In 1901, Dr. Ford Robertson and I began a
bacteriological investigation into the aetiology of
General Paralysis. After 2 year.st work on the subject
we published a paper along with Dr. John Jeffrey
in which we produced evidence in support of the
hypothesis "that General. Paralysis is the result of
a chronic toxic infection from the respiratory and
alimentary tracts, permitted by general and local
impairment of the defences against bacteria,. and
dependent upon the excessive development, of various
bacterial forms, but especially upon the abundant
growth of a Klebs Lóffler bacillus of modified virulence, which gives the disease its special paralytic
character."Since then we have continued the investigation
and we have gained fresh knowledge which has served
to convince us more firmly in our original hypothesis
So much so, that in his Morison Lectures last year,
which were on the subject of our combined research,
Dr. Robertson published the name which we had given
to the special diphtheroid bacillus believed by us to
be the immediate cause of Genera]. Paralysis, viz.,
Bacillus Paralyticans.Space will not permit me to go over the evidence
upon which our belief is based, but I would
like to mention that our present opinion is that
General Paralysis is caused by a group of diphtheroid
bacilli, which we have shown to be virulent to rats
and mice.In March 1906 we began to subject sheep to the
infection of these bacilli with the object of producing
an immune serum for the treatment of cases of
General Paralysis.Dr. Ford Robertson has very kindly allowed me
to use my portion of our combined research as the
subject of this thesis. It comprises the procuring
the serum, giving it to patients and keeping clinical
records of the results: I propose to follow this
order in my description
