually cellular
specimens of elephantiasis excised from the female genital organs at the Ripon
Hospital, Simla, where this disease is frequently met with in women. They were
also undeniably present, although they were not very conspicuous, in two dis
- t i n c t c a s e s o f c a r c i n o m a t o u s t u m o u r f r o m t h e s a m e h o s p i t a l , o n e o f t h e f a c e , t h e
other of the breast; and Dr. Gibbons, of the Medical College, Calcutta, has
found them in a papilloma at the orifice of the urethra.
Dittrich also, of Prague, who calls them "Mikuliczsche Zellen" states that
they are found, not only in rhinoscleroma and oriental sore, but also in leprosy
and glanders. Under these circumstances the view that they are organisms of any
kind seems hardly tenable, as it is difficult to imagine a special organism in
- h a b i t i n g s o m a n y d i f f e r e n t k i n d s o f g r o w t h . A n o t h e r v i e w , u p h e l d p a r t i c u l a r l y
by Dittrich, that these bodies are the result of the action of bacteria upon the
cells of the tissue, cannot be said to have ever had much foundation, for no
- b o d y s e e m s e v e r t o h a v e s e e n b a c t e r i a a c t u a l l y w i t h i n t h e h y a l i n e m a s s e s , a n d
it is effectually disposed of by the fact, to be presently discussed more fully,
that there were no bacteria present in any of these cases of rhinoscleroma, and
that bacteria were also wanting in the Delhi Boil examined by Dr. Cunningham
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