Emanuel Edward Klein—The Father of British Microbiology and the Case of the Animal Vivisection Controversy of 1875

Introduction

The new Appendix A of the European Convention for the Protection of Vertebrate Animals Used for Experimental and Other Scientific Purposes, which gives guidelines for accommodation and care of animals, was approved by the multilateral consultation in Strasbourg on June 15, 2006. It starts with the definition of the primary animal accommodation such as a cage, pen, run, and stall as well as secondary animal accommodation such as holding rooms and containment systems. It gives thorough instructions for the physical facilities, the environment, the education and training of staff, and care for laboratory animals. It continues with the description of the specificities of breeding of the most common groups of laboratory animals, including rodents (mice, rats, gerbils, hamsters, guinea pigs, and rabbits), cats, dogs, ferrets, nonhuman primates (marmosets, tamarins, squirrel monkeys, baboons), farm animals (cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, and minipigs), birds (fowls, turkeys, quails, ducks, geese, pigeons, zebra finch), amphibians, reptiles, and fishes. This sophisticated regulation comprises 109 written pages (Appendix A 2006). Although it gives the required guidelines for the contemporary laboratory researches, the appendix does not say anything about the origination of the regulations for animal experiments. This was the main reason we decided to describe the animal vivisection controversy of 1875 and the role of Emanuel Edward Klein in it, because it was the starting point for all regulations of animal experiments. Emanuel Edward Klein (1844–1925) was a British microbiologist of Croatian origin (Figure 1). He completed his medical degree in Vienna, Austria, in 1869, where he studied under the physiologist Ernst Wilhelm von Brücke (1819–1892) and the pathologist Salomon Stricker (1834–1898) (Fatović-Ferenčić 2008; Mortimer 1999). Brücke was appointed as an active teacher and head of the Institute of Physiology as the chair of physiology and higher microscopic anatomy at the University of Vienna in the summer of 1849. The School of Physiology, which he founded in Vienna, eventually extended its influence far beyond the Austrian borders. Many of the most accomplished physiologists of the next generation were trained in Brücke’s laboratory. Sigmund Freud, who worked there from 1876 to 1882, considered that Brücke was the most respected teacher and the greatest authority in the field that he had ever known. Stricker, on the other hand, became a research assistant at the Institute of Physiology under Brücke and later the head of the Institute of General and Experimental Pathology in Vienna. He dedicated himself to research in histology and experimental pathology and is credited with the discovery of diapedesis of erythrocytes (Lesky 1965). The work of both Carl Heitzmann and Carl Koller was directly linked to Stricker’s experimental designs, although this is far less known in the published literature. By demonstrating ad oculus the world of capillaries, diapedesis of blood cells, and cell division in vivo, Stricker paved the way for investigations in immunology and allergy (Holubar 1987). Among his written works is the 1871 Handbuch der Lehre von den Geweben des Menschen und der Thiere, a two-volume textbook containing his essays on histology along with the works of the several other eminent physicians. At the time, it was considered one of the greatest histology textbooks. Stricker and Brücke were Klein’s mentors, who inspired his experimental work in science and medicine and determined his research interests and direction.

The crucial moment in Klein’s life was his visit to England, where he was sent in 1869 to determine the terms for the translation of Samuel Stricker’s manual Handbuch der Lehere von den Geweben des Menchen und der Thiere, in which he himself had authored two chapters, one on the termination of the fine nerves in the tadpole’s tail and the other on the development of the blood vessels in the chicken embryo. During the visit, he made such a favorable impression on John Burdon-Sanderson (1828–1905) and John Simon (1816–1904) that they invited him to London in 1871 to conduct investigations under their guidance. Klein accepted the invitation and as soon as 1873 was appointed assistant professor of comparative pathology at the Brown Animal Sanatory Institution in London (Franklin 2000). In the same year, upon an invitation from Sir William Savory (1826–1895), Klein began his collaboration with Saint Bartholomew’s Hospital, London, where he was appointed joint professor of general anatomy and physiology (Andrews 1925). He was a diligent researcher and wrote around 260 scientific papers on different topics in the fields of anatomy, histology, pathology, embryology, and physiology. However, his greatest contributions were in the science of microbiology. His handbook Micro-organisms and Diseases, published in 1884, was the first microbiological handbook written in English and made Pasteur’s and Koch’s bacteriological discoveries, published in French and German journals, available for the first time to English and American scientists (Mortimer 1999). Klein established the standards for microbiological research by insisting on microscopical identification, cultural isolation, and animal inoculation as the three phases necessary in establishing the connection between a specific germ and a specific disease. Due to the breadth of his research, rigorous implementation of Continental European improvements, and continuous education of future microbiologists, microbiology in Britain became an established field of science, and Klein became known as the “father of British microbiology” (Lambert 1963).

