EELATION OF PATHOGENIC TO SEPTIC BACTERIA 48 



In some instances I can see something like a thin septum 

 stretching between some of the cells and fixed to the mem- 

 brane of the common sheath, but I cannot be quite certain 

 about a septum being present between each two cells. I think 

 that the sheath of many a bacillus, be it short or long, be it a 

 straight thread or a curved one, is traversed by such septa at 

 relatively few places ; in many places it is a continuous mem- 

 branous tube in which the protoplasmic cells lie in a single 

 row. In threads in which the above-mentioned granular de- 

 generation occurs the presence of septa can be easier ascer- 

 tained than in perfect bacilli, but one must not confuse them 

 with transverse discoid debris within the tube. In some such 

 tubes it is seen that many compartments contain one cell ; others 

 contain two cubical cells or one oblong, and still others there 

 are that contain three cells, one oblong and two cubical ones. 

 In threads in which the above-mentioned nodose swelling up 

 of the cells has taken plane there are distinct signs of septa 

 between the individual cells, especially where the degeneration 

 comprises a whole row of cells. 



Comparing the Bacillus anthracis of heart's blood or 

 spleen of a mouse, guinea-pig, or rabbit, dead of the disease, 

 with the bacilli and bacillus threads grown in the cultivations 

 of neutral pork broth, or in a mixture of this and gelatine, it 

 is found that the organisms are almost twice the thickness of 

 those taken from the animal. I do not refer to the bacilli and 

 threads in which either granular degeneration or the torula- 

 like swelling of its cells or spore formation is going on, for 

 these are naturally thicker, but I refer to bacilli in which un- 

 altered protoplasm is contained within the sheath. 



Ewart (' Quarterly Journ. of Micr. Scien.,' April, 1877) 

 maintains to have observed a transition of the ordinary non- 

 moving Bacillus anthracis into flagellate-moving bacillus. 

 I can only say with reference to this, that in all my observa- 

 tions, whether conducted in test-tubes or in cell specimens, 

 there was never anything of the sort observable. Ewart took 

 no precaution whatever against contamination with other 



