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serum of dysenteric patients and with immune serum from animals, he not only 
showed that these organisms differed from the dysentery bacillus he first isolated 
but that they apparently constituted a second variety or species. 
Therefore, Kruse was the first who drew attention to the variations 
in the agglutinability of the dysentery bacillus. On the basis of this 
distinction, and in spite of the similarity in morphology and in all cul- 
tural properties, known at that time, between Bacillus dysenterie and 
the organisna isolated from cases of institutional dysentery, he proposed 
to designate the latter as pseudo dysentery bacillus. 
The investigations of Spronck (6) seemed to confirm this distinction, he 
having isolated a similar organism from patients suffering with dysenterie symp- 
toms in Utrecht (Holland), in which, however, the clinical manifestations were 
not so typical as those encountered in acute, epidemic dysentery. However, 
Flexner (7) and later Vedder and Duval (8) opposed this view and emphasized 
the fact that the variation in agglutinability was only one of degree and that 
there was agreement in other properties. 
In September, 1902, Duval and Basset (9) reported on the etiology of the 
summer diarrheas of infants. From such cases they isolated an organism which 
they believed to be identical with B. dysenteriw not only in morphology, cultural 
features and pathogenesis, but also in its reaction with specific serum. Park and 
Dunham (10) next isolated an organism which produced indol in peptone solution 
and which, while it agreed in its agglutinative reactions with the Flexner strain 
found in Manila, differed in this respect from the one Shiga obtained in 
Japan. Hiss (11) and Klopstoek (12) endeavored to differentiate dysentery 
bacilli from typhoid and colon bacilli by taking advantage of the distinct reac- 
tion in fermentation. 
The studies of Lentz (14) and of Hiss and Russell (15) further emphasized the 
cultural distinctions between the different dysentery bacilli and the variations 
in their agglutinative reactions. These investigators found that two types of 
bacilli could be distinguished, one which fermented mannite and the other which 
did not cause acid production in this medium. The agglutinative reactions of 
these two types indicated further that the so-called “pseudo-dysentery” bacillus 
regularly fermented mannite, while the other, the original type of B. dysenteriae, 
was unable to act upon that substance. 
Martini and Lentz (13) a short time after, made additional studies upon the 
agglutination of these two varieties of dysentery bacilli, in which they employed 
the serum of a goat immunized to the “Shiga” strain of the bacillus. Their 
results are interesting in showing that such a serum agglutinates only the 
“Shiga’-“ Kruse” epidemic variety in high dilutions, but that some other 
strains of dysentery bacilli (all of which do not attack mannite) agglutinated 
in lower ones of 1:25 to 1:50. On the basis of this difference in agglutination 
and in behavior toward mannite, they uphold the distinctions proposed by Kruse 
between the so-called “dysentery” and “pseudo-dysentery” bacilli. 
Park and Carey (16) called attention to the fact that all varieties of dysentery 
bacilli (obtained from dysentery cases), which produce indol in large amount 
and which develop acid from mannite, distinetly differ in their agglutinative 
reactions from those which do not act upon mannite and which produce no indol, 
or only a trace of that substance. 
Gay (17), in a study of the types of dysentery bacilli in relation to bacteriolysis 
and serum therapy, repeated the experiments of Lentz and of Hiss and Russell 
aM RA tin 8 