Medicine and science as disciplines reflect the specific culture, and specific times in which they are produced. The profile of a physician-scientist, as well as his worldview, is shaped accordingly (Fatović-Ferenčić 2004). The second half of the nineteenth century was characterized by the rise of “positivism,” which, under the influence of development of basic sciences, redirected the interest of physicians from bedside medicine toward laboratory practice. Laboratory and experimental work in specific circumstances, dictated by the development of science and new scientific methodology, became a new source of fascination for physicians at the turn of the twentieth century (Cunningham and Williams 1992). In this sense, the work of the French physician, Claude Bernard (1813–1878), was paradigmatic. Bernard established the use of the scientific method in medicine and relied on experimentation as the key to scientific progress. Texts and books did not suffice anymore, and future physicians were encouraged to better understand the working of internal organs through actual visualization of vital actions in the living animal.

Emanuel Edward Klein, the key figure of the 1875 vivisection controversy, is a typical representative of experimentalists of that time when the norms of scientists’ behavior toward experimental subjects and protection of animals had not yet existed. Klein’s appeal before the Royal Commission on Vivisection for Scientific Purposes in 1875 and the view of him as a monstrous vivisectionist marked the beginning of ethical concerns over the quality of life for animals and of the public interest in the welfare of research animals.

The Notorious Handbook

After the series of lectures “On the Propriety of Using the Lower Animals for the Purpose of Experimentation” given by Sanderson at the University College London, a textbook was produced in 1873 titled Handbook for the Physiological Laboratory and published in London (Burdon-Sanderson 1873). The editors included John Burdon-Sanderson, professor of practical physiology at the University College London; Edward Emanuel Klein, assistant professor in the Pathological Laboratory of the Brown Institution in London; Michael Foster (1810–1880), fellow and praelector of physiology at the Trinity College Cambridge; and Thomas Lauder Brunton (1844–1916), lecturer on Materia Medica at the Medical College of Saint Bartholomew’s Hospital in London. The experiments on the animals described in the Handbook were conducted at University College London, Cambridge University, Edinburgh University, and the Brown Institution. The first volume contained detailed instructions for performing dozens of classical experiments in physiology, previously described by French physiologists Francois Magendie and Claude Bernard, whereas the second volume contained 123 plates illustrating the experiments. The editors’ preface emphasized that the Handbook was intended for beginners in physiological work and laboratory methods, rather than ordinary students. The Handbook consisted of 600 pages, 353 illustrations, and 123 plates. Klein’s histological and embryological section contained 163 pages on microscopic tissue morphology, methods of obtaining and preparing tissue samples from living animals or preserved material with and without the use of various reagents, methods of staining and hardening materials, and cutting frozen or waxed sections and was enriched with 189 engravings. Klein’s contribution was divided into two parts. In the first part, he described the preparation of the elementary tissues, with chapters on blood corpuscles, epithelium and endothelium, connective tissues, muscular tissue, and tissues of the nervous system; while the second part described the preparation of the compound tissues and consisted of chapters on methods, vascular system, lymphatic system, organs of respiration, organs of digestion, skin, cutaneous glands, urogenital system, special sense organs, inflamed tissues, and embryology. Burdon-Sanderson authored chapters on blood analysis, circulation, respiration, and animal heath; Foster described neuromuscular functions; and Brunton wrote on digestion and secretion.

