The life of Pasteur

by René Vallery-Radot

On the 10th, Bourrel telegraphed the arrival of another rabid dog, and the same operations were gone through.

“This rabid, furious dog,” wrote Pasteur to his son-in-law, “had spent the night lying on his master’s bed; his appearance had been suspicious for a day or two. On the morning of the 10th, his voice became rabietic, and his master, who had heard the bark of a rabid dog twenty years ago, was seized with terror, and brought the dog to M. Bourrel, who found that he was indeed in the biting stage of rabies. Fortunately a lingering fidelity had prevented him from attacking his master....

“This morning the rabic condition is beginning to appear on one of the new dogs trephined on June 1, at the same time as two refractory dogs. Let us hope that the other new dog will also develop it and that the two refractory ones will resist.”

At the same time that the Commission examined this dog which developed rabies within the exact time indicated by Pasteur, the two rabbits on whom inoculation had been performed at the same time were found to present the first symptoms of rabic paralysis. “This paralysis,” noted Bouley, “is revealed by great weakness of the limbs, particularly of the hind quarters; the least shock knocks them over and they experience great difficulty in getting up again.” The second new dog on whom inoculation had been performed on June 1 was now also rabid; the refractory dogs were in perfect health.

During the whole of June, Pasteur found time to keep his daughter and son-in-law informed of the progress of events. “Keep my letters,” he wrote, “they are almost like copies of the notes taken on the experiments.”

Towards the end of the month, dozens of dogs were submitted to control-experiments which were continued until August. The dogs which Pasteur declared to be refractory underwent all the various tests made with rabic virus; bites, injections into the veins, trephining, everything was tried before Pasteur would decide to call them vaccinated. On June 17, Bourrel sent word that the new dog bitten on June 3 was becoming rabic; the members of the Commission went to the Rue Fontaine-au-Roi. The period of incubation had only lasted fourteen days, a fact attributed by Bouley to the bites having been chiefly about the head. The dog was destroying his kennel and biting his chain ferociously. More new dogs developed rabies the following days. Nineteen new dogs had been experimented upon: three died out of six bitten by a rabid dog, six out of eight after intravenous inoculation, and five out of five after subdural inoculation. Bouley thought that a few more cases might occur, the period of incubation after bites being so extremely irregular.

Bouley’s report was sent to the Minister of Public Instruction at the beginning of August. “We submit to you to-day,” he wrote, “this report on the first series of experiments that we have just witnessed, in order that M. Pasteur may refer to it in the paper which he proposes to read at the Copenhagen International Scientific Congress on these magnificent results, which devolve so much credit on French Science and which give it a fresh claim to the world’s gratitude.”

The Commission wished that a large kennel yard might be built, in order that the duration of immunity in protected dogs might be timed, and that other great problem solved, viz., whether it would be possible, through the inoculation of attenuated virus, to defy the virus from bites.

By the Minister’s request, the Commission investigated the Meudon woods in search of a favourable site; an excellent place was found in the lower part of the Park, away from dwelling houses, easy to enclose and presumably in no one’s way. But, when the inhabitants of Meudon heard of this project, they protested vehemently, evidently terrified at the thought of rabid dogs, however securely bound, in their peaceful neighbourhood.

Another piece of ground was then suggested to Pasteur, near St. Cloud, in the Park of Villeneuve l’Etang. Originally a State domain, this property had been put up for sale, but had found no buyer, not being suitable for parcelling out in small lots; the Bill was withdrawn which allowed of its sale and the greater part of the domain was devoted by the Ministry to Pasteur’s and his assistants’ experiments on the prophylaxis of contagious diseases.