164 WELCKERj ON SARCINA. 



With respect to other situations in which the occurrence 

 of sarcina has been noticed, may be mentioned, in the faeces 

 and intestinal canal, by Bennett and Hasse; in cholera-stools, 

 by Wedl and Mensomdes ; in the contents of portion of 

 gangrenous strangulated intestine, by Demme ; in the bron- 

 chia, by Yirchow and Friedreich ; in the substance of the 

 lungs, by Zenker, Yirchow, and Demme; in the fluid of the 

 cerebral ventricles, but under doubtful circumstances, by 

 Jenner.* In animals, it has been found by Yirchow in the 

 stomach of the rabbit, and in that of the dog by Frerichs ; 

 whilst, more lately, Eberth has found it in the intestine of 

 the ape, and in the caecum of the common fowl, &c. 



No specific distinction has hitherto been drawn between 

 the kinds of Sarcina derived from these various localities, 

 although diversities in the size and colour of the corpuscles 

 have been incidentally noticed. 



The case in which I observed the occurrence of Sarcina in 

 the urine, was that of a medical man, forty-seven years old, 

 who had been ailing for some years, and was consequently 

 somewhat emaciated, and had lost much strength. He 

 suffered much from nervous excitability and depression of 

 spirits, and entertained a vague suspicion that he was 

 labouring under some renal affection, even before the dis- 

 covery of the sarcina in his urine. He never vomited, and 

 there was no evidence of the existence of Sarcina in the 

 stomach. 



I first examined the urine on the 1st, 2d, and 5th July, 

 1857. It was strongly acid, and very shortly after its emis- 

 sion presented, when contained in a test-tube three fourths 

 of an inch in diameter, a light-whitish cloudiness. This, 

 when the fluid was closely examined by the naked eye, by 

 transmitted light, was seen to be caused by the presence of 

 very minute grayish-white corpuscles, which microscopic 

 examination proved to be nothing but sarcina. At the end 

 of about an hour these corpuscles had subsided, and formed 

 a grayish-white, light sediment, occupying about one tenth 

 of the length of the tube. 



In the urine just passed into a perfectly clean glass, the 

 microscope detected — 



1. Very numerous specimens of sarcina. 



2. Crystals of oxalate of lime. 



* To these instances may be added two or three in which the occurrence 

 of Sarcina was noticed by ourselves in the contents of the Btomach 

 especially in one remarkable case of rupture of the diaphragm, in which the 

 stomach was forced into the left side of the thorax, and became distended 

 with an enormous quantity of brown gruinous fluid, consisting almost 

 entirely of Sarcina ventriculi. [G. B.] 



