Cyon, Elias de, 99, Boulevard Haussmann, Paris. Prof. Physiology Univ. St. Petersburg; Mem. Acad. of Med. St. Petersburg.
Author of “Die Lehre von der Tabes dorsualis kritisch und experimentelle erläutert,” Berlin, 1867; “Principes d’électrothérapie,” Paris, 1867; “Methodik der physiologischen Experimente und Vivisectionen, mit Atlas,” Giessen, Leipsig, 1876; “Recherches expérimentales sur les fonctions des canaux semi-circulaires et sur leur rôle dans la formation de la notion de l’espace,” Paris, 1878; Bibl. de l’École des Hautes Études, section des Sciences Nat., Vol. XVIII., Art. 1—(Experiments on pigeons, dogs, rabbits, and lampreys made in the laboratory of Claude Bernard.)
Experimented in his private Laboratory at St. Petersburg in 1874; also in Ludwig’s Laboratory at Leipsig; in his own Laboratory, and that of Claude Bernard, at Paris. To observe the action excited by barometrical pressure upon the organism, he placed animals in the iron cylinder invented by Paul Bert, but improved upon the latter in such a way that the arteries of the animal were brought into communication with a manometer placed outside, and the nerves of the animal could be acted upon by an electric current.
… “The effect of such a division of the semi-circular canals is appalling. It is impossible to convey any exact idea of the unceasing movements of the pigeon; it can neither stand, nor lie down, nor fly, nor perform any systematic movements whatever, nor retain for an instant even any position in which it may be placed.…. To keep alive pigeons which have been thus operated upon I have wrapped them in a napkin, so as to prevent even oscillations of the head. Thus pinioned I placed them in a hammock, specially constructed for pigeons having had the semi-circular canals severed. Notwithstanding these precautions, it has frequently happened that I have found the pigeons dead in a corner of the laboratory.… So violent were the muscular contractions, that though enfolded in a napkin, the pigeons still managed to throw themselves out of the hammock, and roll on to the ground till fatal injuries to the brain ended their sufferings.”—“Functions des canaux,” etc.; Bibl. de l’École des Hautes Études, Section des Sciences Naturelles, Vol. XVIII., pp. 45-46.
“The medical man who speaks with horror of the torture of animals in physiological experiments, will do well to remember how often he has prescribed most repulsive, and not always safe treatment for a patient, in order to obtain some insight into how it was likely to act. Many a surgical operation is performed, less for the benefit of the patient than for the service of science; and the utility of the knowledge aimed at thereby is often much more trifling than that attained by Vivisection of an animal.”—Methodik, p. 8.
“The true vivisector must approach a difficult vivisection with the same joyful excitement, with the same delight, with which a surgeon undertakes a difficult operation, from which he expects extraordinary consequences. He who shrinks from cutting into a living animal, he who approaches a vivisection as a disagreeable necessity, may very likely be able to repeat one or two vivisections, but will never become an artist in vivisection. He who cannot follow some fine nerve-thread, scarcely visible to the naked eye, into the depths, if possible sometimes tracing it to a new branching, with joyful alertness for hours at a time; he who feels no enjoyment when at last, parted from its surroundings and isolated, he can subject that nerve to electrical stimulation; or when, in some deep cavity, guided only by the sense of touch of his finger-ends, he ligatures and divides an invisible vessel—to such a one there is wanting that which is most necessary for a successful vivisector. The pleasure of triumphing over difficulties held hitherto insuperable is always one of the highest delights of the vivisector. And the sensation of the physiologist, when from a gruesome wound, full of blood and mangled tissue, he draws forth some delicate nerve-branch, and calls back to life a function which was already extinguished—this sensation has much in common with that which inspires a sculptor, when he shapes forth fair living forms from a shapeless mass of marble.”—Methodik, 1876, p. 15.
“The description given by Cyon of the method of operation (Methodik, p. 510) is as follows: ‘The rabbit is firmly fastened to the ordinary vivisecting table by means of Czermak’s holder. Then the rabbit’s head is held by the left hand, so that the thumb of that hand rests on the condyle of the lower jaw. This is used as a point d’appui for the insertion of the knife.… To reach the hollow of the temple the instrument must be guided forward and upward, thus avoiding the hard portion of the temporal bone and leading the knife directly into the cranial cavity.… The trigeminus then comes under the knife. Now holding the head of the animal very firmly, the blade of the knife is directed backwards and downwards, and pressed hard in this direction against the base of the skull. The nerve is then generally cut behind the Gasserian ganglion, which is announced by a violent cry of agony (einen heftigen Schmerzensschrei) of the animal.’”
“When I published my treatise on physiological methods and the art of vivisection four years ago, several of my colleagues of the English Universities entreated me not to announce my work in any of the English newspapers, as they feared that public opinion might be still more aroused.”—Letter to the Gaulois, December, 1881.
Czermak, Johann Nepomuk. B. at Prague in Bohemia, 1828; Med. and Chir. Doct.; formerly Prof. Univs. Cracow and Pesth; Prof. Univ. Prague, 1860; Prof. Physiol. Univ. Jena, 1865; Prof. Univ. Leipsig, 1870; founded Physiological Laboratories in each of the above Universities; inventor of the laryngoscope, and also of several instruments for securing animals during vivisection.
Author of “Beschreibung einiger Vorrichtungen zu physiologischen Zwecken,” Vienna, 1865; “Nachweis der Erscheinung der sogenannten Pulsverspätung beim Frosche, und das Verfahren der selbe wahrzunehmen,” Vienna, 1865; “Populäre physiologische vorträge gehalten im akademischen Rosensaale zu Jena,” 1867-1869; “Die Physiologie als allgemeines Bildungselement,” Leipsig, 1870; “Ueber Schopenhauer’s Theorie der Farbe,” Vienna, 1870; “Der electrische Doppelhebel,” Leipsig, 1871; “Ueber das Herz u. den Einfluss des Nervensystems auf dasselbe,” Leipsig, 1871; “Nachweiss echter hypnotischen Erscheinungen bei Thieren,” Vienna, 1873; “Ueber das Ohr und das Hören;” “Ueber das physiologische Privat-Laboratorium an der Universität Leipsig,” Leipsig, 1873.