134 NEW YORK ZOOLOGICAL, SOCIETY: 
mates have been free from this disease. The experimental work 
along this line is not complete, but the facts already gathered 
are of importance. 
The examinations were conducted as follows: As soon after 
death as possible the animal was opened, the trachea from larynx 
to bifurcation was ligatured at each end-and removed. Smears 
and scrapings were then taken under sterile conditions from mu- 
cous membrane, 5 to 6 slides used in each instance. A like num- 
ber of specimens were taken from the nostrils under the same 
conditions at the same time. Smears were taken from the living 
animal by the means of small cotton swabs applied to the mucous 
membrane of the throat or nostrils. 
Smears taken from the nostrils of suspected cases and those 
that showed no clinical signs whatever, were interesting in dem- 
onstrating that at one time the bacilli were present in great num- 
bers, while at other times (intervals of one or two weeks) we 
find them few in number or wholly absent in the same animal, 
hence it would seem that too great reliance cannot be placed on 
the occurrence of bacilli in the nostrils as indicating a diseased 
animal, for in several instances bacilli were found in the secre- 
tions from the nostrils when on careful autopsy no evidences 
of tuberculosis were found. The bacilli were found to be fairly 
constant in advanced cases of pulmonary lesions where breaking 
down of tissue was a distinct feature. Coughing is rarely present 
among these animals, even in the most advanced cases, but sneez- 
ing is quite frequent even in health, and this, it seems to me, is the 
most prolific source of dissemination of the contagium. Since 
the bacilli when dried may be carried by currents of air it is 
not necessary that healthy animals should come in direct con- 
tact with the tuberculous cases to become infected. 
Without the Bacillus tuberculosis the disease cannot be con- 
tracted even by the most weakly animal, but it is equally true 
that with its presence in a building or in the body of a com- 
panion the strongest is not absolutely free from the danger of 
contagion. Notwithstanding the frequency of extensive pul- 
monary lesion, the trachea, larynx, and pharynx are seldom af- 
fected with tuberculosis in these animals. I found lesions in the 
larynx in only one instance, but in three cases discovered an 
occasional bacillus within the epithelial cells lining this organ. 
Some appeared to be in process of degeneration. The bacilli 
were never in sufficient numbers to give rise to any distinct 
lesions. Two of these cases had no lesions of tuberculosis pres- 
ent in any part of the body on examination. This fact would 
