786 EXPERIMENT STATION EECOKD. 



" The chief distinguishing features of the disease are anemia, weakness, 

 emaciation and edema, conjunctival ecchymoses, conjunctivitis, pyrexia, and 

 some posteria paresis. The pathological findings are constant and characteristic : 

 Splenic capsular ecchymoses; acute hemorrrhagic nephritis, with acute glomeru- 

 litis and petchiiB; hemorrhages in renal lymph nodes; epicardial and endocardial 

 ecchymoses; and less constantly pleural, peritoneal, and conjunctival ecchy- 

 moses, and pleural effusion. The blood changes are those of anemia with 

 lymphocytosis. There is much phagocytosis of blood pigment by endothelial 

 cells of the liver and spleen. 



" The disease is probably transmitted mechanically by flies through the broken 

 skin of cuts and various wounds. Saddle horses were not infected, and there 

 are no evidences that any animals were infected by means of Stomoxys or 

 tabanids or by ticks or bats. 



" The epidemic, which threatened to destroy several hundred mules and 

 horses, has been controlled (there having been no new case in 6 months) by 

 detection of infected animals, by means of daily routine temperature records 

 throughout the corral, the microscopic examination of the blood of all animals 

 having a temperature above 100° F., the isolation in screened stables of infected 

 animals or suspects, and the sacrifice of all infected animals." 



The probable mode of infection and the methods used in controlling' an 

 outbreak of equine trypanosomiasis (murrina) in the Panama Canal Zone, 

 S. T. Darling {Parasitology, J, {1911), No. 2, pp. 83-86').— The information 

 here presented is included in the account above noted. 



Investigations of Beschalseuche, Zwick and Fischeb (Ar&. K. Gsndhtsamt., 

 36 {1910), No. 1, pp. 1-103, flgs. 22, charts 2^; abs. in Sleeping Sickness Bur. 

 [London] Bid., 3 {1911), No. 23, pp. 28-31).— The authors point out that this 

 disease of horses has been prevalent at times in Germany and other parts of 

 Europe for the last 100 years. The following conclusions arrived at are based 

 on examinations of 26 infected horses: 



" Beschalseuche is caused by trypanosomes' which in their essential char- 

 acteristics correspond with Trypanosoma equiperdum. These trypanosomes are, 

 like those of dourine, transmissible to small experimental animals, as well as 

 to cats, dogs, and horses. They produce in these animals a disease picture 

 which completely corresponds with that of artificially produced dourine. Sheep 

 also have shown themselves susceptible to infection ; on the other hand, several 

 attempts made to infect a goat and a cow failed. Beschalseuche and dourine 

 are essentially identical diseases. The trypanosomes in pregnant animals sick 

 of Beschalseuche can pass from the mother to the young. Beschalseuche does 

 not spread except by coitus; the transmission of the disease in natural condi- 

 tions does not occur by intermediaries (biting flies). For demonstrations of 

 the trypanosomes in horses suspected of the disease one may use, (1) the 

 microscopical examination of the mucous membrane of the vagina and urethra, 

 as well as of the fluid contents of the local skin swellings as soon as possible 

 after their appearance, and moreover cultures in blood bouillon; (2) inoculation 

 under the skin or the peritoneum of white mice, guinea pigs, rabbits, and dogs 

 of the fluid contents of these specific skin swellings and, according to the size of 

 the experimental animals, of larger or smaller quantities of defibrinated and 

 centrifuged blood diluted with physiological salt solution. Agglutination and 

 the fixation of complement are not, as far as observations go, suitable methods 

 for diagnosis of Beschalseuche. The serum of a horse suffering from Beschal- 

 seuche and of 2 sheep artificially infected with Beschiilseuche trypanosomes ex- 

 ercised a protective action in white mice, which was not, however, quite reliable 

 against an otherwise lethal infection with the trypanosomes of Beschalseuche 

 and dourine. This serum does not protect, however, against such an infection 

 with nagana typauosomes. 



