BOTANY. 328 



plieric moisture is essential for its i)roductiou. The coloriug matter of 

 the bhie milk is not combined with the bacteria which may be present, 

 but is dissolved in the serum of the milk. A microscopic examination 

 shows Ifhe presence of small rod-like • bodies, which ultimately form 

 torula-like chains. According to Keelsen, the cells of the chain, which 

 he calls gonidia, remain dormant unless placed mi fresh milk, in which 

 case they germinate. Tommasi-Ciiidelli and Ivlebs have studied the 

 origin of malarial fever, and conclude that malarial affections which they 

 induced experimentally were produced by organisms which were in the 

 ground in malarial districts before the outbreak of the fever, and 

 whose transmission in the air could be directly observed under definite 

 conditions of dampness and moisture. The organism which greatly 

 resembles Bacillus suhtilis has been named B. malaruv. Hansen claims 

 the priority of having discovered the cause of leprosy to be an organ- 

 ism named Bacillus lepra. 



One of the most important pai)ers published during year is that of 

 Dr. Hans Buchner, On the experimental production of the Contagium of 

 Splenic Fever from Bacillus subtilis^ with observations on the introduction 

 of splenic fever through the organs of respiration. As i.s well known, 

 BaeiUus subtiUs, a common bacterial form found in decoctions of hay, 

 can scarcely be distinguislied iiiorpliologically from Bacillus anthracis, 

 which is supposed to produce splenic fever in dillerent animals. Buch- 

 ner undertook to ascertain whether, by varying the conditions of growth, 

 either of these two species miglit not be transformed into the other; 

 that is, B. antkra<iis might not become harmless when inoculated and 

 B. suhtilis might not produce splenic fever. He found by cultivation of 

 B. anthraeis in different solutions, as a solution of Liebig's extract of 

 meat, that it gradually lost its power of producing splenic fever when 

 inoculated, and at the end of what he calls 1,500 generations ot the 

 fungus he saw no difference, pathologically speaking, between the two 

 species in question. On the other hand, Bacillm subtiUs, whicji had for 

 a certain length of time been cultivated in defibrinated blood, w^hen in- 

 jected into different animals produced symptoms of splenic fever.' The 

 comparative distribution of bacteria in the air has been studied by Mi- 

 quel, who finds that they are much more numerous in summer than in 

 winter, and he states further that an increase of the amount of bacteria 

 is followed in a few days by an increase in the number of deaths from 

 contagious and epidemic diseases. The communications of Pasteur on 

 the cholera of fowls, and the etiology of splenic fever, and the means of 

 prophylaxis, belong rather to the department of pathology than botany. 

 A paper on the Cause of Blight in Pear Trees was read by Prof. T. J. Bur- 

 rell before the Am. Assoc. Adv. of Science, in which he attributed the 

 disease to the presence of a minute bacterial form. To a similar cause 

 it is also probable that the so-called yellows in peaches is to be attrib- 

 uted. Dr. George Sternberg, U. S. A., has issued a translation of Mag- 

 njn's Les Bacteries, to which he has added original notes and plates. 



