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harmless or of a non-pathogenic species? Malarial parasites may be 
found, upon repeated examinations, for months in the blood of indi- 
viduals living in malarial zones, without chills and fever, or without 
any other recognizable departure from health; trypanosomata may be 
present for long periods of time in apparently healthy cattle, carabaos, 
guinea pigs, or rabbits; filaria may be observed for years in the circulat- 
ing blood before clinical symptoms develop; but in these cases no one 
would argue, for example, that the malarial parasite was a harmless 
commensal. 
In discussing the question whether amcoebe multiply in the normal 
intestine we wish, before detailing our new work, once more to call atten- 
tion to our original communication in which we concluded that, while 
amoebee may occasionally be found in stools from a healthy person, the 
fact of their proliferation in a normal bowel for a period greater than the 
longest incubation period of the disease, had not been proved. In view 
of the statements of Schaudinn, Craig, and others, that amocebe are so 
prevalent in the intestines of healthy people, we have again studied 
several series of cases occurring in all classes of people found in these 
Islands, and have been unable to find evidence requiring us to change our 
previous conclusions. Indeed, we could not in a single examination of 
the feces, find amcebe in 70 per cent of real cases of dysentery, to say 
nothing of examinations of healthy people. 
These series, which have been undertaken to determine the prevalence 
of amoebe in the intestine, have not dealt with the question of whether 
or not this situation is a normal one. ‘The series are as follows: 
(1) Five hundred and eighty-seven cases from Bilibid Prison Hospital, includ- 
ing all nationalities, were examined. Ameebiasis is quite prevalent in this prison. 
Of these 154 contained ameebe, or 26+ per cent. Of 38 consecutive autopsies from 
the same hospital during the time the above examinations were being made, 16 or 
42+ per cent showed ameebic infection of the colon. 
(2) In another series of 100 cases, three examinations were made from one 
week to ten days apart; of these 39 contained amebe, or 39 per cent. 
(3) Of 318 American patients in the Civil Hospital, mostly admitted because 
of some gastro-intestinal disturbance, 57 were positive, or 14+ per cent; among 
69 native patients in same hospital, 11 were positive or 17+ per cent, 
(4) Of 143 stools of American patients examined in the clinical laboratory of 
St. Paul’s Hospital, by Mr. O. Lindquist, resident pathologist to the hospital, 
44 per cent were positive; among 217 native patients, 31 per cent were positive. 
These examinations were largely among patients suffering with diarrhea or 
dysentery. 
(5) Of thirty examinations in the biological laboratory by other members of the 
staff from stools sent in, as a general rule, by private patients suffering from 
dysentery or diarrhoea, 7 were positive, or 23+ per cent, 
In addition to differences in the percentage of infections discovered 
by stool examination, which differences must at least in part be due to 
the personal equation when the examinations are conducted among 
