Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 76.djvu/345

Rh escaped detection during a century of its existence known to Europeans, was at last seen by Dr. Forde, in 1901. It was Dutton, however, who first recognized that the little flagellate in the blood of Dr. Forde's patient was a trypanosome, similar to those which cause disease in lower animals. Dutton was the first to give full details regarding the character of the organism, to describe the symptoms produced by it and to give it the name it still holds.

The Liverpool school has sent four expeditions to study sleeping sickness. The experimental work which was carried on in England was begun in 1903 with material brought back from the Gambia by Dutton. At first the researches were conducted in Liverpool, but as the work expanded and the material increased, it became necessary to find a place in the country where the work could be more fittingly carried on. Such a place was found at Crofton Lodge and Cottages in Runcorn, a town sixteen miles from Liverpool. There, in a roomy rambling old country house beside a sunken road, with two tall holly trees guarding the entrance, might be found at one time research workers from India, Russia, Austria, Canada and the United States, who kept at their work from early morning until nearly midnight, and occasionally all night.

The most important experimental work of the laboratories in Liverpool and in Runcorn has been the search for a cure for sleeping sickness. These investigations were begun by Dr. Thomas, who was the first to use and recommend atoxyl, the remedy which Koch used later in Africa with so much temporary success. Although the little animal disappears from the blood and the fever subsides after the use