Although the Handbook was the first comprehensive text on physiology to be published in Britain, its scientific success was almost totally overshadowed by the public outrage over the animal vivisections described within its pages. Burdon-Sanderson and Klein received the greatest criticism from antivivisectionists, because they authored the majority of the painful experiments—15% of all experiments described in the book—without any mention of using anesthesia, despite the fact that ether and chloroform had been in use since the 1840s (Jesse 2008). Klein described experiments on tadpoles, frogs, lizards, snakes, chickens, geese, ducks, rats, rabbits, guinea pigs, calves, pigs, sows, hedgehogs, cats, and dogs. An illustration of the cold precision with which Klein writes is typified by his description regarding the investigation of the histology of the eye, where the cornea of a living frog was to be scraped with a sharp cataract knife, so as to remove the epithelium completely. To examine Peyer’s follicles with wax mass, a cat, dog, or rabbit was to be starved for a day or two, then fed with milk or fat meat, and finally strangled. To produce inflammatory changes in liver cells, a needle was to be inserted into the liver and the animal killed 24 to 48 hours after the injury (Richards 1987).

The Royal Commission on Vivisection for Scientific Purposes

In 1875, the Royal Commission on Vivisection for Scientific Purposes, presided over by Lord Cardwell, was established in response to the animal experiments described in the Handbook, with a goal to set acceptable standards for animal research for the times. Klein was questioned, together with other authors, in 1876; and the testimonies were published in the Blue Book, the term applied to all nineteenth-century parliamentary papers, on account of their being bound with a blue cover (Jesse 2008). Burdon-Sanderson was questioned on the animal experiments that he had performed without the use of anesthetics or with the use of curare. On one occasion, he exclaimed that, during his education in France, Claude Bernard was “the most inspiring teacher, the most profound scientific thinker, and the most remarkable experimental physiologist he had ever known”; and he even paraphrased Francois Magendie’s statement on the “long and ghastly kitchen.” In his own defense, he stated that the book had always been intended for professionals and not for students (Richards 1987). Foster claimed that his approach had always been to avoid pain and that he would be more careful in his future studies. Brunton was questioned on his animal experiments on ninety cats, but he proved that he had used anesthesia and had avoided the use of curare. It seemed that Klein, as a foreigner, did not know how to respond appropriately before the Commission, as may be inferred from the following excerpt:

Although Klein sent a revised version of his statement, when he finally realized the mistake he had made in speaking so candidly, it was already too late. The Commission decided to publish both of his statements, and the image of a cruel vivisectionist was created in the eyes of the general public, despite his friends’ claims that he was actually fond of animals, especially dogs (Bulloch 1925). Consequently, the image of Klein as a prototype of a monstrous vivisectionist remained unchanged until his death in 1925. He was unreservedly attacked by the older generation of physicians and surgeons, who perceived medicine as an empirical, rather than experimental, discipline with a purpose to educate gentlemen and not scientists. Such a reaction was understandable, particularly if we keep in mind that physiology in Britain at that time was increasingly seen as a separate scientific discipline, characterized by distinct academic culture and a jealous pursuit of its autonomous disciplinary goals (Sturdy 2007). Klein was also condemned by radical groups like the suffragettes, antivivisectionists, and the socialists, united in the fear that human vivisections were the next step in this natural progression (Lansbury 1985). This gave rise to the numerous pamphlets printed denouncing him and his practices (Barlow-Kennett n.d.).

As the result of this controversy, two societies were formed. On the one side, the Victorian Street Society for the Protection of Animals Liable to Vivisection was formed by Frances Cobbe and Doctor Hogan in London in 1875. It effectively united eminent members from very different sides of the British Victorian Society in the fight for the same goal. The most prominent members were, among others, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Westminster, Henry Edward Cardinal Manning; the Archbishop of York, William IX Thompson; the Lord Chief Justice of England, Sir Alexander Cockburn; Prince Lucien Bonaparte of France; Princess Eugenie of Sweden; Alfred Lord Tennyson; Robert Browning; and John Ruskin (Vyvyan 1969).

