302 BACTERIA IN THE SPUTA 



The following were the elements found in the sputum : a fair 

 number of red blood corpuscles, both isolated and in small clusters ; 

 here and there a great gathering of ellipsoidal epithelia (so-called 

 alveolar), mostly with a coat of granules of myelin, and a few free 

 particles of the same ; many cylindrical and vibratile epithelia of 

 the air passages ; the usual buccal epithelia ; a few slender and 

 short spires of Curschmann ; myriads of uncapsulated pneumo- 

 cocci, generally in vast cumuli ; small well-defined groups of 

 capsulated pneumococci, after type in Fig. 4, /; various other 

 forms of bacteria and bacilli ; filaments, and even tufts, of Lep- 

 toihrix ; groups and large cumuli of spores and sprouts of oidium 

 ( Oidiiwi ladis ?) . 



As it is my custom to keep the sputa for whole weeks in 

 order to repeat my investigations, on the seventh day after col- 

 lecting this sputum I detected in it fragments of fructifications, 

 which I could perfectly well recognise. 'I then thought of remov- 

 ing a particle of the patina of the sputum, which was adhering to 

 the internal wall of the tube, to that side on which I had always 

 inchned it, in collecting the specimens. There the layer of the 

 mAicus was very thin and wet, the tube being accurately closed. 

 This mucous patina, having been adhesive and undisturbed for 

 several days, ought to have preserved nearly the same conditions 

 favourable to the fructification of Leptothrix, as seen on the 

 patina of the teeth. That layer appeared to the naked eye opaque 

 and greyish, like a very delicate mould. 



The result of that research could not have been more satisfac- 

 tory, as Fig. 16 shows. It extends over two visual fields (magnified 

 850 diameters), and the colouring of ears with gentian violet 

 is very striking, the particle of the sputum having been immersed 

 for two hours in the liquid stain, then washed and mounted in dis- 

 tilled water. It will be observed at a glance that the bundle of ears 

 has been severed in two groups : in the superior one, A, all the 

 stalks are preserved; in the inferior, B^ only five are visible. The 

 fructifications or part of them, as well as the missing stalks, were 

 spread here and there over the surrounding visual fields. The 

 inferior group, B^ has been pressed sideways by the cover-glass, 

 and lies in profile with its base down ; the superior one, A^ has 

 been pressed down vertically by the cover-glass, and is conse- 



