38 DR. E. KLEIN. 



clear contents and in this a minute nucleus. They become 

 elongated and by fission divide into, or by gemmation produce, 

 two new spherical corpuscles. The growing ends of the 

 threads seen at the marginal part of the specimen sometimes 

 are connected with such a chain of spherical torula-like cor- 

 puscles, and in this respect the appearances bear a striking 

 resemblance to the formation of gonidia by mycelium threads. 

 This change also has nothing whatever to do with the forma- 

 tion of spores. It can be ascertained to exist always also in 

 the cultivations in pure pork broth and gelatine pork in the 

 test-tubes and flasks. In some cultivations in the neutral 

 pork broth I have met with it very extensively already after a 

 few days' incubation. With great distinctness and profusion I 

 have seen it in cultivations in gelatine pork carried on at the 

 temperature of the room. 



The observations which I have made on the life-history of 

 the Bacillus anthracis differ in some respects from those of 

 previous writers. Starting with the Bacillus anthracis of 

 the blood, introduced into the cultivations of neutral pork 

 broth or of the mixture of this broth with gelatine, it is invari- 

 ably the rule that, as noticed by other observers (Koch, Pas- 

 teur, Buchner, and others), the bacilli grow out sooner or later 

 into long homogeneous-looking threads which form bundles, 

 the individual threads coiling round one another in the manner 

 of the wires of a cable. But there are always some short 

 bacilli, or chains of them and short threads ; especially in the 

 former it is noticed in the fresh state and after staining, that 

 their ends are not so blunt as is usually represented, but that 

 they are slightly rounded ; and the same rounded appearance 

 is also noticed on the ends of the threads, which are undoubted 

 anthrax bacillus threads. In all specimens of gelatine pork 

 above described the rounded conditions of the ends of the 

 threads is easily perceived. 



In the first few days the cultivations of neutral pork broth 

 invariably show, as mentioned above, a uniform distribution of 

 shorter or longer bacilli, isolated and in chains. These gradu- 