On the other side was the Physiological Society, whose aim was the promotion of experimental research. It was founded in 1876 by, among others, Charles Darwin, Francis Maitland Balfour, Thomas Lauder Brunton, Francis Darwin, Michael Foster, Francis Galton, W. H. Gaskell, Thomas Henry Huxley, Emanuel Edward Klein, F. W. Pavy, Henry Power, P. H. Pye-Smith, William Rutherford, Sir Edward Sharpey-Schafer, Gerald F. Yeo, and C. Yule (Sharpey-Schafer 1927).

It is obvious that this case of vivisection controversy was primarily the confrontation of the two worlds with opposed views—one, a conservative aristocratic class prone to the Oxford movement and the Natural theology (Vyvyan 1969); and the other, a progressive bourgeois class as an advocate of the theory of evolution, still controversial at the time. To make a civilizing step forward, having a public discussion in an official place does not suffice and a wider context is required, not the least of which is the approval of the public. In this particular case, in which vivisection controversially came to the attention of the public, popular fiction played an important role in the propagation of the stereotypical image of a scientist.

One outcome from the publicity was the publication of three gothic novels supposedly inspired by Klein’s character, namely, the novel Paul Faber, Surgeon (the character of Surgeon Paul Faber) by George MacDonald in 1878; The Professor’s Wife (the character of Physiologist Eric Grant) by Leonard Graham in 1881; and Heart and Science (the character of Assistant Ovid Vere) by Wilkie Collins in 1883. These novels described a new type of a scientist whose characters were heavily modeled on that of Emanuel Edward Klein. However, the use of language, and the fact that stereotypically negative characteristics (hypnotist and sadist) were combined with ethnic affiliation (German and Jewish), and anticlerical elements (evolutionist and atheist), speak more about the British Victorian xenophobia than about Klein himself.

The outcome of the whole controversy was the passage through the English Parliament of the Cruelty to Animals Act, which was based upon the investigations of the 1876 Royal Commission Report. The Act stipulated that vivisection could be performed only by persons holding a valid license, issued by the home secretary, upon the advice of the responsible authorities. For special experiments, which might involve pain, or in which anesthetics could not be used during the course of the experiment, special certificates limiting the number and defining the scope of such experiments had to be obtained and signed by the same authorities, and the operation of these special certificates was subjected to the veto of the home secretary at any time (Sharpey-Schafer 1927).

Discussion and Conclusion

It is obvious from Klein’s words that he was completely insensitive to the pain of the animals that he used in his experiments. Throughout the hearing he expressed his personal attitudes, and insensitivity, toward animals openly and without any reservation, and at no time did he attempt to present himself in a different, more sympathetic light. It is evident that he was unaware that the methods he used in his experiments, and particularly that his goals (scientific truth), violated almost every moral, and scientific, norm operated at the time. On one hand, animal lovers pictured him as a monstrous vivisectionist (Vyvyan 1969), while on the other hand, he himself contributed to this decidedly unfavorable image by bluntly expressing his attitudes toward vivisection. The probable truth was that Klein had almost certainly been heavily influenced by the Jennerian tradition of connecting diseases of humans with animals, and as a consequence focused almost exclusively on continuous animal experiments (Andrews 1925). The experiment in which he described himself and Lingard feeding fowls with putrid lungs of dead humans to see if consumption could be transmitted that way was doubtlessly unnecessary in its design and operation. On the other hand, that project had been funded with half of an annual Brown Sanatory Institution grant of 2,000 GBP in 1875 and was described in the Supplement to the Sixteenth Annual Report of the Local Government Board (M.R.C.S. 1889). Given that there were no manuals, or rules, on laboratory animal management and welfare at the time, this paradoxical dichotomy, encountered in practice, is perhaps more understandable.

