39 



turned out not to be growths at all, but to be merely 

 typical septic nodules or deposits, and the cavity on 

 the base of the tongue was just the result of one of 

 these superficial submucous deposits having been quite 

 recently broken away. This case was a good example 

 of the rapidity with which these septic deposits can 

 be formed. 



The following cases occurring in pigeons are also 

 illustrative of this rapidity. In April 1903 a two year 

 old pigeon, bought the previous January, while feed- 

 ing young began to walk about with his crop all flabby, 

 sat about on the floor, and rapidly became very weak. 

 Respiration was hurried ; food was taken fairly well, 

 but the bird steadily wasted away. On being held 

 upside down a quantity of greenish watery fluid with 

 an exceedingly foul smell would drop out of the 

 mouth. There was constant diarrhoea, the excreta 

 being profuse and gelatinous in appearance. On the 

 i^tk day of the illness the bird died, and its owner, a 

 medical man, sent the body to a veterinary surgeon 

 for examination. His report was " tuberculosis," In 

 the June following another Cropper in the same loft 

 suffered from exactly the same symptoms and died on 

 the loth day of the attack. The next day I made an 

 examination. The body was much emaciated, the 

 vent feathers very dirty, the spleen much enlarged and 

 full of nodules. The liver was also nodulated and the 

 intestines much discoloured. IMicroscopical examin- 

 ation of films (stained by the Ziehl-Neelson method) 

 failed to show any tubercle bacilli, but did reveal dense 

 crowds of septic bacilli in the spleen and a few in the 

 heart blood. 



Here is another instructive history. A prominent 

 Pouter fancier bought some ordinary Homer pigeons 

 to serve as foster parents for his young Pouters. 

 Among these was a hen " in bad health, with soft, 

 sticky, and yellowish green droppings." After being 



