The characteristics of the spinal fluid in postdiphtheric paralysis has received scant attention in our own literature. There were no observations published in this country, as far as we could ascertain, until the report made previously by one of us (J. C. R.). Foreign workers, especially French clinicians, have published their investigations in a small number of cases. There has not been accumulated as yet, however, a sufficient amount of information on the subject to establish conclusively the cytologic and chemical alteration, if any, which may be encountered.
An exact knowledge of the condition of the spinal fluid in postdiphtheric paralysis is of some importance for two reasons: first, to determine the presence or absence of a reaction on the part of the meninges to the toxins of the diphtheria bacillus, and second, to assist in the differential diagnosis of this condition from certain other diseases which may be accompanied