Despite Klein’s considerable contributions and pioneering work in a number of research areas, especially those of anatomy, histology, physiology, embryology, and microbiology, the aura of a cruel vivisectionist continued to follow him even after his death. For example, Waddington (2003) believed that Klein’s actions inflicted huge damage on the development of physiology and stated that he had “no regard at all” for the suffering of laboratory animals. He further characterized Klein as undiplomatic, blunt, and unpopular. Bulloch (1938) emphasized Klein’s individual, dogmatic, and polemic character. Richards (1987) tried to place Klein’s approaches into the context provided by a European attitude to his vivisections and showed that the same experiments were being conducted by physiologists on the European mainland at the same time as those working in Britain, even though public attitudes differed considerably between the two localities. Finally, Worboys (2000) attempted to balance the aforementioned extreme opinions by emphasizing the very positive contribution that Klein’s experimental work had on the popularization of bacteriology in public health, surgery, and medicine.

If we put Klein’s testimony, and particularly his attitudes expressed before the Royal Commission, into a historical perspective, we might say that they were part of the scientific philosophy shared by the majority of scientists at that moment in time. For example, Francois Magendie (1783–1855), generally regarded as the father of modern physiology, commented on Klein’s vivisections as follows: “If I were to look for a smile that would express my feelings about the science of life, I should say that it was a superb salon, glittering with light, to which the only entrance is through a long and horrible kitchen” (Vyvyan 1969). Magendie’s immediate successor in the Chair of Medicine at the College de France, Claude Bernard (1813–1878), stated that “the physiologist is not an ordinary man; he is a scientist, possessed and absorbed by the scientific idea that he pursues. He does not hear the cries of animals, he does not see their flowing blood, he sees nothing but his idea, and is aware of nothing but an organism that conceals from him the problem he is seeking to resolve” (Vyvyan 1969).

Klein’s contemporaries, Louis Pasteur (1822–1895) and Robert Koch (1843–1910), who were honored as scientific heroes in their countries, also performed vivisections as pivotal to their work and understanding (Dubois 1961; Brock 1988). Lansbury (1985) tried to explain the difference in attitudes toward vivisection in France and in Britain by invoking religious differences between the two countries. According to him, Catholic France was more open to animal vivisections, because physiologists were compared to priests and animal sacrifice, in pursuit of science, to mass sacrifice in pursuit of salvation. However, if we take Cardinal Manning as the most prominent member of the Victorian Street Society on the one side, and the president of the Society, Frances Cobbe, who was against animal vivisections but endorsed fox hunting, on the other, we can conclude that this observation is disputable. It would be more reasonable to explain French openness to animal vivisections through the influence of guillotine executions during French Revolution (1789–1799) and human autopsy during the apex of the Paris School of Clinical Medicine (1789–1848) and British condemnation of the same through the activity of oppressed groups such as workers, suffragettes, and nonconformists (Mason 1997). Mason (1997) drew the connection between vivisectionists, Oxbridge medical students, and conservatives on the one side and antivivisectionists, suffragettes, liberals, socialists, and radicals on the other. In the late nineteenth century, vivisection carried a broad definition, and individuals both inside and outside of the medical community in Europe, as well as in other parts of the world, considered vivisection to be a controversial issue. For example, Mary Putnam Jacoby’s (1842–1906) advocacy of vivisection was part of her effort to reform medical education but was also consistent with her political strategy aimed at allowing women to enter scientific practice and advancing women’s rights. She formulated a scientific identity in opposition to the sentimental Victorian femininity, rejecting a sympathetic and caring model of medicine invoked by many of her female peers (Bittel 2005). Klein’s advocacy of vivisection, on the other hand, was shaped by a continental experimental worldview with a single goal, which was a deeper commitment to the scientific enterprise and a strong belief that science offered solutions to the social problems of the day. Evidence in support of this is the fact that he performed an experiment on himself by drinking water infected with the Vibrio cholerae in July 1884 to prove that in itself it was not sufficient to cause cholera (Waller 2002).

The Handbook for the Physiological Laboratory, which became a case of controversy debated before the Royal Commission, was published 135 years ago. Guidelines for the use of animals in research have been changed almost out of recognition since those times. However, the current European Union directive on the use of animals in research has opened the debate all over again (Cressey 2008). While scientists are endeavoring to justify the importance of basic research, antivivisectionist groups are preparing to lobby for Europe to severely curtail or even end animal experiments. The controversy that started with Klein obviously still continues.